Thanks, as always, to xkcd
We need to start asking how
3 days ago
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Monday, July 28, 2008
Would you look at that...
Analysis: US now winning Iraq war that seemed lost
From the Associated Press:
Despite the occasional bursts of violence, Iraq has reached the point where the insurgents, who once controlled whole cities, no longer have the clout to threaten the viability of the central government.Of course, it should have been apparent that things were turning around when liquor stores in Baghdad stopped getting blown up.
---
Beyond that, there is something in the air in Iraq this summer.
In Baghdad, parks are filled every weekend with families playing and picnicking with their children. That was unthinkable only a year ago, when the first, barely visible signs of a turnaround emerged.
Now a moment has arrived for the Iraqis to try to take those positive threads and weave them into a lasting stability.
''I open my store at 10 a.m. and close it at 7 p.m.,'' Dawood said. ``The security situation is much better, and I hope it becomes even better because I believe that all Iraqis are brothers and deserve to live in peace.''Compare this to a story from 2005
Mr Sabah has little competition largely because Islamic extremists now register their disapproval of alcohol by bombing his rivals' premises. The Rose, however, is unscathed, presumably because the bombers fear the proximity of US military hardware.and another from just eight months ago
But even as Iraqis begin returning to liquor stores, they still take care to remain inconspicuous. On a recent day outside a liquor store on Saadoun Street, two men with a case of Johnnie Walker in their car were removing the bottles from the brightly labeled box and stashing them under the seats and in other hiding places.Regardless of the legitimacy of this war's beginnings, regardless of your opinion of Bush, things are getting better in Iraq. I guess the mainstream media is finally realizing they can't cover it up until November 9th.
---
A construction worker and Sadr City resident, who agreed to be interviewed on the condition he not be named, told of how he was beaten last year by the Mahdi Army, the militia loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr, after his brother complained to militia members about his drinking.
Not that we're finished:
U.S. commanders say a substantial American military presence will be needed beyond 2009. But judging from the security gains that have been sustained over the first half of this year — as the Pentagon withdrew five Army brigades sent as reinforcements in 2007 — the remaining troops could be used as peacekeepers more than combatants.And it's still costing a shitload of money. What's the price for a stabilized democracy in an unstable region? How much is a military presence in the Middle East worth? More than we originally thought, but still less than the Democrats would have you believe.
Flame on, everybody. Don't disappoint me.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Oh shit...
Shockey traded to Saints
From Gambit:
Saints pick up outspoken, talented, temperamental disgruntled tight end Jeremy ShockeyAnd at nola.com:
New York’s loss is New Orleans’ gain?
---
We’ll see if donning the Black and Gold tames Shockey’s temperament and makes him more, well, gruntled.
Saints trade for Jeremy ShockeyLike jeffrey says, training camp hasn't even started.
Perhaps the Giants finally had enough of the tension created by their disgruntled star, who was reportedly pushing for the trade to New Orleans.
This could be really good or really, really, REALLY terrible.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Great, now I have to move to Kansas
Click that. You won't be sorry.
I'll be sending my moving bill to PZ Myers.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Obama, McCain to New Yorker:
"We're just as dumb as the rest of America"
Related: Poe's law escapes internet; "never going back"
Personally, I think that's pretty fucking funny.
Look at all the elements:
- burning flag
- Osama bin Laden
- Lunatic black-separatist
- Evil Muslim
- in the Oval Office
- standing on the Presidential Seal
However, in a scene that has become all too common in this country, we get this:
Obama: "tasteless and offensive"
McCain: "totally inappropriate"
What a pair of idiot pansies! Have we become so scared and stupid? Really, guys, I think you'll find your balls rolling around under the campaign bus seats. Maybe some staffer found them and put them in the overhead.
I saw on the news tonight (the NATIONAL news) some idiot saying, "Some people will take it seriously and may use it in political commercials." Yeah, we have words for those types of people: dumbass; imbecile; moron. If we didn't dumb down everything in our society in order to cater to the lowest common denominator, perhaps we wouldn't have to worry about all of those idiots thinking this is serious. I mean, come ON! The only people not offended by this are the fuckers who are being ridiculed. And that just adds to the FUCKING JOKE!
To quote Mugatu, "I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!"
From SFGate
But Art Spiegelman, the Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist and former New Yorker staffer, was baffled that much of the negative reaction to the cartoon was coming from Obama supporters on liberal blogs.What Art (Do you mind if I call you Art?) fails to realize is that the left-wing elite know that the rest of us are too stupid to get it. We need to have everything spoon-fed to us by the Nanny so we don't think too quickly and get our tummies all upset. Plus, as I've mentioned, people in Kansas don't read the New Yorker.
"They sound so elitist," Spiegelman told The Chronicle. "The essence of what they're saying is, 'I get it, but I don't trust the people in Kansas to get it.' But isn't that what the whole hope and change thing is supposed to be about? That they will get it."
McCain should have, to stay on message, said something akin to Little Green Footballs:
The cover is obviously a moonbat parody of what they think are right-wing ideas about their messiah. But they got so meta with it, they ended up wrapping around and making themselves look stupid.That's a perfect response. Just as much arrogant, snarky condescension as the cover, itself.
Obama should have said, "As bullet of mypantstheatre, a dear friend and, frankly, idol of mine, remarked, 'Personally, I think that's pretty fucking funny.'"
Or everyone could have, you know, ignored it. Like most of the country ignores every other issue of the New Yorker, which is, let's face it, a really boring magazine. Even when I was living in New York, I only read it because I felt like I had to. It never ceased to amuse me how important New Yorkers thought they were. Of course, I could hold that opinion because I wasn't one of the deluded East Coaster assholes who made living in NYC such a pain in the ass.
I'm going to have to stop. The irony levels are out of control! The ship canna take it any longer!
Is it November yet? I am so tired of this bullshit.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Midwest v. New Orleans
Surprise!
It was bound to start eventually.
Here's a good piece on the current hard-working, small-town whites > shiftless, urban blacks crap.
I'm Callin' BullshitInteresting stuff in the comments, too, such as:
There's been a recent spate of right-wing blogs all saying the same thing:
"Now, I'm not racist, but how come all those small-town Iowans are so much more supportive and self-reliant than those big city New Orleans folks were during their disaster?”
---
...it takes a special sort of blinded gall to ignore Iowans getting reimbursed almost entirely for their damages and then complain that Katrina victims are sucking on the government teat...
---
Of course, Iowans are a lot more likely to receive giant agricultural subsidies, but I understand that accepting such money does not in any way make you less self-reliant or salt-of-the-earth.
I’m not sure why the right-wing pundits are crowing about Iowa. We have a Democrat governor and a Democrat majority in our state congress, plus the majority of our national congressmen are Democrats.This would be funny if it wasn't so fucking infuriating. Check out the actual blogs he links in the post.
Thanks to the Mighty God King.
Monday, June 23, 2008
George Carlin... dead
I've always been fond of saying that comedians are the prophets of our age. Among them, George Carlin was the greatest.
I started listening to him when I was 13 - A Place for My Stuff. With the volume so low we could barely hear it, my cousin and I tried as hard as we could to keep our laughter quiet so we wouldn't get caught listening to dirty jokes. We were rarely successful. Later in life, he taught me so many things: That it was the absurdities of life that made it both intolerable and interesting. That outrageous statements and behavior were ok. That I didn't have to think or speak like everyone else. That social mores are arbitrary and ridiculous. The joy of fucking with the English language and that words were more important than almost everything else. That intelligence is more important than compassion. I can't credit (or blame) him with my liberal use of dirty words, but he was obviously an influence.
He's also the reason I don't have a tattoo, reminding me on one of his specials that they can be used for positive identification.
Some of my favorites:
(apologies for the paraphrasing)
My very favorite, since the first time I ever listened to him:Ratshit! Batshit! Dirty old twat!
Exactly.
Sixty-nine assholes tied in a knot!
Hurray, lizard shit!
Fuck!
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Attitude Adjustment
With all the attitude I've been spewing all over the 'tubes the last few days, this struck me as an appropriate addition:
Once again, thanks to xkcd
Friday, June 20, 2008
More on the Midwest Floods
The guys over at Humid City have been doing this a lot longer than I have and say it better than I could:
stop me if you’ve heard this one before
Yes, please do stop me if you’ve heard this one before. Because the punch line stinks.
For those who lined up to laugh at and mock the people of New Orleans for their “stupidity”... – can you really look at what happened in Iowa and still believe all or any of that heartless bullshit you threw at us? Wouldn’t it be more productive to simply take a massive crap in your own hat?
The common thread here isn’t in the unpredictability of Mother Nature. The common thread is the bad, incomplete, poorly designed, poorly implemented, and badly kept structures brought to you by our own Army Corps of Engineers. And the jackasses in Congress, in the Senate, and in the White House who refuse again and again to give money back to taxpayers in the form they need it most; towards the basic protection of American citizens in their own homes.
Be sure to check this one out, as well:
YOU’RE F**KING KIDDING ME, RIGHT?
Read all about President George W. Bush, going to Iowa after the devastating floods, saying he’s headed there “with the lessons I learned from Katrina.”
I would have used a lot more "fuck". So if you feel fucked out of your usual fucks, here you go: Fucking fuckity fuck.
Again thanks to Louis Maistros and Lord David over at Humid City.
Who needs science?
Ah, Louisiana...
Well, the ridiculous SB 733 - "The Louisiana Destruction of Science Education Act" passed all the way through both chambers, with a total of THREE votes against it. I am extremely disappointed with those I thought were above this sort of thing. I'm looking directly at you, Messrs Donahue, Lafleur and Lafonta.
It now moves on to Governor PBJ, who is certain to sign it because: a)It's obviously veto proof and he knows it. Why piss off the Christians for no purpose? b)He's a total pandering jackass when it comes to religion. I hope he does the right thing, but I've pretty much given up on this.
I guess I'll just wait until Tangipahoa tries to use it and Americans United, the ACLU and the FFRF jump on them with both feet. I hope it hurts. I'll need a heads up before the protests, OK guys?
Bigger voices than mine are in this fight already, and I don't have the energy for it. We are so ignorant that we deserve what we get.
Case in point:
BR man arrested, accused of having sex with his dog While attempting to serve a warrant to a 46-year-old sex offender Wednesday, U.S. marshals stumbled upon the man having sex with one of his dogs in his backyard, an affidavit says.
---
Chaney, clad in only a white T-shirt and black slippers, was standing in front of a chair where a brown and white dog was standing, the affidavit says. Marshals observed Chaney try to penetrate the dog several different ways.
This was in the PAPER!! Now I know you're all thinking, "But, what, bullet, is one to do as an illit'rate resident of Loosiana (as if there's any other kind) who cain't read dem papers?"
Never fear, it was also on the NEWS!
Just kill me now.
Props to BigEZBear for the dog fucker links. Picture from Looking for Group.
On the Midwest Floods
"They all told us, `The levees are good...' "
From the AP on AOL: Midwest Flood Victims Feel Misled.
Same story, different headline in Idaho:
Flooded-out homeowners in the Midwest say FEMA gave them a false sense of security
I feel for these people. I really, really do. This is so much bigger than the New Orleans flood. New Orleans was (mostly) flooded by a lake - 15 feet and then done. Rivers never stop. I will help in the only way I can, if I can, by donating to the Red Cross. But I have to ask:Juli Parks didn't worry when water began creeping up the levee that shields this town of about 750 from the Mississippi River - not even when volunteers began piling on sandbags.
After all, local officials had assured townspeople in 1999 that the levee was sturdy enough to withstand a historic flood, and FEMA had agreed. In fact, some relieved homeowners dropped their flood insurance, and others applied for permits to build new houses and businesses.
<-snip->
"They all told us, `The levees are good. You can go ahead and build,"' said Parks, who did not buy flood coverage because her bank no longer required it. "We had so much confidence in those levees."
Where the hell have you people been? Did you not pay any attention 3 years ago? Since? Maybe you should have.Maybe people will pay attention this time. If the majority of the country had actually cared about New Orleans for more than a few news cycles, this might have been prevented or at least mitigated.
Blame this on FEMA and the Corps of Engineers and the Federal Government (not just Bush). It's justified. Their levees leave a lot to be desired. But levee or no, you should have had insurance. Flood insurance is the cheapest protection you'll ever buy. Unless you live on a mountain or in the desert, you should have it. After all that happened down here, putting your faith in the CoE is just stupid.
I wonder how many of you have said in the last three years anything to the effect of "Why can't those people in Louisiana get it together?" "Why are they taking my money to rebuild?" "It's just going to happen again." "People shouldn't live there." Wait till everyone starts saying it about you.
Wait till you have to deal with the tragic bureaucratic disaster that is FEMA. Hope you like formaldehyde. And I wonder how many people are going to defraud the government this time around. I'll be sure to be just as shocked and angry as you were. For those that did have insurance, wait till your insurance companies try to screw you over, falsify engineering reports, try to trick you into giving up your coverage. And in the end, watch as the money you were promised, the help you desperately need, just sits and sits and sits in Washington and then is frittered away in "overhead" by the people who are supposed to be helping you.
I guess then you'll understand. But "they" still won't.
Like I said, I feel for these people. My heart breaks for them. We know exactly what they're feeling now and we know what they face on the horrible road ahead. If I sound bitter, though, it's because I am.
Everyone needs to pay attention. For a long time. Until it's fixed.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
I love the internet
I've been having a really crappy couple of days. I know exactly why. I ran out of medicine on Monday and kept forgetting to get it refilled. 2 days with no meds = instant depression. Then I'm really irritable for a couple of days after I get started back up, so today hasn't been really peachy either.
Then I came across this on Penny Arcade:
I would love to know what sick bastard at Kellogs came up with this genius idea. I just spent the first three years of my sons life trying to get him not to eat blocks, and now you're telling him they taste like fucking strawberries. Thanks a lot assholes.
And then this, courtesy of the coolest seven-year-old blogger around
I feel a whole hell of a lot better.
Monday, June 16, 2008
With a cherry on top.
(why do we even bother?)
Some of the readers here probably remember JP. He came to atheism as an ex-Catholic by way of various Protestant experiments, just trying to figure everything out. Most atheists have made a similar journey and a great many people tried to help him with it. Now he's gone back to the Catholic Church. I thought perhaps his time trying to sort out belief vs. non-belief would have given him more insight into the thinking of non-believers that he could now convey to his brethren. Maybe dispel some misconceptions. So I stuck around. Made comments here and there. Shared his frustrations.
And this is what I get for my trouble. Indeed, what we all get for our efforts to help this man.
Here is how I see atheism: Imagine, if you will, a big pile of dog feces. On top of it, you see whip cream with a long stemmed cherry. From a distance it might look pretty good but the closer you get to it, you realize it stinks and it's misleading. That is atheism.
What I hold to be true is a pile of dog shit. With a cherry on top.
Thanks, JP. It seems your journey back to ignorant and superstitious bigotry is now complete.
Have fun.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Memorial Day - a different perspective
For another example of how technology is totally changing the world and how we interact and relate to each other go check out Sanya Weathers' take on Memorial Day over at Eating Bees. It's a gaming blog, as Sanya was the Community Director for DAOC and now for GuildCafe and was blogging about MMOs before the term "blog" existed. So though the comments might be a little impenetrable for some, one can't help but understand this:
...I crossed off names with a yellow highlighter when Johnny and Jane came marching home or at least back to a place with air conditioning and internet access hurrah, hurrah.Regardless of your thoughts on the war (and please don't use the comments to discuss it), I'd like to remember this Memorial Day that people who are "just playing a game" have a great impact on each other's lives and that the loss of a member of a "virtual community" hurts, too.
Sometimes I used a black marker. Not often. But enough.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
On getting old(er)
I often tell my wife, "The fact that I'm not as old as I'm going to get in no way mitigates the fact that I am already old." Sort of. I usually don't use words like "mitigate" with my wife because she laughs at me and then corrects my grammar. The point, however, stands.
At Voodoo Fest in October, I was with some friends waiting for Rage Against the Machine to take the stage when the following was shouted by one of them:
"I don't want to sound like an old man, here, but this little girl next to me is mad at me because I'm standing on her pants. Are you fucking kidding me?! Standing on your pants?! What the fuck is wrong with you?"I had to agree, especially since a guy next to me had just asked me rather politely if I could step off of his pants and I was happy to be able to properly ridicule the idea without directing it at him.
I found myself in a similar "I don't want to sound old, ..." situation tonight at the movies. (More after the break)
First off, let me say that I hate text messages or "texting". It is a thoroughly ridiculous and inefficient method of communication. I understand its advantages and use it (sparingly) in situations in which more conventional forms of communication (like shouting across the room)are rude and/or inconvenient. The middle of a major hurricane is one of those situations in which text messages are invaluable, if still distasteful. I'm not anti-technology, I just dislike this particular medium.
The kid next to my wife and I would not stop texting through the entire movie. What's the big deal, right? If he had been using a regular phone, maybe it wouldn't be. But he had one of those big do-everything-but-jack-you-off phones with a huge screen that was distractingly bright. We're not in your fucking living room, dude! Watch the fucking movie! He finally stopped when my wife leaned over and started reading over his shoulder. I was so proud.
When the movie was over, I saw upwards of ten kids ranging from 13 to 17 years old pick up their phones and start texting as they were walking out of the theater! Hadn't even gotten down the aisle. Please stop telling(?) Mary Sue Bob whatever drivel is passing through your under-developed noggin long enough to avoid stepping on my fucking feet. And dude, I understand and admire the dexterity involved in simultaneously texting and taking a piss, but just disconnect for crying out loud! At the very least, it's unsanitary. Yeah, you won't be laughing when you get gonorrhea of the face.
I know, I know. My parents didn't understand why I had to have music drowning out the world all the time and these kids will have children and not understand the constant need of the hive-mind buzzing in their brains. I just wish it didn't make me feel so old.
BTW, the new Indiana Jones totally rocks.
UPDATE 5-26: Apparently, the Russians are pissed off about Indiana Jones, which is off topic, but fucking funny. Thanks to Broken Toys for the link.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Big Brother Jam
You are the witness of change
And to counteract
We gotta take the power back
From Rolling Stone, apparently Big Brother Is Producing Your Rock Video!
...the rockers performed in front of several of the city’s 200,000 CCTV cameras and then used something like the Freedom of Information Act to acquire their footage...Gaming the System.
Social Hacking.
Culture Jamming.
Whatever you want to call it, it's cool.
Props for the discovery go to jeffrey over at Library Chronicles.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
A glimmer...
Tonight, at my cousin's high school graduation, I heard something that gave me a little hope for our current faith/science problems.
My cousin goes to an all-boys Catholic high school in Baton Rouge. The Bishop of Baton Rouge was officiating the mass. This is the same bishop that, 16 years and two weeks ago, got drunk with me and my friends in a bar we rented after our all-boys Catholic high school graduation in New Orleans. (Stop it. We had girls there, too.) He was just a lowly auxiliary bishop back then, not the full-fledged head of a major Diocese that he is now.
During the homily, he brings up the Hubble telescope and the wonders of the universe and, of course, how God made all of that and he also made us and isn't all of that so wonderful. In the middle of it all, he says that "scientists" (you all know those guys, right) say that not only is the universe 13 billion years old but one can see the beginnings of the universe through the Hubble.
He attributes it all to the Glory of God(c), of course. Still, in a time when even the most powerful Christian on Earth, the leader of hundreds of millions of Catholics, is giving legitimacy to the ridiculous notion of "Intelligent Design," a bishop down here in Protestant-gutted Louisiana (especially Baton Rouge - don't even get me started) is talking up science to a room full of conservative Christians. Mostly Catholics, but still.
It's something.
Friday, May 16, 2008
Art for art's sake?
This is ridiculously incredible.
Don't ask, just go.
MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Logic is Not the Opposite of Faith
If you’ve taken the time to spy any chunk of ideas I’ve written about, it’ll probably come as no surprise that I am very into the strictures of debate, even the lesser frequented unwritten rules of plain discussion. Yes, my wife hates me. Points of order are easy complaints for me to make, as so many believe their own utterances to be expressed in a debate-worthy fashion when, in truth, many are just blathering intellectually without any steerage. Kind of like this paragraph!
This does not mean, however, that every discussion is a formal debate or that I expect hard core forensics to be applied to a friendly, verbal tête-à -tête. Sure, it would be nice, but I cannot, myself, maintain that infinitive level of focus. (One must always leave time to watch Star Trek.) So, a number of family members have seized varying occasions to ask me, “What tactic crops up most frequently without ever actually leading to debate?” Hands down, that would be the idea that logic is the opposite of faith. It deserves debate, but persistently comes from people who don’t know how.
While no one has ever said to me, outright, that logic is the opposite of faith, the notion creeps into and through plenty of discussions as if it is a given. A completely viable thinker can stand right there, ask you your reasons, listen to the dissertation of logical proofs you offer up as the very definition of REASON itself, and then counter confidently with, “Sounds like you have to give it up to God, “ or some non-sense about the great mystery. The problem is not that folks believe in such blueprints to the universe, it is simply that they’ve impacted nothing for the sake of the discussion. They’ve neither proved nor disproved, agreed nor disagreed, helped nor hurt the conversation. They’ve made the time you’ve taken to explain yourself, time wasted. It is little different from taking a half hour to describe your ground-breaking research on Project Blue Book, by request, only to have the requester respond with, “I hear the barley crop is in for a harsh season.” You might as well have been talking to the Wailing Wall.
While I’ve no doubt that the idea of logic as the “opposite” of faith began with logicians who recognized illogic in the manners that some people had chosen to express their beliefs, this wordplay now seems to get more often insinuated into conversation by the blind believer. It is used as a tool. It is meant to puncture a hole in any logical argument regardless of the subject matter or content. It’s treated as a trump card. By claiming that logic is the opposite of faith and thereafter claiming that you are a faithful person, it gives flimsy license to simply discount everything another person has said, baselessly. Its use smacks lightly of a child in the terrible twos.
“By comparing every layer of the Earth’s crust in reverse order, taking particular note of the fossils therein, we can see the slow and gradual changes that are the hallmarks of evolution.”
“Nope.”
“If you said you were going to clean the car on Friday and thereafter promised that you were going to clean the car on Friday and then you spent Thursday through Sunday as a vomiting drunkard in Tijuana, what you told me was untrue.”
“Nope.”
I suppose it’s natural to want a universal trump card. If you believe in whatever humanly frail configuration your own personal card presents in conversation, such eliminates a lot of petty annoyance, tons of conflict, and the need for anything mentally challenging on the spot. (Please read Idiocracy.) The problem with this particular zinger, the presumption that logic is the opposite of faith, is that it is not factual. Logic is not the opposite of faith. In fact, if one is truly faithful, s/he MUST embrace logic. We’ll get to that.
Logic is not the opposite of faith for a great many reasons. Among them, this Layperson’s List:
1) There are no universal opposites.
2) Logic exists as a part of “creation” and, if God exists, logic is therefore a gift from God.
3) Logic and faith are not mutually exclusive…they overlap.
The first entry on my Layperson’s List, “there are no universal opposites,” may sound highly philosophical, (meaning, of course, boring), but in actuality it is a simple misunderstanding about how we use the concept of opposites (and yes, still boring). This “opposites” concept is generally defined as “the one thing that is most unlike a given thing,” and is tainted immature in its over-application.
I touched briefly upon this misunderstanding in my piece Fun with Stereotypes, Generalizations, and Profiling when I wrote, “Philosophy 101…Students are asked to think back to the beginnings of civilization [language] and list ideas that might have been perceived as basic, universal opposites. Inevitably, through common sense, students list right and wrong, light and dark, on and off, good and evil, man and woman, yes and no, happy and sad, and other appropriate notions. The problem with the structure of supposed universal opposites is the result. Woman is somehow placed on a list with wrong, dark, evil, no, off, and sad. This is the very tender root of association as used, even by accident, for prejudicial effect.”
The illustration is an intriguing one, mostly because reading between the lines brings something to light…antonyms are a function of language, opposites are a function of thought. Neither is a function of physical reality. You see, a man is the antonym or “opposite” of a woman in word alone, not in his physical being. This is difficult for us to accept. In plain conversation it is very easy to overlook the fact that the WORD “apple” has nothing to do with a physical apple. The WORD apple helps us communicate the IDEA of an apple, even if an apple is not present in the room to point at. Two people on the phone, one saying “apple” and one hearing “apple” both share a similar IDEA as to what the conversation is about. What they CALLED that idea, however, would never alter, impact, or otherwise affect an actual piece of fruit in a bowl. An apple, by any other name, is still whatever it is. “A rose, by any other name would smell as sweet.”
So, the WORD “man” is shown as antonym to the WORD “woman” because the language is thereby limiting the context of the communication to a DUALITY of sexes. Outside of that context (that supposed duality) might be the fact that nearly 9 percent of all newborns in the U.S.A. are born gender non-specific or the fact that “man” and “woman” are really talking about roles while “male” and “female” talk about gender. Regardless, using antonyms is a tool that limits the context to only an idealistic duality when a physical duality does not exist. Hence phrases claiming, “It’s like comparing apples to oranges,” or “What goes up, must come down.”
Let us not confuse that linguistic tool, those antonyms, those words, with limited perceptions or thoughts somehow invoking physical opposites. Let us not allow the useful existence of antonyms, antonyms that limit a context, to drive us to believe that there is never a greater context and therefore no more to understand than A is magically opposite of B.
Opposites, as a function of thought, are susceptible to all the pitfalls of subjectivity like any other idea. Hubris is one of these pitfalls, the egotistical notion that we can take a function of thought and manifest it as physical reality in order to discuss it as a fact. (Weird Science) We cannot.
See, opposites, as thoughts, are necessary. In early childhood development, the use of opposites is a teaching tool that allows us to assimilate knowledge when we are still pooping pants. Saying that one thing is MOST unlike another thing teaches us how to reason. It teaches us how to recognize differences and eventually how to assimilate and to categorize those differences. An infant might learn to recognize a cartoon picture of a dog as a dog, but then most immediately calls anything with four legs and a tail a dog. By staying on and teaching the child that the cartoon on the next page is NOT a dog, but a cat, the baby eventually recognizes those differences and can pick between both animals. As well, those two images are so basic in the U.S.A., that the child somehow learns that a dog is the opposite of a cat. That’s great for learning, but we forget once older that, in fact, a dog is not the opposite of a cat. If “opposite” is tasked to be the object most unlike the given, well doesn’t a cat have a lot more in common with a dog than, say, a Twinkie or deep space or anti-matter? Who is to say which thing is truly MOST UNLIKE another? In the same way, “day” has more in common with “night” than it does with a bologna sandwich, “up” more in common with “down” than with pencil shavings, and “order” more in common with “chaos” than a fictional character in an unpublished manuscript who has a propensity for wearing chaps.
“Opposite” is a reasoning tool. It allows us to visualize one thing, and then, with no further input, visualize a new idea perceivably 180 degrees out from the original. We then label that second idea with a name. Anti-Christ, Bizarro, Evil Spock, they are all anthropomorphizations of this mental practice. They amuse us. “Dude, those jeans have so many holes in them, they’re like the anti-pants!” Meanwhile, our amusements overlook the same practice in everyday conversation.
“Unnatural” sounds like an opposite, it sounds like anything “not natural,” but then what is “supernatural” and how does it play into the relationship of such ideas? “Abnormal” sounds like anything “not normal” and then has the same problem with the concept of “paranormal.” If “alive” is truly the opposite of “dead,” then how can we even conceptualize fictions dealing with the “undead” or loosely related existential matters? If “love” is the true opposite of “hate,” bereft of any similarity or convergence, then a “love/hate” relationship could never exist, except among the happily schizophrenic. Come on people, pencil is not the opposite of pen, pencil is not the opposite of paper, pencil is not the opposite of eraser. If a pencil could exhibit some physical property defining it as opposite to any of these three, we could never discuss the remaining two in an “opposites” context without getting tossed in a loony bin. Yet we do discuss them. We discuss all three. Almost everybody has used pencil as the opposite of all three of these in discussion. Such proves that the practice is dependent upon shifting ideas, momentary opinions, convenient retorts, a simple call to meet an isolated conversation’s need. The practice is not, and will NEVER be what many speakers claim. They claim the “opposite” attribute to be a self-evident truth, a physical reality, a given, and state that they are merely acknowledging that “fact” before spurring the conversation on. Wrong! That’s faulty foundation.
Opposites, as tools, have their place in helping us make a point, but they are never a given nor the point themselves. We build our point in conversation the way we built our mental prowess from those early childhood beginnings and so it is no wonder that opposites are part of byplay. However, they cannot be the result of that disagreement, only one tool in arriving there. I can easily say, “The rough draft of your essay was INCOMPREHINSIBLE,” in order to illustrate through hyperbola how poorly a piece has been put together. Yet, as bad as that piece may be, “incomprehensible” is a stretch. Incomprehensibility would more literally dictate that it was in code, in alien symbols and, perhaps, somehow written fourth dimensionally. The opposite of comprehensible is used for the sake of exaggeration. Notice, though, that this could not be the point of the conversation. You should never hear a speech leading up to, “In conclusion, your essay is incomprehensible,” unless, of course, the essay IS written in code, in alien symbols, and somehow fourth dimensionally. The real life conclusion will always be something other than that. It will be, “So, I insist that you write this again,” or, “So, you’ve failed the assignment,” or, “You are going to have to look for a literary agent with a death wish before you can get this published!” There is no closure in a debate that ends on a note of opposites as absolute.
Heady? Yes, perhaps. Still, that’s a veritable litany of reasons as to why opposites of any kind are a misused construct in conversation. Opposites falsely group terms together that do not belong (i.e. women and evil). Opposites are treated as antonyms with no limit to context, a backwards process that attempts to take a word’s functional status and force it into being a physical reality. Opposites are a teaching tool for immature minds, one that must be outgrown if one is to partake in adult conversation. And, in the end, opposites are never the point, never the conclusion.
These misuses in our generation are taking place in countless households to innumerable volumes. How often have you heard assertions like,
“That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever,”
followed by,
“You’re wrong! It makes complete sense!”
We’ll call these speakers Phil and Norma, respectively. Their tiff is just one example that simultaneously fails multiple rigors of debate as well as the intent of plain discussion to reach agreement, all through simple misuse of an opposite.
First, Norma’s retort presumes itself to be the point, as if just mentioning an opposite wins an argument. It does not. Whatever the point is, Norma has clearly missed it.
Second, though the two statements seem related because they use similar words, Norma has actually gone completely off-topic. When Phil presents the subject matter as a flawed train-of-thought, that suspect repartee is now the pith of the disagreement, the new content. Norma is beholden to address the subject matter directly. Instead, in this case, Norma says the one thing she anticipates will allow her to AVOID addressing any part of the statement. It’s not unlike Ann asking what Tully’s financial plan is to pay off credit card debt and Tully responding with, “I see no reason to help pay down our debt when you refuse to cook dinner all the time.” Sorry Tully. We are linear beings. We are subject to a force of nature called chronology. Ann asked her question first and deserves to have it addressed first. Phil brought the suspect train-of-thought to light first and deserves to have it addressed by Norma immediately thereafter. Save the other things you wish to discuss for later. The other things may be valid concerns, but they are not valid arguments when unrelated to the most immediate topic.
Third, there’s more to life, more to this context, than a perfect duality of sense and nonsense. These are antonyms, not universal opposites. As illustrated before, “sense” has more in common with “nonsense” than it does with marzipan or the voice-over direction in FernGully. Logical sense exists. Philosophical sense exists. We all know the literary dichotomy struck between sense and sensibility. Emotions are a part of making sense of things. Cultural differences lend interpretation to sense. Ethic is a biting factor in sense. Thomas Paine separated out common sense from all other sense. Sense has components, layers. Therefore, when Phil claims that something does not make sense, it is a call for Norma to compile all such applicable building blocks to restate and to support her premise. He demands explanation. It’s a dare of sorts, knowing that if Norma cannot, she fails her point. Well, stating an opposite does none of this. It’s just as much a failure as if Norma had clammed up and said nothing. In fact it is additionally a failure in that she’s both failed her point and falsely presumed that somehow she made a valid one. Enacting this assumed reversal is actually less meaningful than if she’d said nothing. You go girl!
So, logic and faith cannot fit some conversational mold as universal opposites simply because universal opposites do not exist. Even if one wishes to compare them via this structure, one is attacking the issue from a very childlike standpoint. That might be useful to start a dialogue, feel out your listener, but if you do not therein elevate the discussion by more mature means you are simply taking the standpoint of a mentally challenged four year old. A more mature debater would realize that a more proper antonym to logic is illogic. A more proper antonym to faith is skepticism. If logic and faith are polar concepts, then their antonyms should be as well. Yet, skepticism and illogic are not treated in this way. Skeptics can be logical and can be illogical. Persons failing logic can be secular skeptics and can be faith-driven. Skepticism and illogic overlap. They meet up in areas and remain apart in others. Therefore, if the antonyms are not polar, the chosen words are not polar, not opposites.
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The number two item on the Layperson’s List of reasons that logic is not the opposite of faith reads, “Logic exists as a part of ‘creation’ and, if God exists, logic is therefore a gift from God.”
I’ve always taken great offense at the implication that my simple ability to add five plus five is somehow directly influenced by Satan. “The heresy of numeracy!” Again, nobody ever actually picketed my calculus class nor did the devil himself ever bubble up in a fiery din whilst I hashed out a neat little truth table. It does seem, however, that when one gets on the specific subject of faith one is frequently asked to completely forego math, physics, and any critical reasoning skill in order to accept what another person shares at face value. It seems I am frequently put in the position of being asked, advised, or ordered to “let go.” There is merit in the act of “letting go” of course, but I am specifically talking about those who ask me to “let go” of cold, hard facts. Are not those cold, hard facts also a part of the existence in existentialism, part of the pattern in the multiverse that God designed? If I can do as you ask and let go of all quantum principal in order to understand your take on God, cannot you let go of religious staples in order to discuss another possibility? Letting go is meant to be applied to uninformed opinions. Letting go helps shed material possessions toward a happier, Walden life. It removes anger. It helps us move beyond the loss of a loved one or get over a substance addiction (in my case, bad tacos). It helps us accept defeat in order to fight again another day. Letting go is at one time a coping skill, a metaphysical practice, the foundation of peace, a test of maturity, a facing of fears, strength, and yes, a leap of faith. Given all its many flavors, it is even easy to understand why so many folks swear by it to such an exclusive degree. After all, in practice, the technique is said to lead one to realize just how things matter, how ideas stack up. Why is it, then, that “letting go” is so frequently used to inform me of what supposedly doesn’t matter. Happiness matters. Coping matters. Maturity matters. Faith matters. However things stack, doesn’t that mean that math matters and logic matters and the process of elimination matters? Yet, the clockwork of so many orations urges me to reject curtain number one in order to choose between curtains two and three. Hello? Monty? I’m willing to take that journey with you, but tell me why first. Presume you know something I don’t. Presume God has spoken to you directly and that you are strapped with the burden of explaining that wonder to a person completely out-of-the-know. You are going to have to start the explanation speaking in my terms in order that I should understand and come to share that newer knowledge with you. This means telling me why curtain number one (logic) is off-limits BEFORE we can go any further. “Letting go” CAN be alternatively accomplished by thoroughly accounting for the ideas that are to be rejected. I need not come to spiritual balance ONLY through leaps of faith. Perhaps I want my faith to be an informed one. If there is such a higher view to be achieved, one drawn from omnipotence or everpresence, its truth will reverberate down into the “lesser” things of this world and thereby make valid my desire to discuss them, negating your desire to ignore them.
Still, the offense I’ve taken in this radical supposition that my yearning for checkmate is a call to Beelzebub, doesn’t actually come from ridiculous notions like Satan loves Texas Instruments. My consternation more readily hails from the fact that this assertion discounts God’s presence, usually a discounting by the God believer. Given my values, folks may find it hard to swallow that I do believe in God. I MIGHT even go so far as to say that, while logically, I have no idea what that God looks like, how s/he is to be treated, or what form our interrelationship is supposed to take, there is the remote possibility (one in infinity) that the body of religious philosophies presented us might accidentally be correct, or might accidentally have one passage or two that is correct. I’m insulted by the hypocrisy in the assertion, not the assertion itself. If Satan wants to live in my underwear drawer, let him. It’ll make my life a hell of a lot more interesting than anyone else’s. But don’t come to me and tell me that God made [hu]man in his own image while part of that image, the basic ability to reason, is concurrently suspect. Don’t present reason, even reason used to discount the existence of any god, as a temptation outside of the body that need not be experienced. In order to conceptualize, to “know of” a god at all, one requires the basic ability to reason. Reason is not a choice. Reason is part of the definition of that “image,” it is plainly what separates humans from animals. It is a part of me to no more varying degree of difference than my leg, my arm, my personality, or my capacity for love…all treated as divine gifts by the way. If there is a God, s/he would WANT me to use my logic, WANT me to take full advantage of my divine gifts. Logic, and the mathematics it spawns, are not a work of the devil. To say so is to disavow the god who "sent" you.
Some very basic examination backs this up. By claiming that my logical discourse in debating you is some temptation from Satan or from tricky free-will in a materialistic world, you are submitting that logic is not part of the divine image in which you assert me to have been made. Therefore, either God did not have logic to give or God had it and purposely withheld it. Let’s examine those two possibilities while you try to convince me to “let go” of reason.
If s/he divinely withheld logic, then I do not have it and therefore you cannot ask me to forego it or let it go. I cannot let go of something I do not possess in the first place. My statements would be no more or less important than yours and must then be treated as such without subtraction. Further if s/he again divinely withheld it, then if I obtain it and use it, I am being Godly or God-like and you shant argue with me. Kowtow.
On the other hand, if God didn’t have logic to give, then s/he is completely illogical. This would be a very ironic construct, given that we usually attribute a massively chaotic state to hell and not heavenly dwellings. Irony aside, an illogical being defies explanation. You would have no way to discuss such an entity, no way to sell it. You’d have nothing to say. Whatever words in whatever order you’d attribute the attempt to illuminate the listener would be words classified as incorrect before even leaving your mouth. Essentially, this scenario beckons you to stuff a sock in it and shut the heaven up!
Well, religiously faithful persons cite neither of these scenarios. They do not refrain from speaking on the subject and do not treat my conversation as God-like. They do not present God as illogical nor treat my argument as equal to their own. So, in these practices, they are acknowledging logic as part of their definition of the divine. They must accept my grounds AND use similar anglings to justify their own beliefs. To be truly faithful, one must embrace logic.
All tolled, whatever shape the possibility of a divine plane or omnipotent entity might take, logic is going to be a part of it, a building block, a theme. With those kinds of pillars shoring up the vastness of creation, humans partaking in logic would be partaking in something far larger than the self, far larger than even all perceived reality and imagination. Humans exercising logic in a simple, every day conversation would be echoing a key element that permeates all which lies behind the veil of this world and the next and the next and the next. Mind you, a great many other human actions would likely also be a part of this theme. Emotion, life force, honor, valor, deeds, work, originality, talent, name your pick. I can easily make the same claim about almost anything people put on a pedestal. The point is not to escalate logic to some tensile strength that girds the structure of the unknown, but to say that it is undoubtedly one of the contoured chits in the jigsaw. We cannot aggrandize select divine morsels while sacking their counterparts.
Look, Jesus knew and used math. He didn’t just have some rudimentary understanding of math that might barely rival my computer illiterate father trying desperately to buy a broken Swatch on eBay. He was a carpenter. He lived with the complexities of practical math in the forefront of his mind, at the tip of his tongue and writ with his own meaty hand every single day. Wood was an enormous commodity. Math assured one that s/he got the designs correct prior to the first cut. Math would have been a large portion of his conversations and therefore his relationship with his “Earthly” father. Sure, if Jesus was somehow God or son of God or prophet of God, he may have known way back then the deepest fractal anomalies and cosmic string proofs. Putting together a goofy goat yoke for his neighbor wouldn’t have been much of a challenge. Yet, he didn’t miracle his wares into being. Poof! A quilt rack! Poof! A scroll shelf! If he did, we would have certainly read about it in Crap Not Edited from the Bible Weekly. He built them with bare hands and used plain logic to do it. If he didn’t exist, he didn’t exist. If he was just a guy, he was just a guy. But, if he was God, it is important to take note that he didn’t forego the math. He didn’t treat simple, human logic as something beneath him. He used it. He partook and did so in the positive. He achieved with it, worked with it, and to a certain degree exhibited faith in it. Jesus could be completely made up, but employing logic would still be a Christ-like endeavor.
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This brings us to the last entry on our Layperson’s List of why logic is not the opposite of faith, one that was described as “Logic and faith are not mutually exclusive…they overlap.”
Sum up all known logic, if you will, to be represented by a circle. Do the same, then, with faith. Draw it out, if it helps, just two circles on a piece of paper. Now, how do you place those circles, those rings on a page? If you are asserting that logic and faith are opposites, and you are my four year old nephew, you’d probably place them at the farthest corners from each other, never to intersect.
Or, perhaps, if you eat organic consume and wear a dress made of hemp you’d draw one ring on one side of your paper and another ring on the “back.” 
A few Real Genius Lazlos will make two separate pieces of paper and rush them via AMC Pacer to trash receptacles in New York and L.A. 
And, there’s always the defeatist simpleton on a high horse, usually with a three times life size bust of Heidegger mounted over his bed, who will simply refuse to draw either circle, claiming that sketching them out implies a relationship between the two and since they are “opposites” they have absolutely no relationship. Wow, kids! Isn’t drawing fun? Mmmmmm, glue. 
Regardless of how lofty an approach one takes in this penciled exercise, illustrating how s/he perceives logic and faith to be opposites, the results are all the same. Each of these examples overtly claims that the sketcher cannot think of, cite, or even imagine a single, solitary instance in all of life and creation wherein logic and faith might conjoin. See, the crux here is not whether logic and faith as nouns ever truly overlay, one on the other, but rather the implication that the asserting individual cannot even THINK of a way in which the two MIGHT sync up. Ergo, if I CAN think of one way they might, and you cannot, I know more about them than you do and you must take the subservient position of the novice in the debate. If I can think of two ways they might overlap, your backseat would be all the more necessary. If I can think of one or two ways they DO sync up, that’s even deeper a reflection of my superior knowledge, etc. You can draw circles until you are blue in the face, plotting them out on all sorts of pages forcing them as far apart as you wish. You are simply making a model of your belief. What you fail to realize, however, is the brittleness of that model, the sheer fragility of that particular belief. It’s a belief, as represented on paper, that is so fragile, I do not need a proof to discount it. I need no facts, no studies, no surveys. I need no experts, no philosophers, no clerics. All I need to completely shatter that particular assertion is to MAKE-UP a single way in which logic and faith MIGHT be concurrent, and your models are completely defunct, confuted. Put simply, I can visualize all of your options….plus one. I can perceive logic and faith to be at least this… 
…if not this 
… if not every permutation of this. 
If you cannot perceive it, you know less and I win. If you can perceive it, even just after I show it to you for the first time, you acknowledge instances in which the two can overlap, thereby disacknowledging the assertion that the two are opposites at all.
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So, to recap, there are no universal opposites. Do not claim, then, that logic and faith are opposites and treat your claim as a given, unless you’re bucking for village idiot. Logic is a part of creation, and if you believe creation to be supernaturally sourced, then logic, like faith, is an important measure in understanding that supernature. It should be given quarter in all discussions on faith, lest you soundeth quite dumb. Logic and faith are not islands. No more can you separate out logic from faith than you can faith from the many facets of living you wish it to guide. They interrelate. They cross-compliment. You may choose to pick portions of each realm which do not overlap for the sake of discussion, but by all means do not fail to acknowledge the other manners in which they do, or you go to the grave as blank as you came from the womb.
For my part, logic is not meant to explain the unknown. Rather it is used to explain the newly known. Faith, by comparison, is meant to carry through an element of truth uttered in something very old and make it applicable present day. As systems of thought, perhaps even as aspects of the human soul, these two foci are too often pit against one another in discussion, presumed at cross-purposes and treated like weapons. Instead, I feel they are each a differently functional environment in which to conduct that discussion and that the participants must respect those environments, sometimes simultaneously, or perish. Personally, if logic were the mountains and faith the plains, I’d simply want to camp in the hills. It would be so much more interesting there.
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