Get Crucified in Style

On Obloggers, Paul Hsieh alerts us to “some important safety tips for those who plan to be crucified this weekend.” (Lol!)

==Excerpts:

This Holy Week, the thousands of guilt stricken or pious worshippers who will flay the skin off their backs, and the handful who will crucify themselves, are encouraged to get a tetanus shot first and be sure to use a clean whip or nails.

“Getting deep cut wounds during whippings or lashings is inevitable and being so exposed during the course of the penitence, with all the
heat and dust blowing in the wind, welcomes all sorts of infections and bacteria like tetanus,” he explained.

Re-enactments of the Passion of Christ are common in many parts of the mostly Roman Catholic Philippines but frowned upon by the church
authorities.

In San Fernando City 23 people, including two women, have signed up to re-enact the crucifixion at three “improvised Golgothas” around town.
Four of them will use real nails.

The city government’s website trumpets the preparations.

“The City Health Office (CHO) autoclaved all the nails to be used and will administer anti-tetanus vaccine to all the “Cristos” to ensure
their protection from possible infection,” it points out. City officials will conduct an inspection of the Golgothas on Thursday.

Some 23 people, including two women, plan to reenact the crucifixion. The festival is sponsored by Coca-cola and a company called Smart
Telecommunications.

In a break from the original tradition, penitents are encouraged to “bring enough drinking water for the whole course of the pilgrimage to
avoid dehydration, rather than buy bottled drinking water from unfamiliar sources.”

There is also government advice for the many tourists and spectators who attend the events.

“It is also better to bring self-prepared foods such as sandwiches, not only to save money, but also to avoid getting diseases such as
diarrhea, hepatitis A, and typhoid after eating food bought from street vendors,” the health secretary suggested.

============

Just imagine, instead of asking for myrrh, Jesus would have called out for “some Coke please.” WHAT BRAND ENDORSEMENT THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN!! Coke would officially have replaced wine in all the chalices of Catholic churches!

X-Men in Mumbai

Last Sunday, I went on a coffee date with a man I had been in contact with for several months. Our conversation was fluid, lively, expansive (in terms of the topics we discussed), and stimulating. However, there was this one moment that totally cracked me up. You’ll see:

Him: You know that the X-Men movies have a definite homosexual sub-text, right?

Me: Oh, of course! It’s hardly a sub-text–it’s the entire freakin’ gay agenda, loud and proud!

Him: Yah. Precisely! Well, in Mumbai, there is a definite X-men type gay underground group. We have Magneto, a.k.a, Ashok Row Kavi–the militantly gay activist, and his posse at the Humsafar Trust; and then we have his nemesis Professor X–the more benign and amiable founder of Gay Bombay groups with the rest of us followers.

Me: Oh, interesting! And what character are you?

Him: Well, I’m not really a “character” per se: I Am The Cerebro!

Funny Dream

Last night, I had this really funny dream. In fact, when I woke up, I just sat on my bed and chuckled at how funny the dream was!

In my dream, I was back in some college classroom–didn’t look like any of the classrooms from my real college days–with all my old classmates. The classroom was an auditorium, with seating arranged along rising layers. My favorite professor–a professor of Psychology back in my collge–was in this dream. He was standing in the front of the class.

The lecture had not yet begun. This was because apparently we had to first stand and *sing* the national anthem (I can’t remember which country’s national anthem we were about to sing.)

Okay, so well, we all started singing the national anthem. Not too long after I had begun singing–and just as I had touched upon some high note in the anthem–the girl seated right in front of me turned back to look at me in a playfully teasing manner, and said: “Shut Up!”

That girl was Jennifer Lopez!

HAAHAAHAA!

Being God Just Ain’t Fun Anymore

*sigh* The things people do to their gods. If you thought that atheists were sacrilegious, then you haven’t really thought hard enough. Religious believers do the most inane things to their gods.

Every year at this time in India, Lord Ganpity (also known as Ganesha), the beloved elephant-god with a pot-belly and an eating disorder, is dumped into the seas in a mass frenzy of ritualistic hedonism. I feel sad for poor, drowning Ganpity, who clearly cannot keep his heavy body afloat and therefore drowns in no time, only to be recast into an idol the following year and dumped yet again! Ouch! Meanwhile, the Indians who create a spectacular fiasco out of the whole activity, are loud, drunk, boisterous, and generally clueless about their surroundings: Lord Ganesha be damned… err.. drowned!

And then here’s a Christian politician in the United States who is taking god to court! He is suing god for being a reckless deity, for being careless about his creation, and for allowing suffering and calamities to befall this earth. Oh boy. I wonder what lines of defense will god mount. And who’s sitting on the jury? Is Satan allowed?

UPDATE!!

People, I am NOT making this up; and this is NOT from The Onion. This is for real!

A legislator who filed a lawsuit against God has gotten something he might not have expected: a response. One of two court filings from “God” came Wednesday under otherworldly circumstances, according to John Friend, clerk of the Douglas County District Court in Omaha.

“This one miraculously appeared on the counter. It just all of a sudden was here — poof!” Friend said.

State Sen. Ernie Chambers of Omaha sued God last week, seeking a permanent injunction against the Almighty for making terroristic threats, inspiring fear and causing “widespread death, destruction and terrorization of millions upon millions of the Earth’s inhabitants.”

Chambers, a self-proclaimed agnostic who often criticizes Christians, said his filing was triggered by a federal lawsuit he considers frivolous. He said he’s trying to makes the point that anybody can sue anybody.

Not so, says “God.” His response argues that the defendant is immune from some earthly laws and the court lacks jurisdiction.

It adds that blaming God for human oppression and suffering misses an important point.

“I created man and woman with free will and next to the promise of immortal life, free will is my greatest gift to you,” according to the response, as read by Friend.

There was no contact information on the filing, although St. Michael the Archangel is listed as a witness, Friend said.

A second response from “God” disputing Chambers’ allegations lists a phone number for a Corpus Christi law office. A message left for that office was not immediately returned Thursday.

Attempts to reach Chambers by phone and at his Capitol office Thursday were unsuccessful.

—————

That’s it. God exists! I need to confess! I have sinned!

Lucky to be in India

There are times when I am reminded of how lucky I am to be in India. This is one of those times:

Airline sacrifices goats to appease sky god

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - Officials at Nepal’s state-run airline have sacrificed two goats to appease Akash Bhairab, the Hindu sky god, following technical problems with one of its Boeing 757 aircraft, the carrier said Tuesday. …The goats were sacrificed in front of the troublesome aircraft Sunday at Nepal’s only international airport in Kathmandu in accordance with Hindu traditions, an official said.

[HT: Greg at Noodlefood] 

The question that still remains is, did the technical glitch in the airplane get resolved? I wonder what the mechanic who invariably had to sort out whatever technical glitch had to say about a goat getting all the attention!

Well, just as I was feeling slightly happy to be in India, I remembered this comment left on one of my posts:

proud that we give respect cow as same as our mother coz after mothers milk we have cows milk.
our land is our mother we even give respect to stones , but some countries hav no human values.

Gawd.

Jesus and the Beast

666 - The number of the Beast
667 - Guy Across the Street From the Beast
668 - Neighbor of the Beast
660 - Approximate number of the Beast
/666 - Beast Common Denominator
6, uh… what was that number again? - Number of the Blonde Beast

LOL!
From here.

Oh, and then this other one:

Who was Jesus?

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS JEWISH
He went into his father’s business.
He lived at home until he was 30.
He was sure his mother was a virgin, and his mother thought he was God.

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS IRISH
He never got married.
He was always telling stories.
He loved green pastures.

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS PUERTO RICAN
His first name was Jesus.
He was bilingual.
He was always being harassed by the authorities.

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS ITALIAN
He talked with his hands.
He had wine with every meal.
He worked in the building trades.

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS BLACK
He called everybody “brother.”
He liked Gospel.
He couldn’t get a fair trial.

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS A CALIFORNIAN
He never cut his hair.
He walked around barefoot.
He started a new religion.

THREE PROOFS THAT JESUS WAS A WOMAN
He had to feed a crowd, at a moment’s notice, when there was no food.
He kept trying to get the message across to a bunch of men who just didn’t get it.
Even when he was dead, he had to get up because there was more work to do.

American Monopoly on Stupidity

America seems to have the monopoly on stupidity. In all my years spent in America, I was never quite impressed by the intellectual or thinking abilities of the average Joe–even if they were my fellow students in college. Indeed, even the fact that the expression “average Joe” is an American invention is rather apt, I think.

I can theorize that, perhaps, this intellectual complacency comes from their comfortable position as a world super-power and their massive economy, by virtue of which, they have the power to purchase or entice brains, intelligence, and solutions to keep their culture moving forward.

Of course, I’m caricaturing, and plain ol’ dumbness is a rather ubiquituous feature among all peoples everywhere. However, in the general American population, the dumbness appears to be particularly pronounced: it is observed in practically all social and economic strata of American society, and is often celebrated by the American youth and media. To be dumb is almost “cool”; god forbid you get labeled “geek” or “nerd”! “Dumb jocks” get the hot chicks, and “smart jocks” is an oxymoron. In fact, the tyranny of stupidity can get so real that intellectually superior kids come to regard their abilities as a curse; they try so hard to suppress their talents, deliberately fail their courses, avoid speaking up in class, apologize for getting an “A” (”Oh, it was just a fluke!”), try to blow off that spark of intelligence within them so that they can get into the “cool” but dumb crowd.

I was watching the show “Beauty and the Geek” last night on TV. It’s the season that aired in America earlier that has now come into syndication in India. The show is essentially about pairing up socially inept but brilliant boys with socially adept but utterly dumb girls.

Uncannily, all the brilliant boys are also physically unattractive, but all the dumb girls are physically stunning: it’s like a strange (but artificial) law in nature that you can only have either intellectual giftedness or physical attractiveness.

Anyway, well, one of the “geeks” made the comment that he would be so willing to give up some of his intellectual abilities to be able to date such beautiful girls and be accepted by them. Meanwhile, the “beauties” made their typical, utterly stupid, remarks like people should stop eating gaseous food to curb environmental pollution.

Then you have this contestant on the prominent Miss Teen USA pageant competition making an incredibly absurd, incoherent, and non-sensical remark in answer to a question posed by a judge:

Asked why a fifth of Americans could not locate the United States on a world map, she stammered out an answer that made Paula Abdul’s worst “American Idol” moment seem like a model of cogency.

Her answer, in its entirety, was: “I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uhmmm, some people out there in our nation don’t have maps and uh, I believe that our, I, education like such as, uh, South Africa, and uh, the Iraq, everywhere like such as, and I believe that they should, uhhh, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., uh, should help South Africa, it should help the Iraq and the Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future, for us.” 

And with that, you are simply reassured–almost beyond a doubt–that America does have a monopoly on stupidity.

[P.S.: I simply forgot to mention President George Bush! If this post is about anyone at all, it has to be most appropriately about him!]

[h/t: Noodlefood]

Descartes for Pigs

From this awesome site via stumbleupon.com.

The Impact of Satan

Recently, I had one of the strangest encounters as far as I can remember with a crazy mystic. It was surreal–everything about the encounter was.

Let me explain: This past Saturday, I went to one of the most crowded parts of Mumbai in search of a wall lamp for my room.

An interesting thing I observed as I was walking around was that in any given area, all stores dealing in similar products tended to be situated right next to each other or at least in very close proximity to each other. Thus, for example, if you were looking to buy bathroom fixtures, you would just have to spot one store selling the items, and very next to it, you would find a series of other stores selling the same thing. I don’t have a clue why they do that–it cannot just be that the same people owned all of these stores because this trend carried on with practically every kind of store.

Don’t Indian storeowners understand the principle of scarcity?–set up your store in an area where you’re the only vendor of your products (or one among the very few) so that you can scale up your prices, increase profits, and avoid competition. Clearly it cannot be zoning laws because such laws only demarcate industrial, business, retail, commercial, residential, and agricultural areas; I don’t think zoning laws apply to the type of product you’re selling.

And here’s another strange but related aspect of how Indian businesses are set up: While you may find, say, shoe retail stores situated next to each other or in very close proximity, when it comes to bars and clubs, it’s the exact opposite!

Spending a night ”bar hopping” or “pub crawling” is virtually impossible here because bars and clubs tend to be situated at opposite ends of the city–and I’m only slightly exaggerating! There are no such areas that can reasonably be called “nightlife areas,” even though more recently some bars are clustering up in small and scattered pockets of the city. In other words, once you enter in a club in Mumbai–which typically tend to be expensive and highly pretentious hangs–you are pretty much stuck there for the night, unless you become determined to pull yourself out and drive an hour to another place. 

Anyway, all of that was besides the point. But before I get to my point, I have to state another observation: As I made my way in and out of adjacent stores looking for a wall lamp that did not make me frown, I realized that most of these stores sold products for upwards of thousands of Rupees, but had no provisions for accepting credit/debit card payments! That practically means that large amounts needed to be paid in cash!

Now, I am not the one to typically carry wads of 100, 500, or 1000 Rupee notes in my wallet. I prefer the convenience and safety of using my check card. If I need more cash than I am carrying, I simply find an ATM nearby. So, it seemed to be a really sloppy business practice to not accept card payments particularly when your business deals with products that cost large amounts of money–at least amounts that people should not be expected to carry around in their wallets regularly.

Needless to say, I refused to exert any extra efforts trying to look for an ATM to withdraw cash to make my purchase. I decided to deliberately find a store that did accept cards and reward them with my business. Well, and this is where I get to the point of my post: I managed to find one store that accepted cards; but I didn’t know that what was to happen next would be one of the strangest experiences ever.

As I pushed the glass door to enter, thick clouds of incense smoke from inside the store smothered me entirely. I could barely see a few inches ahead; all I could see were balls of colorful, blurry lights shining from the lamps all over the walls and the ceiling of this store. I also heard voices chanting. For a few moments, I was simply confused and unsure of what to do. I stood still, just inside the front door of the store, waiting for either my eyes to adjust or for the smoke to thin out. Soon, a salesman came up to me and asked if he could help. Deciding to simply ignore all the incense smoke and chanting, I asked the salesman to show me some of his wall lamps.

During all of this, as the smoke thinned out and I was able to look around, I happened to glance at the cashier’s counter: a man dressed in traditional Indian white kurta sat with his legs folded and his hands in the shape of the Buddha’s hands–index finger touching the thumb, palm facing outward.

–Okay, wierdo–I thought.

Finally, I had decided upon a lamp, told the salesman to find me a new piece of it from the back storeroom, and approached the cashier’s desk to make my payment. Well, this strange man in the kurta had been watching me all along–I was the only customer in that store at that time, and I could literally feel his stare burning into me the whole time I was there. When I got to the desk, the man spoke up and said one of the wierdest things I’ve ever heard said to me:

“You have the impact of Satan!”

“HUH?!? Excuse me??”

“You have the impact of Satan!” [long pause] “That’s a good thing!”

“HUH?? What?” Taking my time to digest what I had just heard. Then, I just bursted out into a loud, open-mouthed laughter!

“So would that mean that if I had the impact of God, it would be a bad thing!?” I asked, now curiously amused by where this conversation was going.

“No, no.” He said. His English betraying an obvious uncomfortability with the language and a thick north Indian dialect. “It’s not a bad thing; but Satan is better. More powerful. You will be very successful. You are very smart. I saw you. You came in, stopped, looked around, looked carefully at all the lamps. You thought carefully before choosing a lamp to buy.”

“Oh. Don’t other customers also carefully inspect what they want to buy before they buy it?”

“No. Not as you did. What is your name? You are a Capricorn.”

“I am [my name]. And I am an Aquarius.”

“February, March?”

“January.” By this time, I just wanted to pay for my lamp and get out of this twilight zone. But mysteriously, or coincidentally, the salesperson was having a tough time working the credit card machine; I suppose they are not in the habit of using the machine too often.

“Your number is 88″

“Huh?”

“It’s a powerful number. You have a strong…. uhhhh… powerful…..” hands gesturing vigorously, trying to signal the meaning of force or persona, perhaps. “Tell me about your education.”

I decide to be courteous and respond truthfully. “I got my degree in the U.S., in Communication.”

“Good. Good. I am a guru, you know. I can see your powers.”

“Oh. Okay. Good. I guess.” I’m glaring impatiently at the salesman… “Hello? Why is it taking you so long, dammit!” I want to say to him. Luckily, the machine worked this time and my receipt was being printed. I noticed that my lamp was already packed and wrapped in a bag, kept on the cashier’s desk. The rest of these moments were filled with a thick and awkward silence.

I was the lone customer inside a smoke-filled store of a thousand lit lamps with a man who just accused me of having the impact of Satan and an inept salesman who did not know how to operate the credit card machine! Aaaaarhhll! I needed to get out of this insane environment as fast I could! I signed the credit receipt, grabbed my purchase, said a hurried “goodbye” and “thank you” to the mystic and got out of that store.

“Woah! What was that all about!?” I thought. It was like a strange dream–surreal.

Well, anyway, later that Saturday evening, I met with two of my friends and decided to have dinner at Alfredo’s. I was eager to show off my new lamp to my friends, and so I took it out of the bag, unwrapped the cover, and—what do I find?—it was not the lamp I had chosen at the store! Aaarrrrrrgggh!

In one brief evening, I had encountered incompetence and truly wacky mysticism. *sigh* Only in India!

Yo Mama

We all know those “your mama” insults we hurled at each other back in the days–well, and still do, in some cases–sometimes the Hindi version of it, “teri maa ki…“

Well, Kim’s Play Place links to a truly hilarious set of “yo mama” taunts as would be said by philosophers! It’s really craaazy! (p.s. some familiarity with the major ideas of these thinkers might help.)

Descartes: I asked your daddy if your mama was good looking, and he said, “I think not.” And he disappeared! So you don’t even have a daddy. But everybody’s had your mama.

Freud: Tell me about your mama.

Nietzsche: Your mama is dead.

Jefferson: That we are endowed with life, liberty and the pursuit of your mama.

Hume: She is ugly; therefore she is your mama.

Kant: She is your mama; therefore, she is ugly.

Hegel: Your mama is so fat she broke the dialectical cycle.

Plato: Your mama is so fat that when she sits around the cave, she eats the shadows.

HAahaaaHAHA! LOL! Gawd! I just can’t stop laughing here at work! Oh, here’s one of my favs:

Ayn Rand: Man - all of mankind - is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. But your mama is so fat, this means she never ends.

Daaayyaam! See more here.

This is Genius

A mathematical genius came up with an irrefutable proof that demonstrates all girls are evil. It’s pure genius! Check it out.

Via stumble upon and Noodlefood.

I just love stumbling! So, if you like stumbling around too, then rate and review my blogsite as well.

Men, Women, and Breasts

Ya know, being gay and all that, I never really figured out the straight male’s fascination with breasts. In my eyes, they were just large chunks of bulbous fat–and quite frankly, large viscous chunks of fat anywhere is simply an undesirable thing.

Despite intense and indepth discussions with my heterosexual counterparts, I was never convinced of how chunks of fat can suddenly become sexually arousing merely by virtue of it being located on the chest (of a woman, of course!). Well, here’s an article that attempts to address my question:

Until very recently, it was a mystery to evolutionary psychology why men prefer women with large breasts, since the size of a woman’s breasts has no relationship to her ability to lactate. But Harvard anthropologist Frank Marlowe contends that larger, and hence heavier, breasts sag more conspicuously with age than do smaller breasts. Thus they make it easier for men to judge a woman’s age (and her reproductive value) by sight—suggesting why men find women with large breasts more attractive.

Alternatively, men may prefer women with large breasts for the same reason they prefer women with small waists. A new study of Polish women shows that women with large breasts and tight waists have the greatest fecundity, indicated by their levels of two reproductive hormones (estradiol and progesterone).

So, basically, men (unconsciously, perhaps) prefer large breasts only so they can distinctly assess its relative sag as an indicator of age. Daaayaam! Well, that makes sense I think. Being gay and all, it matter least to me what age a woman is, so quite naturally I don’t bother looking at her breast as an indicator of her fecundity, sexual virility, or age.

But wait. There is still an unresolved issue. I know that even gay men like to admire big breasts on women–I know I do. I often catch myself doing a double-take on a hot, attractice woman with big breasts; of course, my glance is more of appreciation of beauty and not of sexual desire or arousal, but the question still remains: why do I–a gay man–consider big breasts on women beautiful? Hmmm… they should do a study on this now.

 [P.S. Read the rest of the linked article for some really interesting, funny, and bizarre views.]

The Proof that P: Jokes in Philosophy

This is my first post using Windows Live Writer, and I must say it’s an awesome and incredibly efficient way to publish my posts right from my desktop!

Anyway, as a test post, I decided to have some philosophy-type jokes. The first one below about the cows I recently read on an Objectivist blogger’s site. I can’t remember who and which site, so if you’re reading this, please let me know so that I can link to your page.

The other jokes are taken from this page compiled by David Chalmers.

====

Two cows were lazily grazing on the green, rolling hills of a country-side. Just then, the first cow looked at the other and asked, “What are your thoughts on the mind-body dichotomy? Do you think it’s true?”

The other cow looked up and answered: “Moooooo!”

====

The First Law of Philosophy: For every philosopher, there exists an equal and opposite philosopher.

The Second Law of Philosophy: They’re both wrong.

====

If metaphysics is being qua being;
and if epistemology is knowing qua knowing;
then metaphilosophy must be… qua qua qua.

====

Davidson’s proof that p:

Let us make the following bold conjecture: p

Wallace’s proof that p:

Davidson has made the following bold conjecture: p

Grunbaum:

As I have asserted again and again in previous publications, p.

Lewis:

Most people find the claim that not-p completely obvious and when I assert p they give me an incredulous stare. But the fact that they find not- p obvious is no argument that it is true; and I do not know how to refute an incredulous stare. Therefore, p.

===

B as in…?

Well, so I have a date tonight with a surprisingly interesting guy whom I spoke with on the phone for over 2 hours! Yea, that is very strange because I had practically given up all hope of having a conversation with an Indian gay man beyond the perfunctory “hello.”

But that announcement is not the reason for this post. My date for tonight happened to just call me at work and ask for my e-mail address. This is how I mentioned it to him:

J-J-D-O-U-B; that is, J-J, D as in dog, O as in orange, U as in umbrella, and B as in…. err….. bastard.

Hmmm… well. He laughed. So that wasn’t too bad.

Just Something Strangely Funny

I was just re-reading a comment by Tim Wikiriwhi on an old post, and I am still awestruck–as if reading it for the first time–by the absurdity of his comment! It is actually very amusing, and I don’t mean to be derisive at this moment. I am merely curious about the kind of thinking process that produced the chain of sentences in his comment.

Take this one for example. Tim says

I find it an hallmark of intellectual poverty that… the universality of homosexuality in regard to every tribe of humanity is not understood as proof of the fall of mankind into sin.

Good gawd. Those reasoning skills are awfully blunt! That statement is kinda like saying, “I find it an hallmark of intellectual poverty that… the universality of religious belief in every tribe of humanity is not understood as proof of the fall of mankind into irrationalism and sin.”

Actually, even though I disagree with the logic of my statement, it certainly is more sound and defensible than his. I wonder what he holds as the standard of proof–what does “proof” or proving something constitute.

Anyway. The world–and all its people–never ceases to amaze me. Having a blog is a delightful way to meet such people with such outlandish thoughts and arguments from a safe distance, where any such interactions can be terminated at the moment it begins to go out of the bounds of sanity and simple sense.

Catholic Church Evicts Newborn Infants

Pope Benedict XVI has just decided to forcefully evict newborn babies from their centuries-old abode–the limbo–and transfer them directly to heaven.

This was foreshadowed by the previous pope’s troubled conscience that wondered if it was right to condemn innocent cherubs to an unending ETERNITY of meandering in a limbo, with absolutely no possibility of having a union of God. Indeed, this blog made a note of this issue in December 2005 when the previous pope raised this matter for his Church to consider.

Now, reaching a decision that serves as a massive public relations coup for the Catholic Church and for God, the current pope has decided to shut the gates of limbo forever and fling open the gates of heaven for little tiny tots–and parents around the world are delighted by this news. For over thousands of years, virtually every reigning pope–who allegedly holds the keys to the other side–refused babies entry into heaven.

According to Catholic doctrine, even God has no power (or enough mercy) to permit babies into heaven because these innocent little cherubs were in fact TAINTED WITH ORIGINAL SIN!! Clearly, the pope could not allow such sin-stained creatures to get near the perfectly pure brilliance and radiance of God!

But all that is history now. With this new ruling, the pope has effectively granted permission for ORIGINAL SIN to enter heaven in the form of these deceptively innocent-looking babies. You can be sure that the souls of all deceased babies are currently being transported from limbo to heaven on the backs of androgynous angels with huge wings. This is certainly a momentous event in the eternal history of God’s existence.

[HT: John Enright]

Crossing Over in India

Crossing the road in India

This is real, people. This is pretty much how every Indian city traffic is–humans and vehicles in constant and dangerous confrontation. Also, turn on your speakers to hear the typical noise levels in Indian cities. The video has been shot in the city of Hyderabad.

Overheard at the Office

So, at work, this guy friend of mine–who, for good measure, happens to be quite hot–and I are engaged in a conversation on self-help books.

I said: “I read a book called ‘How to Read People.’”

So, gesturing at himself, he asked: “Well, what are you reading now?”

With a naughty look in my eyes, I said: “A pornographic novel.”

History of Philocomedy!

This is so funny! Dr. Stephen Hicks is a professor at Rockford College in Illinois, and he has compiled a brief "History of Philosophy" from his student papers.

Some of the ones I thought were totally hilarious:

Against Marx, Rand advocates free enterprise and selfishness, but her philosophy is sort of controversial, in a sense. She commits the fallacy of hoc poc der doc.

According to Freud, the child has lust during the breast-feeding stage. Eventually his mother stops, and his lust is suppressed until his adultery stage.

To Socrates, having a good life meant dying. Socrates was com­pletely opposed to the Sophists. Not only did the Sophists not have reasons, they also did not have reasons. Sophists felt that there were no real reasons.

For Aristotle, the virtuous person can be known as temperature, someone who is under complete control. Aristotle thinks the Principle of Noncontradiction is an axiom is because it is one.

Celebrity Baby Names

Gwyneth Paltrow’s baby is named “Apple”.

Branjelina are rumored to name their upcoming baby “Africa”.

Tom and Katy have named their just new-born baby “Suri” (apparently, its hebrew, but even the Israelis don’t know what it means!)

What with baby names like Apple, Africa, and Suri
I am so glad I’m not a celebrity baby,
My name is, plain old, Jerry.

[John, I couldn't help it! The topic renders itself so easily for such rhyme!]