Caution on Mirecki, two ways of thought, and pants

Controversy on how to respond to Mirecki incident:This weekend at Panda's Thumb, there was an essay that I considered linking to, then ignored. The reason I condidered linking to it is because the author was able to use exerience as a private investigator to argue that Mirecki did not, in fact, fake his injuries. Then it veered off into conspiracy land, at which point I decided the best response was to ignore it.

I mention it now because of the discussion of the post at Dispatches from the Culture Wars and Evolutionblog. What I did not realize up until now is that there are some questions about the incident less kooky than the claim that it was all faked. (I cannot find examples of this, though. If someone could point me to one in the comments, it would be appreciated.)

Uber Kuh on Theists:

There are two basic ways of looking at any situation. They are, given the facts, either (A) "This is what I want the facts to be" or (B) "This is what the facts are."...

Now, think about this in terms of religious belief. Religious belief involves belief in the truth of a religious claim(s). Moreover, especially with Western monotheistic religions, religious belief extends to include faith that certain logically implausible or impossible claims are true, which makes this type of faith one that holds despite the evidence. In other words, religious belief is admitted as irrational by those who hold it...

What I have never understood is why so many people are unwilling to give up their dreams when the hard, cold facts of reality affirm that those dreams cannot be real.

Read the whole thing.

Poo:Here's Pooflinger's Annonymous at it's best:

We see day after day incidents of adultery, of fornication, of deception, and of violence.

How the hell is this any different than the days when kings and tyrants alike were subject to the church above all else? Nothing has changed, dear. The only reason you see things as "worse" is a mixture of population density, acculturation and the simple fact that we have this lovely thing called "the internet" (perhaps you've heard of it) which allows you to instantly access information from all over the world. We don't need any mystical prophecies to tell us that social problems will become more noticeable as humanity proliferates.

Pants:Someone who believes very strongly that women shouldn't wear them. (I don't think this is a joke - but who knows.)