Forum Discussion: Five Awful Atheists?

Ian Murphy's article 'The 5 Most Awful Atheists' is getting a lot of attention -- more than it should, probably. He has no demonstrated knowledge or understanding of atheism; all his recent work seems involving whining about 'awful' people. So why does anyone take Ian Murphy's opinions seriously?

Just as important is the fact that he has nothing new or original to say. Not even the concept is original: whining about prominent atheists being "awful" because they are "rude" or "militant" for daring to speak out is a popular tactic among those who don't want to see religion subjected to the same standards of criticism and debate as every other ideology.

It's a tactic of cowards and Ian Murphy fits right in: nowhere in his article does he directly and substantively engage the any of the arguments of the people he complains as being "awful." He rarely even quotes them directly -- he just alludes to what they have said that is supposed to be "awful." This is not the behavior of a serious, informed, or respect-worthy person.
A forum member writes:

Sure, I disagree with all of those people on some issues. But them I pretty much disagree with everyone here on different issues from time to time.

The assumption here seems to be that when a well known atheist makes a comment about something other than atheism that he or she is either making these statement as a spokesperson for atheism, or because of their atheism. And that simply isn't the case, even if they want to compare their decision making process on those issues to their decision making process that led to their atheism.

The point I agree with is that not everyone is an atheist for rational reasons, and being an atheist doesn't make a person inherently rational in all areas. In fact I don't think I have ever meet anyone who is completely rational in every area at all times.

I don't agree with the Libertarian approach, but I still like Penn. Maher is a blowhard, but I do find him funny often enough to enjoy his rants. They are all idiots at times. That makes them pretty much just like everyone else. Take them to task for the individual stupid things they say. That's good. But the article wants to make every stupid thing they say be related somehow to them being atheists, and that's just stupid.

Tony is making some important points here -- points that are completely lost on people like Ian Murphy. Since atheism isn't any sort of ideology, philosophy, religion, or worldview, there's hardly anything that a person can say or do that can be attributable to atheism in any way.

However rude, obnoxious, or even hateful some random atheist may be, it's not making them a "bad" atheist, just a bad person. It's this fact that atheism is more an attribute than an ideology which so many people have trouble comprehending. A person's atheism isn't any more a direct cause of their behavior than their being tall or blonde.

The same can't be said for actual ideologies, religions, and belief systems. A person doing awful things in the name of or in the context of an ideology can be described as a "bad" member of that movement (in addition to being a bad person, of course). You can have awful libertarians, bad communists, evil Christians, and hateful Muslims.

I have to wonder: if Ian Murphy keeps encountering "awful" people everywhere he looks, maybe should stop and take look in the mirror? After all, he is the one thing that's consistent in all those situations.

 

Beware of Bad Barbecue - How To Avoid Cooking Awful Smoked Meats

Warning--There is a lot of bad barbecue out there. Good people drying out ribs! Your neighbor burning another chicken! Here are a few tips so you can avoid bad barbecue.

• Get yourself a real barbecue smoker. If you want to make real smoke barbecue, you are going to need a real barbecue smoker. There are plenty of them available on-line or at your local big-box home improvement store. Even WalMart sells barbecue smokers. There are a few different types to choose from, and different fuels to burn, but they will all turn out good barbecue if used properly. Find a good resource book at the local library, or check out many of the e-books available on line to determine what type of smoker is right for you. You can find an inexpensive smoker for around $100 that will do the job, or you can get yourself a super-deluxe model for thousands of dollars if you need that! Bottom line, you can't smoke barbecue without a barbecue smoker.
• Learn to cook "Low and Slow." The secret to turning out excellent barbecue is to cook the meat in a smoker at a very low heat for a long time. This is what is referred to as "low and slow." Using this method, ribs will take about 4-5 hours, a pork shoulder will take 8-10 hours, a chicken will take about 2 hours and a beef brisket will take approximately 12-14 hours.
• Season your meat. All good barbecue is seasoned prior to cooking with what is call a "Spice Rub" or "Barbecue Rub" or most commonly, just a "Rub". This is a blend of spices that is liberally applied to the meat and "rubbed" into the meat, prior to cooking, usually a few hours before it goes into the smoker. There are as many barbecue spice rub recipes as there are people cooking barbecue! Find yourself a good barbecue book, or an e-book product for a recipe to help you get started with a good rub recipe that you can call your own.
• If using sauce, only apply at the very end of the cooking process. Many (most) barbecue pit-masters make their own sauce to slather on their meat. Like a barbecue rub, there are thousands of different recipes for barbecue sauces. Again, get yourself a good barbecue cookbook, or e-book for various barbecue sauce recipes. Experiment until you create what will become your own special blend. Most barbecue sauce contains a lot of sugar. Sugar burns easily when subjected to heat. If you do not want burnt barbecue, only apply the sauce during the last stage of the cooking process, when the fire is really low. Liberally brush on the sauce the last few minutes of cooking, serve some on the side with the meat, and serve up your barbecue.

By following these four simple tips, you can avoid serving and eating awful barbecue. Life is to short to subject yourself and friends to bad barbecue, when it is so easy to turn out the real deal, tender, moist and smokey.

 

7 Awful Mistakes To Avoid For Designers

---

If you want to learn quickly as a designer, the easiest way is by learning from your mistakes. Particularly for youthful and hopeful designers, countering blunders is common due to lack of practice. There is a very ancient proverb which says that to make a mistake is what human beings are all about. Therefore, if you ever commit a blunder, don’t worry and learn from it.

But since you are in a professional environment, you cannot afford to make too many errors in your work. That is why it is necessary to understand the common mistakes that occur for designers and eradicate them from scratch. Below, you will recognize 7 of the most widespread blunders that most designers face in their careers:

Starting Without Client Brief In any client venture, briefing information is essential to steer a designer from beginning to end of the process. Some visual artists have an awful addiction of being far too assured and start the venture without acquiring instructions from client.  Also known as a design brief, it aids you to gather what your customer wants in their venture. Without understanding your customer’s demands, you just cannot work on a project.

Overlooking the Viewers The function of a creative design is to creatively aid companies in showing their message to their viewers. For this reason, if the visual artists neglect the likings and disliking of the viewers, they will never be able to make a design that is attractive. To make relevant designs, you have to first evaluate the target market for which it is intended for.

Not Keeping an Agreement In a creative designer’s profession, wage and expenses concerns are consistent. When you never sustain an agreement with your customers, you are likely to be conned of money. Now don’t get the feeling that all customers have ill-intentions. But some customers have an addiction of getting the work done and managing away without paying you.

No Remaining In Touch Some visual artists experience shyness while some are completely unaware when it comes to remaining in tune with the customers. One of the greatest faults you can create in your professional life is not connecting with your customers effectively. By not remaining in contact with the customers during the venture, you give them an experience of being ignored and undesirable. You must take reviews from them to prevent any customer criticisms at the end of the day.

Laziness In any occupation, due dates are tremendously essential to fulfill. By concluding your work on time, you display your perseverance and truthfulness to your promises. Some visual artists usually act lazy on their tasks. When they end up dropping short of their timeline, they complete off an average work as a new trend.

Lagging Behind in Advancements In this competitive rivalry, it is necessary for creative artists to stay current with the newest improvements in their area. As technology improves on a daily basis, modern and enhanced ways of visual developing are discovered. Those who fall short to pull alongside the current trends are beaten by their rivals.

Neglecting Paperwork Some visual artists fall short to comprehend the value of starting from pen and paper. They immediately open Photoshop and start making the digital edition of the work. This is a huge error as one should know how the style looks in non colored documents because some marketing methods don’t make an allowance for colors.

Awful Jokes 

Have a laugh - or even a groan!

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ... bonk!

That's a man laughing his head off.

What an awful joke but life's not always that funny. Take my wife ... please! I said that to my next door neighbour and now they've run off together ... and I don't half miss him.

That's not true, of course, I'm happily married. Well that's what my wife tells me!

Anyway, it seems that a survey has discovered that the more awful jokes and gags are the more we like them. One in four of us will giggle away at even the most cringe worthy punch lines. It's also true though that 73.2% of statistics are made up.

Okay, what we have on this lens are jokes, but some of them are pretty awful. What makes them so painfully funny? It must be the punch lines!

But first, before you exercise your chuckle muscles, a note of caution: If you find any of the jokes on this lens offensive or unsettling in any way ... tough!

 

awful jokes

What do you get when you cross roast pork with a telephone?
Crackling on the line.

Our baby was christened 'Glug Glug'. The vicar fell in the font.

Little Sammy came running into the house and asked, "Mummy, can little girls have babies?"
"No," said his mother, "Of course not."
Little Sammy then ran back outside and his mother heard him shout out to his friends, "It's okay, we can play that game again!"

Knock, knock!
Who's there?
Tex.
Tex who?
Tex you ages to open the door.

Did you hear about the scientist whose wife had twins? He baptised one and kept the other as a control.

A bad football team is like an old bra - no cups and little support.

"Doctor, doctor, I feel like a pack of cards."
"I'll deal with you later."

Why did the king go to the dentist?
To get his teeth crowned.

Honolulu: It's got everything. Sand for the children, sun for thre wife, sharks for the wife's mother ..."

This man tells the doctor, "Every time I sneeze I feel very sexy." The doctor asks, "What do you take?" "Pepper," the man answers.

I haven't spoken to my mother-in-law for 18 months - I don't like to interrupt her.

Two monkeys were getting into the bath. One said, "Oo, oo, oo, aah, aah aah."
The other replied, "Well put some cold in it then."

 

 

How To Make Awful Edible Fleshworms

To make Roasted Awful Edible Fleshworms you'll need a few things. I have two methods of making them - one involves ham and slightly easier cooking, the other requires bacon and more work to prepare. They give similar results but I think the bacon one has a slight edge in looks and flavor.

Both methods require the same basic preparation and handling. A strip of pork tenderloin is wrapped in Prosciutto Ham (just the stuff from the deli counter at the supermarket - no need to get all food-snobbish here) and baked, or a strip of tenderloin is wrapped in strip-style Bacon, then frozen (more on why later), then roasted. 
 

Both are finished off with some high-heat broiling to give the desired amount of "charred/crusty" look to the worm. Then the mouth is cut out and the teeth are inserted. Then the worm is given any final presentation touches that may be necessary.

Method 1 - Using Prosciutto Ham

You will need:

• Strip of Pork Tenderloin (This is a boneless strip of meat whose worm-like shape will be useful.)
• About 75g - 100g of sliced Prosciutto, depending on the size of your worm. Normal sandwich-slice thickness will be fine - about 1.5mm - 2mm thick.
• 1 stick of uncooked spaghetti.
• Small, sharp knife.

The Prosciutto is on the left, the Pork Tenderloin on the right. The Prosciutto will be the "skin" and the tenderloin will be the "body" of the worm-to-be.

Step 1 - Wrap the Tenderloin with the Prosciutto

Start at the "head" end of what will be the worm, and wrap the strips of ham at a slight angle so they overlap as they wind their way down the tenderloin. Make sure they overlap, and as you get to the end of one strip add another one before you get to the end, so the end of one strip overlaps the beginning of the next by at least a good inch. Handling the worm will shift the ham a little, and the ham is a little fragile. Also, in cooking the ham will shrink somewhat - the last thing you want is for the "skin" not to cover all the tenderloin, so if in doubt wrap and overlap more, rather than less.

Be sure to wrap a little over and past the ends.

Step 2 - Cooking

Place the worm into a roasting pan and stick it into the oven - which has been pre-heated to 350 degrees. (If you forgot to pre-heat the oven, do that now while the worm waits in the fridge).

I cooked my worm for about 25 minutes, after which the tenderloin is well done, and the whole worm had pleasantly "roasted" look to the outside.

However, to give it one final finishing touch, I cranked on the top broiler of the oven at full power and watched carefully as the exterior of the worm got crisped-up a little more.

I did this until it looked right to me - it should not be more than a few minutes at most. Watch constantly when you broil in this way because the difference between "done" and "burned" can be only a few seconds.

Step 3 - Adding the Mouth and Teeth

To make the mouth, use a sharp knife with a small blade. You need to cut out a semi-circle from the "head" of the worm - use the bigger end of the tenderloin as the head-end. You may wish to get a little experimental and creative with the shape of the mouth as well but this gave just the right look I wanted.

Now is a good time to pick up the piece you just cut out and pop it into your mouth. It should be tasty!

Now, take the stick of uncooked spaghetti and break off small pieces (make them longer than the little scrap in the picture - they need to be long enough to stick in and stay!) Stick the small pieces into the mouth as teeth. Do the upper and lower jaws. I found that evenly-spaced teeth of even lengths gave the effect I was looking for.

Only about 1/3 of each tooth is visible; the other 2/3 is pushed into the meat of the jaw to hold it in.

OK! That's shaped up pretty nicely! We have something that looks like a vicious little roasted-up Fleshworm! Now the remaining step is to do any final preparation work for whatever your presentation is going to be.

Step 4 - Final Preparations

Before we can serve the Fleshworm, we need to remove the guts.

Slice open the abdomen and allow the innards to squeeze out. This will serve as a sauce. You may wish to turn on a fan if you're new to this, as I understand that the smell is really quite astonishing.

It's all about the presentation. For example, those "entrails" in the last picture are actually just a little bit of leftover chili. Some spaghetti sauce could work too. Of course, it doesn't look like chili -- it just looks repulsive.

That's the kind of thing you're looking to do in the presentation. Here is an idea for a simple, single-dish presentation. Get creative! Those little hors-d'oevre skewers or vicious-looking little fondue forks can really come in handy.

Now that's starting to look like something you'd find on the dinner table when visiting a house of horrors.