You can’t win if you don’t play!

Richard Dawkins may think his reply to the question “What if you’re wrong?” is a clever one, but is it really? If religion is a raffle in which only the ticket with the winning number gets the prize, it seems the religious are holding one onto ticket more than Mr. Dawkins is! Granted, none of us can really say what prize we are playing for–72 virgins? eternal frolics in fields of lilies? a cordial handshake with Saint Peter? reincarnation as a believer of an altogether different religion?–but I am sure whatever it is is just nifty.

You do kinda feel bad for those poor souls who purchased their tickets during periods in the history of religion when the winning number was not even being handed out. If the Great JuJu at the Bottom of the Sea is the deity we should all be worshipping, everyone who lived before the Juju faith originated (not to mention homo erectus, homo habilis, etc, assuming species which went extinct before the raffle was invented are technically allowed to play) has a 0% chance of winning. The suckers!

But one thing that YOU should be absolutely confident–no, faithful–of is this. Out of the thousands?/tens of thousands?/hundreds of thousands? of numbers that have ever been sold in this sacred raffle, YOU were definitely born into a time, place, and culture where YOURS will be the number that wins it. That miniscule chance which you should be utterly certain of is definitely something to build one’s life around. So be sure to pray without ceasing, kindle no fire throughout your habitations upon the sabbath day, etc, or however the accident of your birth dictates you should worship.

Now what do we do about all those people cheating to increase their odds?

An inconvenient question

From zombietime

My recent family history

Zerg play report：

What was kind of surprising was how far one had to progress to whip up a couple Hydralisks and make them useful. The unit had always felt a little overpowered in the original StarCraft, but Blizzard looks to be limiting their effectiveness by way of high cost, long tech progression and a more widely spread tech tree.

Looks like I’ve been downgraded. Or is it an upgrade?

Educational site of the day

Anyone looking for excellent reading material should stroll over to The Heretical Press Directory, a repository of writings by Simon Sheppard and his pals. Just click on a random essay and start reading! Amusement–and enlightenment–is all but guaranteed.

Georgia: It’s really quite simple

The clearest, sharpest commentary on the Georgia situation is surely coming from one of the great publications of our time. Yes, I’m speaking of Pravda.

World Opinion Favors Russia – Winning the Media War

Even Americans are saying, “Thank you Russia for standing up to the crackpots in control of our government.”…

…Their all too numerous outlets are pummeling the world community with distortions, trying to shove the castor oil of the empire down our collective throats, but the gag reflex is well intact and their lies remain unpalatable.

Condoleeza Rice, What is Wrong With You?

Are you hysterical or what? Having a difficult menopause? How many times do we have to tell you, Russia calls the shots these days. So keep your hysterical whining to yourself and stop reiterating the same thing time and time again. Russia will withdraw from Georgia when it sees fit. And if it doesn’t see fit, it won’t. Russian troops will move around Georgia for as long as they like. As and when they like. As and when they choose.

Is Condoleeza Rice stupid?

OK her boss is, we all know that and that’s why nobody pays any attention to what he says or if they do, it is to have a good laugh at how such an imbecile could supposedly rule the roost in Washington (when everyone knows it is Cheney and his energy and arms lobbies). So Bush gets a discount, like the uncle that farts at family dinners, like the retarded nephew who belches swearwords after his third litre of Coke, like the simpleton that sits outside the church on Sundays begging for money informing everyone that he is an astronaut on Thursday afternoons.

Bush, Cheney and Rice; Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels

With what moral authority do these mainstays of the neoconservative, corporate elitist, greedy, self-interested Washington regime speak, when in their own closet there are skeletons labelled Abu Ghraib, Iraq, Guantanamo, mass murder, war crimes, illegal invasion, torture, illegal detention, disrespect for international law, denial of due process, rape…?

Up until now you might not have known what to think about Georgia. It might have seemed like a complicated affair, like there could be two sides to what’s going on, or that you might have to study the issue further, when in fact all you need to know to be educated on this episode of history in the making is that Bush is an uncle that farts at family dinners, Cheney is a rapist, and Condoleeza Rice is having a difficult menopause.

That should clear up that. Now back to cheering for our Olympic heroes.

I’m writing the screenplay for a Park Chan-wook film

I’m writing the screenplay for a Park Chan-wook film. The name of the film will be Sympathy for Korean Audiences. Here’s what I got so far.

—————————————————————————————————————

A man and a woman side by side are staring directly ahead at the camera. Their faces are without expression. Hold the shot for a full minute.

With the camera farther away, show the man and woman sitting on a bench. Hold the shot for a full minute.

The woman turns slowly to the man. She says, “Just one. It’s what you said, right?” (or some such line which explains nothing) The man does not reply.

Mr. Deity

Yeah, I’m still AWOL but I will be back. Meanwhile, here’s some Mr. Deity.