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Bob's LedgePosted by Robert Billing on 2002-10-30
I'm reposting this, mainly for Rhiannon's benefit, as it seems to have
got lost from BEST Bits - at least the link's broken. If anyone else can
remember what I had up there I'll do some more reposts.
Red Celt wrote:
>
> Sir! Sir? Why is a creator god as good an explanation as he big bang,
> star/planet formation and subsequently evolution? Isn't this
> "explanation" born of primitive minds and deserving only of passing
It all depends on your definition of "explanation". On a ledge above my
computer there is a Crookes radiometer, a lump of amber, a feldspar
crystal, a bronze of a New Forest pony and a soft-toy penguin.
You could study them in detail (only you'd have to stand on the desk)
and find out how they were formed and how they got to be there. But that
wouldn't answer the question "Why are they there?"
The answer to that question could only be found by asking me, and I'd
say "I just put them there because I like looking at them."
Then someone would form a newsgroup to discuss this answer. Let's call
it uk.religion.bobs-ledge.
After that the trouble would start. Someone would be sure to point out
that it wasn't really feldspar but some related mineral. Then someone
else would say that it didn't matter.
There might be a posting pointing out that there was a lot of dust on
the bit of amber, and suggesting a dating based on this. Two posters
would query why there wasn't any dust on the bronze. Another poster
would point out timidly that the way to maintain the patina on bronze is
to keep handling it, and that was probably what I was doing.
Four people would then jump on her and say that there was no evidence
for the existence of Bob to do the handling.
Someone would post a lighbulb joke.
There would be a message suggesting that as the ng was called
uk.religion.bobs-ledge it was perfectly all right to post messages which
assumed the existence of Bob.
Then there'd be a funadmentalist sect who'd look up the word "just" in
the OED and insist that the literal meaning of "I just put them there"
was the only one. The objects must there have been put there "a little
time ago" and any dating based on the amount of dust was A DECEPTION and
A WORK OF THE DEVIL if it suggested they'd been there since last month.
Another poster would point out that the word "just" could mean "really"
and that this was in the OED as well. If this was the case they could
have been there for a month as the dust-dating suggested without denying
the literal truth of the original answer.
The fundies would get very upset and say that theis was DENYING THE
POWER OF BOB to put things where he liked, when he liked, with as much
dust as was needed to DECEIVE THE UNBELIEVERS who trusted in MAN'S
WISDOM. They would HOLD FAST TO THE TRUTH despite the VILE HERESY of the
previous poster.
The moderator would tell the fundies to back off.
The second lighbulb joke would be posted.
A couple of people would ask if the amount of dust on the ledge wasn't
proof that the objects were just there for no particular reason and that
there was no need to suppose the existence of Bob. And anyway if he
existed at all he'd dust occasionally.
You can continue this ad nauseam. But it goes to show two things. One is
how I think this sort of thing happens, the other is that the "weirdness
gap" between truth and fiction is a lot smaller than you think.
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