As readers of this site know, May 27, 2012, is the time that I have stated as being the date Jesus Christ will return as King of kings over all government on this earth. For such an event to come to pass, the Trumpets of Revelation must all sound, the United States and dollar collapse, the ten nations of Europe arise to fulfill the final revival of the Holy Roman Empire, and Russia with China must unite against Europe in WWIII.
As an aside, readers of this site should also grasp that as far as prophecy is concerned, ten nations in Europe have already combined in association with one another to the degree that the mixture of clay and iron is fulfilled. All that remains is their entrance into a final war, a prophecy that can be fulfilled quickly, as this posting will cover.
How is it possible or even conceivable that all these things can happen in such a short time? And what if none of these events have occurred as late as five, four, or even three days before Jesus Christ is to return? Is it truly reasonable that Christ is coming on May 27th? No, it is not reasonable, not within the parameters of man’s thinking. When this date was given just over three and a half years ago, it was not reasonable to people then, and now it has simply become that much more unreasonable.
But as the last apostle in this age, and as God’s end-time prophet, I am still telling people that this is true and that a short-lived WWIII is now at our doorstep. Due to this strong conviction, the Church of God – PKG is putting all its resources into promoting this final message of Christ’s impending return in order to complete the “work” that God has given us to do. This “work” is nearly complete. As my previous post was written over two months ago, this may well prove to be my final one, since there are only four weeks remaining in this age. …
Folks, as the saying goes, this is deja vu all over again. Here we are, on the day after supposed armaggedon, and there’s no nuclear holocaust, no fire raining down from heaven, no Rapture, and no return of Jesus Christ. In fact, things seem to be moving right along just as they were yesterday and the day before that (and so on…).
Need I point out the obvious, yet again? The obvious being that every single time one of these religious fundamentalists rants about the end-of-the-world, they end up being wrong. And, for the record, over the course of human civilization, there have been a LOT of these failed predictions!
Which begs the next obvious question: why does anyone bother to listen to these so-called “prophets” anymore?
Despite the faux-surprise in the title of this post, I am not in the least surprised that there’s yet another true-believer who is trying to convince their followers that the end-of-the-world is just around the corner…
Ronald Weinland, who considers himself a prophet of God, continues to warn that Jesus Christ is returning on May 27, 2012.
For those who do not believe him and mock his message, Weinland claims that they will die from cancer.
His website, Church of God – PKG, claims that various end times events were triggered by the scattering of the Worldwide Church of God after the death of its founder, Herbert W. Armstrong. With Armstrong no longer at the helm, Weinland claims he “is the pastor of God’s Church on earth, has also been appointed by the God of Abraham to be His end-time prophet and one of the two end-time witnesses (and spokesman of both), preceding the return of Jesus Christ on May 27, 2012.” …
I like the whole “you’ll die from cancer for mocking me” bit; it just seems to show that the good “Prophet” Weinland is full of Christs’s love.
Thankfully, most people will wisely ignore doom-mongers such as this self-proclaimed “Prophet”, but there will be those will be bamboozled. As for me, I just cannot wait to see what sort of excuses are offered on May 28th 😉
I just wanted to take a few minutes to pass along to you a fundraising campaign from the James Randi Educational Foundation’s “Season of Reason 2011”. The poster boy for this campaign is none other than James Randi himself, because do you know any other skeptic who looks more like Santa? See for yourself…
Is Santa really James Randi? Hmmm, I’m skeptical, but the resemblance is uncanny… (Images from Wikipedia and the JREF) 😉
All humor aside, I can say that the JREF is one of the most active of all the skeptical organizations out there, and they indeed serve the purpose of promoting reason quite effectively. If you have a few spare dollars you’re willing to donate, please consider making an end-of-the-year tax deductible donation to the JREF – here is James Randi’s letter seeking donations for this worthy cause…
Friends,
As we near the end of 2011, I’m pleased to say that this has been the JREF’s most productive and effective year on record.
We’ve made some major strides this year in standing up for rational thinking in a world of widespread belief in the paranormal and other harmful claims — our media work including our appearance on Primetime Nightline, our nationwide challenge to proponents of homeopathy and the pharmaceutical chains that peddle it, our zombie horde that made headlines at James Van Praagh’s “Spirit Circle,” our new free educational materials, the grants and scholarships we’ve awarded, our support for local grassroots activism, our new ebooks and mobile apps, the ever-increasing success of TAM, and much more!
None of that would have happened if not for the support we received from concerned and dedicated skeptics and science advocates like you during last year’s Season of Reason. Like most other nonprofits, the majority of our annual donations come in during this critical year-end period, and that largely keeps us going for the following year.
Now we at the JREF are focused squarely on 2012… and it’s beginning to look a lot like reason.
We’re gearing up to enter 2012 with some momentum – and thanks to the hard work and dedication of the JREF staff, we’re preparing exciting new initiatives for coming months, as well as expanding several current projects. But I must tell you that it is only with your generous support that we can possibly do this. …
We’ve made yet another journey around the Sun, and once again the annual celebration of Carl Sagan’s life and legacy is upon us. If you have never read his pivotal work, Cosmos: A Personal Journey, I highly recommend it. Sagan and his work was responsible for encouraging so many people, like me, into pursuing science and the study of the natural universe with a sense of awe and wonder. As a quick tribute to Carl Sagan, I would like to share with you a very popular music video from YouTube called “A Glorious Dawn”, which is based on one of the key ideas in Cosmos…
“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the Universe…” 😀
For many of us who are in our 30s and 40s, we were inspired to become interested in science as a direct result of astronomer Carl Sagan’s public advocacy of science (most especially through his ground-breaking book and TV-series Cosmos). In honor of Carl Sagan and his accomplishments, as well as a way of promoting the public acceptance of science, we can celebrate Carl Sagan Day on Saturday, Nov. 12th – look up an event in your area!
Robert H Lurie Medical Research Center of Northwestern University
Hughes Auditorium
303 E. Superior St.
Chicago, IL
You’re invited to Chicago’s Carl Sagan Day 2011! Come meet up and hang out with Chicago’s secular community, right in the heart of downtown. We’ll be hosting a panel on Science, Skepticism, and the Legacy of Carl Sagan!
(Panelists TBA)
Food* and drink** will be provided!
Sponsored by:
DePaul Alliance for Free Thought
Northwestern University Secular Student Alliance
University of Chicago Secular Alliance
Women Thinking Free Foundation
*includes apple pie from scratch
**includes cosmos (21+)
We look forward to seeing you there! Talk to your group leaders for travel arrangements.
In this quick post, I wanted to share the footage from the physics demonstration show I did at Dragon*Con in Atlanta, GA over Labor Day weekend, 2011. Working with me on the show was Dr. Pamela Gay (of Astronomy Cast fame) and Jerry Hester (physics demo expert at Clemson University). We had a really fun time doing all of these demonstrations, and I think you can see the show was quite a hit! So sit back and enjoy the show 🙂
It should be noted that at one point in the show, right before the final bed-of-nails demo, the audience is watching a video off to the side. To see what they were watching and why they were laughing so hard at the end of it, see my “Bed of Nails Blooper” video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9RLfUmju2A (start at the 3 minute 45 sec mark).
In recent weeks and days, there seems to be another controversy raging within the skeptical blogosphere – this one concerning social interactions between men and women at conferences (and, I assume, in general). In short, some guys are acting like douchebags and they’re not getting the message. Since I just returned from Skepchicon/Convergence 2011 in Minneapolis where I spent a lot of time with the ladies of Skepchick, I wanted to put in my $0.02 worth on this whole fracas.
First, some background… It seems the whole thing got started when Rebecca Watson of Skepchick wrote about an encounter she had with a man in an elevator in Dublin. Long story short: the guy propositioned her, and she said no; she also felt somewhat cornered seeing as how she was stuck, alone, in a metal cage with the guy. Apparently, there were a number of people who thought she handled the situation poorly (especially by blogging about it and noting the inappropriate behavior on the part of the man in question).
Further, PZ Myers of Pharyngula – whom I also hung out with at Skepchicon/Convergence 2011 – has chimed in with his thoughts on the matter in a well-written series of blog posts:
I want to spend the remainder of this post just expressing my thoughts on this whole subject. First of all, ask I stated earlier, I just got done spending four days with the Skepchicks at Skepchicon, where I was in the minority in terms of formal presentations – on every single panel I participated in, I was the only man. I have no problem with that, because – as I stated in an earlier post about diversity in skepticism – it allowed me to get a sense of what it is like to be in the minority and to see the various issues from a female perspective.
In addition, I spent a good deal of time with the Skepchicks in a social sense; I even shared a room with a couple of them for the conference. During that time, I heard them open up about a lot of things that concern them as women, including the reaction from some men regarding this whole backlash against Rebecca Watson. And that brings me to my next point…
In general, men are much larger and stronger than women, and this – combined with our built-in drive to have sex as much as possible – goes a long way towards explaining why it is that women react the way they do, especially when a guy is being a douchebag. Think about it from a woman’s perspective, such as in the case of Rebecca in that elevator with the creeper: you are alone, you are smaller, you are weaker, there are no avenues of escape, and there’s this bigger, stronger, and clearly horny guy who wants to do you. Now the creeper did take “no” for an answer and backed off, but the mere fact that he set up such a situation in the first place is enough to put a woman off. In a very real sense, the woman in this scenario is likely to feel more like prey than anything else, and that’s not a good feeling.
Unfortunately, most men don’t have this experience because we are usually the “hunters”, but perhaps I can provide some perspective on this for my fellow hetero males. Years ago, when I was in college, I went to a party with my brother where pretty much everyone was a gay man, except my brother and me. The word had gone out that we were straight, so all the other guys knew we were off limits sexually and just there to hang out with our friends. However, one fellow came to the party late and hadn’t gotten the message, and he apparently took a fancy to me. Now, I know how to take care of myself, but this guy was bigger than me and very clearly interested in me – the fact that he was hopelessly drunk didn’t make things better. All he did was leer at me from across the room all night, much in the same manner in which a drunken heterosexual man will leer at a woman, but it made me feel very uncomfortable. I later relayed the experience to some female friends of mine, and their reaction was universal: that’s exactly what it feels like to be a woman!
Get the point, gents?
Allow me to relay another story about something which happened at the Skepchick party this weekend at Skepchicon/Convergence to emphasize my point even more. I won’t go into much detail given the sensitive nature of the event, but it is worth mentioning, I think. During the Skepchick party on Friday night, a guy came to the party and went around the end of the bar where drinks were being served and grabbed, bodily and quite aggressively, one of the women serving the booze – and she most certainly did NOT wish to be grabbed and groped. Fortunately, me and one other person were keeping an eye on things and we immediately defused the situation by escorting the douchebag out of our party; we even went so far as to get him completely ejected from Convergence for his excessive douchebaggery.
My point is that we were in a situation where there were plenty of people around, the woman in question was not a small woman (she was, in fact, larger than her assailant), the situation was quickly and efficiently handled, and even then she was still rather disturbed and shaken up by the whole thing. I’m certain it’s not something she will forget quickly or easily. Not only that, but a lot of the other women at the party were pretty upset about it. It put a real bummer on the entire evening, and I saw – once again – how it is that women can so easily feel threatened by guys who act like douchebags.
In conclusion, I want to try sending a clear message to my fellow men: women don’t dig douchebags. It’s okay to be a guy, it’s okay to be attracted to women at conferences, it’s okay to flirt with them and even proposition them – provided they are interested as well. It is NOT okay to be a dick about any of the above behavior. Such behavior will quickly and justly earn you the title of douchebag.
So, a sensitive and thinking guy might ask, how do I go about behaving in an appropriate manner on these questions? Here’s a simple solution: try talking to the women you know in your life and asking them. And then – surprise – take their advice! Think with the heads on your shoulders, instead of the ones beneath your pants, a little more and you may be surprised at how much progress you can make in your relationships with women.
I know that I’ve blogged a couple of times already (here and here) about the supposed impending “Rapture” coming up this coming Saturday, May 21st. But while I’ve written there about how loony of an idea this whole Christ-is-returning-so-it’s-the-end-of-the-world is – mostly because there are so many failed doomsday predictions that were supposedly ironclad before they failed epically – one thing I haven’t yet done is to actually seriously analyze the claims made by the would-be prophet of this weekend’s Armageddon festivities, the good Rev. Harold Camping.
It’s Judgement Day!!!
My oh my, that Jesus is one fine lookin’ dude! I wonder who does his hair? 🙂
In the following Livescience.com article, the rationale (such as it is) for Camping’s predictions is outlined. Let’s take a look at the argument and then take it seriously just long enough to show the logical flaws within it, right before we piss ourselves with laughter…
The May 21 Judgment Day meme is the brainchild of an 89-year-old radio evangelist named Harold Camping. Using a mathematical system of his own creation to interpret obscure prophecies in the Bible, Camping originally predicted that Sept. 6, 1994 would be Judgment Day, or the day of the “Rapture” when Christian believers will ascend to heaven, leaving the rest of humanity to its deservedly dreary fate.
Hold on, right there. Camping has made such a prediction before? Yes, he did – he predicted the world would end almost 17 years ago… and the world is still here. Also note this key phrase: “… Using a mathematical system of his own creation…” – what this basically means is that Camping has created a system of numerology which would allow him to manipulate the numbers of his calculation in such a fashion as to give him whatever result he wants. In other words, using such a system, folks like Camping can’t fail… that is, until they actually fail, which is what happened to Camping on Sept. 7, 1994 when we were all still here. But that’s the beauty of using slipshod and ad hoc mathematical systems such as Camping’s: since they are essentially made up out of whole cloth with the express purpose of “never failing”, a missed prediction can easily be discounted when “corrections” to the calculations are magically uncovered after the fact. This, like the thinking driving conspiracy theorizing, shows that such a system is clearly unfalsifiable: it is always right, even when it’s wrong.
The article continues:
… Here’s the gist of Camping’s calculation: He believes Christ was crucified on April 1, 33 A.D., exactly 722,500 days before May 21, 2011. That number, 722,500, is the square of 5 x 10 x 17. In Camping’s numerological system, 5 represents atonement, 10 means completeness, and seventeen means heaven. “Five times 10 times 17 is telling you a story,” Camping said on his Oakland-based talk show, Family Radio, last year. “It’s the story from the time Christ made payment for your sins until you’re completely saved.”
Okay, once again note that these numbers only make sense “in Camping’s numerological system” – which he made up. What is the rationale which justifies Camping’s numerological system as being superior to that of other failed doomsday prophets (such as Nostradamus and those claiming the Mayan calendar portends The End on Dec. 21, 2012)? And why does Camping settle on 722,500 days? Why not 722,500 seconds, minutes, months, years, or centuries? What is so special about days in Camping’s system which distinguishes them from any other unit of temporal measurement? And, assuming there is some kind of reason (whatever that could be) for using days as units, why is it that you have to multiply and subsequently square 5, 10, and 17? Why not simply add them up? Or just multiply without squaring? Or add them up and then square the result? Why not raise the product of these numbers to the third power? What is the rationale behind this calculation which explains why it could be considered trustworthy – other than, of course, the fact that it just happens to give a “prediction” of the world’s end, conveniently, during Camping’s lifetime?
And last, but not least, here’s a good question to ponder: if the Rapture is supposed to come on Saturday, May 21st, on which side of the International Date Line is that going to happen? Will the Rapture follow the rotation of the Earth, seeing as how some parts of the planet will still be on Friday night time while other portions will be on early Saturday morning time? Or is it supposed to just kind of go “poof!” all at once? But if it does that, then it can’t all happen on the same day – and why doesn’t Camping take this into account in his calculations? You can see the problem here.
Now that I’ve taken this stupidity seriously for a bit, it is now time to treat it as the utter silliness that it most certainly is: I’m off to go get ready for the After Rapture Party & Looting 😉
The Skeptical Teacher 