my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
"huh."
my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@zebratron2084 my thoughts: "Wait, who?"
my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@zebratron2084
I thought he was already dead because I guess I mentally marked as "the end of his life" the point at which he unilaterally decided that the word "skeptic" which he had built up all his life now included climate change denial, out of pure libertarian peer pressure, and opened the door for all kinds of other science deniers to use it. So I thought "This is just an empty shell, being led around by parasites until his body stops moving." While that took longer than I expected, it's still worth saying that before then, he did a lot of good work which is not undone with him.
my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@zebratron2084
I also think it's very nice that Penn & Teller have chilled out and returned to their own lane, but I still want an oil executive to appear on Fool Us and say "We made you believe Argument From Ignorance was good enough to reject climate science that we actually knew about. My shitty trophy, please."
re: my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@Cerulean I definitely soured on him after reading Will Storr's "The Unpersuadables." He communicated with Randi for the book (IIRC) and discovered that he genuinely, literally did not believe he was likely to have been wrong about a single opinion of significance in the entire course of his life. Once it was affirmed he was THAT kind of "rationalist," he was drummed right out of my heart. I did enjoy watch him debunk that guy on Real People though. *shrug*
If it gives you any sense of reassurance, though... the Reddit skeptic subreddit has taken a HARD turn to the left in recent times, and seems to have a strong going consensus that anthropogenic climate changes is damn real.
Now, don't get me wrong. They are still jerks.</leela>
re: my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@Cerulean oh on an unrelated note, poker quest is so good, thank you for recommending it! <3 <3
re: my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@zebratron2084 It's okay, he's in Heaven now and really mad about it.
my thoughts on the recent death of james randi
@zebratron2084 I had honestly thought he'd died already. I mean, he was doing stuff with Johnny Carson back when Carson was on *telegraph wires*.