The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

The Benevolent Lord Our Savior or

Everlasting Damnation in Hellfire

Whichever side you fall on doesn’t really matter, because we’re all Americans. Still, any real American supports his or her inalienable right to have choices—and lots of ’em. For what are people without choices? Communists! And despite this fact, there are those who would bar the public from having an open and honest discussion about Intelligent Design, a scientific concept that’s so clear and logical as to appeal to Baptist holy men and intellectually discerning Formula One fans alike.

Sometimes I see the hypocrisy and just shake my head.

Granted, these are controversial issues we’re dealing with, and well-reasoned people do disagree on whether life as we know it was created by a benevolent and all-knowing Creator (ID)—or through a random and heartless struggle for dominance, commonly known as survival of the fittest (Evolution).

For the sake of clarity, allow me to use a simple analogy to explain these two very different versions of creation.

Say you want to buy one of those new flatscreen TVs that are so popular these days. According to the opposing theories of ID and Evolution, you might acquire that TV in two very different ways:

1. You could assume, quite fairly, that Intelligent Designers from Sony, Toshiba, and Sharp are actively producing new and affordable forty-two-inch, high-definition flatscreen TVs, which are then boxed and shipped to the nearest Wal-Mart or Circuit City for you to purchase. Or …

2. You could wait several million years for a new flatscreen TV to evolve spontaneously from a “soup” composed of mud, DNA, and spare television parts. Once this happens, you might attempt to drag your new television out of a swamp and back to your house (or more likely, cave) before a stranger comes swinging out of a tree, kills you and your children, then inseminates your wife with his own seed.

As you can see, both theories present potentially dramatic consequences for society. I’m not saying that one scenario is more valid than the other, but I will say that the Intelligent Design option is the first one. In the interest of fairness, I’ll also say that Evolution (or Natural Selection) is the one where your wife gets raped by a man who lives in a tree. Both theories present unique challenges.

When considering the two, ask yourself which makes more sense in your life.

Then ask yourself, Who’s making these arguments, anyway?

ID proponents can boast of several scientists—brave men who are willing to be called upon by name—to represent their views. You’ve seen these pro-ID champions on your televisions (which, we can safely assume, were designed by engineers and bought from a store … further proof). You’ve observed them being viciously attacked by activist judges, the liberal media, and a certain Bobby Henderson. But where are the men of science who speak out in support of Evolution?

A number of scientists have been cited in defense of Evolution, but if we examine the situation more closely we begin to see a disturbing pattern.

Names like Darwin, Einstein, Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, Ernst Meyer—and many other scientists who 95 percent of the country have never heard of—are offered up as men who’ve supported Evolution. Yet you’ve never seen one of these so-called scientists publicly defending their theory. Why?

Answer: Because they’re all dead.

Hmm … coincidence? When the pro-Evolutionary movement has to resort to dead scientists (who are probably a little warm right now, if you get my drift), it makes one wonder how good an argument they actually have. What’s next … bringing back Aristotle (a homosexual) and Ptolemy (forgotten) to argue for a flat earth? Given the pro-Evolutionists’ track record, that can’t be too far away.

Dead.

As I’ve stated, we do see living judges trying to wield their laws in the face of this highly scientific discussion. However, I predict that the well-prepared ID scientists will soon have liberal activist judges quaking in their penny loafers. These judges are much better suited for sanctioning same-sex marriage, and most of them are old and easily confused. Ignore their words and proclamations, for they tire easily.

The liberal media has also chimed in on the subject, only to be reminded that they’re just overpromoted weathermen with good hair, deep voices, and small penises. I don’t have conclusive evidence on this last point, but looking at news anchormen I’m pretty sure it’s true. Don’t worry about the media, they’ll lose interest as soon as forest fire season returns.

Aside from dead scientists, activist judges, and the liberal media, one other man has arisen as a voice for the Evolutionists—if not necessarily to argue for Evolution, then at least to mock the ID movement. We know little about this man, who hails from the Pacific Northwest and calls himself “Bobby Henderson.”

Far be it from me to cast stones, but there are disturbing rumors about him going around. I read on the Internet that he’s not even a scientist. Also, a very reliable source reports that he lied about his military record. I hear that he’s been divorced three times and sleeps in a crypt. Not all of these rumors are verified, but if we’re to let this lying divorcé, who may or may not be a shape-shifting night creature, take a lead on this important debate, I can only pray for the redemption of this country.

In conclusion, I would like to return to my original argument: We the People need choices. We need as many choices as possible, and we can’t allow the leftist cabal of scientists, judges, Bobby Henderson, and the media to take these choices away from us. Write to your congressmen and demand that ID be taught in schools. Write to your religious leaders and demand that they write to your congressmen.

If we don’t act now, I fear the day will come when judges and the media are free to operate with little regard for the tempering hand of public outrage. Laws will be passed and upheld, and only judges will be able to rule on them. The media will report the news without threat of legal action. To put it bluntly, the god-hating communists will have finally won.

I wonder if they’ll appoint Bobby Henderson to be their dictator.

Toward a New SuperScience (#ulink_e806bb7d-7c57-5054-a433-9f7628f29868)

WE ARE ENTERING INTO AN EXCITING TIME, when no longer will science be limited to natural explanations. Who is to say that there aren’t supernatural forces—magic, some might call it—at work, controlling events around us? Propelled by popular opinion and local government, science is quickly becoming receptive to all logical theories, natural and supernatural alike. Not since the Middle Ages have we seen such open-minded science policy.

What is science, really? Some might call it the observational, descriptive, experimental, and theoretical explanation of phenomena. And so, not surprisingly, there are a few who argue that supernatural theories have no place in science, since they make no testable claims about the world. But that idea is a little shortsighted. Science is also a collection of tools whose purpose is to enable mankind to solve problems. In this sense, supernatural—or magic, metaphysical, not real, what have you—theories have the potential to be just as helpful, if not more helpful, than the standard natural-only science we’ve used for the last two hundred years.

Extending the science tool metaphor further, shouldn’t we endeavor to give scientists the largest collection of tools possible? No one is saying that they have to apply a supernatural explanation to any particular phenomenon, only that the supernatural be available if nothing else works, or if it is convenient for deceptive political purposes. And remember, this is not a radical new idea. In terms of years in use, supernatural science—SuperScience, if you will—has the edge on conventional science. Conventional, or empirical, science has been in use for only a few hundred years. Obviously there must be a reason supernatural science lasted so long, before this empirical-science fad began. Could it be that supernatural science is more productive than empirical science?

Consider the discovery and development of new land, an important scientific pursuit by anyone’s standard. If we compare a period of time in which supernatural science was the norm—say the years A.D. 1400

(#ulink_b68eafe9-f5be-5bec-a5e5-90108cf0057b) to 1600, to a period of time in which empirical science was preferred—say the years 1800 to 2000—we can get a clear picture of just how detrimental empirical science can be.

Here, empirical science comes up short even with every technological advantage it possesses. Even with satellite imagery and GPS navigation, scientists bound by the chains of empiricism have been unable to discover even a paltry 3 percent of the amount of new land that their supernatural-science counterparts found in an equal period of time. Scientists and explorers in the years 1400–1600 had few maps, only a compass, cross-staff, or astrolabe for navigation, and no motorized transportation. Yet even with these setbacks, they still managed to discover more than 14 million square kilometers of new, developable land. Clearly their openness to supernatural forces had something to do with their success, and we can only guess that they were guided to these newfound lands by some creature—most likely the Flying Spaghetti Monster, as historical art suggests.

SUPERNATURAL SCIENCE

Years 1400–1600

14.5 million sq km

EMPIRICAL SCIENCE

Years 1800–2000

0.3 million sq km

It’s only logical to assume that returning to balanced methods of science—natural theories and supernatural theories both—would allow us to find more land, something we greatly need for our growing population. More land means more resources, and more resources means fewer starving children. I can safely say, then, that anyone against the inclusion of supernatural theories into science wants children to starve. Such people obviously have no place in policymaking, and so I suggest that they get no say on the issue.

The Italian explorer Christopher Columbus was guided by a Higher Power.

Next, we’ll look at medicine. It might seem crazy to claim that medicine was superior in the Middle Ages—when science included the supernatural—than it is today—being now limited to the study of natural phenomena—but let’s take a closer look. Medieval medicine was dominated by religion, and yes, sickness was generally thought to be punishment for sins, and so treatment then consisted mainly of prayer. But let’s not forget about the “antiquated” medical procedures that were ultimately so successful as to render them unnecessary today.

Bloodletting, the removal of considerable amounts of blood from a patient’s body, is considered heinous by today’s supposedly superior doctors, but who is to say that the procedure didn’t do more good than modern medicine? Medical texts from the Middle Ages—anyone with even a moderate understanding of Latin can read them, and we have no reason to doubt their validity—tell us that many ailments, from headaches to cancer, are the result of evil spirits who are angry with us. We now know, of course, that there are many causes for these ailments, not just spirits at work, but it’s clear from the texts that they were a very significant cause of sickness—one that does not exist today, because bloodletting worked so well as to defeat these sickness spirits completely, much the same way polio was cured with high doses of vitamin C. To those who disagree, let me ask you: When was the last time you suffered a demon-induced fever?

But there are more diseases out there, and it’s apparent that medical science, equipped with only modern methods, cannot defeat them all. Why not, then, give these doctors and scientists more tools and the flexibility to consider supernatural causes as well as natural ones? Who knows what other ailments, even non-demon-induced ones, might be cured with a simple bloodletting or application of leeches? We’ll never know until we try.

And while it’s true that many people believe in the power of prayer to cure disease, there’s never been any verifiable evidence to support the practice. That’s not to say it’s not possible—it certainly is possible that prayer aids in healing—but it could very well be that these prayers are being applied in a nonoptimal fashion, thus explaining the lack of evidence for their effectiveness. The truth is we don’t know because current scientific methods and religious sensitivities don’t allow this type of study. What if those praying are simply praying to the wrong God, or offending Him somehow? What if, by the wearing of a simple eye patch or Pirate bandanna, those praying might have their prayers answered by the FSM?

History is full of examples of supernatural events, and unless we are saying that we’re somehow more intelligent and educated, better equipped to understand unexplained events today than we were five hundred years ago, then we must accept the explanations given to these events by those who witnessed them. Witches, for example, existed in such quantity and caused so much trouble that it was necessary to hunt them down and burn them in the tens of thousands. Here it is, the twenty-first century, hundreds of years later, plenty of time for the population of witches to have grown exponentially, yet they are decidedly less of a problem now than they were half a millennia ago. I have never even seen a witch, let alone felt the need to burn one to death. We can conclude, then, that our forefathers, equipped with the knowledge that supernatural explanations were reasonable, rounded up all the witches in existence and took care of them.

The other possibility is that there are witches out there, hiding somewhere, plotting their revenge, liberally applying fireproofing compounds to themselves. And someday they may reappear and start causing trouble. And then what will our high and mighty scientists do? Throw calculators at them? Witches eat calculators. The scientific community will be helpless to defeat the threat of these witches, offering only “logical” and “reasoned” explanations for the horrible events the witches are magically inflicting on us.

We tend to exalt our rigid empirical methods and technological advances, almost as if we’re proud of what we’ve accomplished with them, but when the record clearly shows that supernatural, nonempirical science produces these kinds of results—the discovery of new lands, the elimination of demon-inducing illnesses, and the extinction of witches—it’s time to rethink our methods and return to what gave us real results.

Witch eating a calculator.

The biggest irony is that the arguments given against the inclusion of supernatural theories in the realm of accepted science actually show clearly that supernatural theories are legit fields of scientific study. No one is saying that empirical, natural-only science and supernatural science can’t live side by side. They can, and in fact, they must. Intelligent design may shun natural explanations for phenomena, but FSMism makes use of both the natural and the supernatural equally.

FSMISM