There was an opening hymn, which everyone sang, including the new convert, Sister Z, just in front of me. But it soon became apparent that she wasn’t singing the same hymn as everyone else. She was singing some kind of high-pitched melody that only she could hear. Rather loudly, too. And she didn’t stop singing at the end of the verse, she just kept on singing with her head pointed to the ceiling. Something was wrong.

“Dad, what’s she doing?” asked Youngest Boy.

“She’s having a problem in her mind,” I said, wondering what to do. “Just stay calm.”

The hymn ended, but her strange singing continued. The congregation stayed awkwardly silent. Then she started hitting herself in the chest. The person next to her tried to talk her down, but it wasn’t working. Sister Z got up and began shouting at the silent congregation.

“This is an adulterous church!” she shouted in the aisle. “You can’t tell me to be quiet! I will burn your skin.” And so on for about a minute.

It was then that she approached the stand and tried to go for the mike, but the bishop refused to yield. Instead he said, “Brothers and sisters, could I just ask you to quietly leave the chapel and go into the cultural hall.” Which everyone did.

An emergency team soon arrived. They’d seen Sister Z before; apparently this wasn’t a new thing for her.

People were confused and concerned. Fortunately we had some mental health professionals in the ward. Brother B had a brief chat to the adults, and Sister C spoke to the Primary children. All in all, the incident was handled very well.

For me, the notable thing about the incident was the practical way in which everyone handled it. Mormons do believe in the devil, and anecdotes about satanic possession do exist, but they’re not common. I think loads of Latter-day Saints would argue that devils could be cast out using the Priesthood. But how did the people of the Church handle the affair? They called in people who were trained and had experience in that area, like any sensible person would.

If this had happened in a born-again church, it would have been handled totally differently. Demonic possession? No problem! Some of the brethren grab her, the bishop commands Satan to leave, she barfs, end of story. Great meeting! Until next time she has a psychotic episode because the problem hasn’t been solved.

No, they handled it the right way — the non-spiritual, material way. Sensible people know that when you need something done, you don’t rely on spirits. You do what works. You don’t pray to get your sink fixed. You call a plumber. Of course, you could try and sneak God in somewhere, perhaps by praying that the plumber will know what he or she’s doing. The idea has worked its way into proverb: “God helps those who help themselves.” Or this modern homily: “Pray as if everything depended on the Lord, and then work as if everything depended on you.” Or as Voltaire put it: “It is unquestionable that certain words and ceremonies will effectually destroy a flock of sheep, if administered with a sufficient portion of arsenic.”

That which we call ‘spiritual’ is actually just made up. Therefore it’s only good in situations where
a) you can’t do anything about the problem (it makes you feel better)
b) you’re already doing something practical about the problem (and then when it works, you credit God instead)
c) it’s not a very serious problem that you don’t need solved, or
d) the problem relates only to ‘spiritual things’ and not the physical world in any way.

And these are in fact the situations in which people seek spiritual guidance. But when they need to do something real, even believers know that it’s the non-spiritual methods that work.

Has it really been almost a week without a blogpost? You know what that means: I’m out of the running for the Bloggy McBlog Award for Most Pathologically Prolific Self-Expression Despite Deadlines and Actual Work. Drat.

But this page inspired me. It’s an essay by Richard Dawkins to his 10-year-old daughter.

The way scientists use evidence to learn about the world is much cleverer and more complicated than I can say in a short letter. But now I want to move on from evidence, which is a good reason for believing something , and warn you against three bad reasons for believing anything. They are called “tradition,” “authority,” and “revelation.”

I like that he’s mentioned ‘revelation’ specifically. Let’s skip to that.

If you had asked the pope in 1950 how he knew that Mary’s body disappeared into Heaven, he would probably have said that it had been “revealed” to him. He shut himself in his room and prayed for guidance. He thought and thought, all by himself, and he became more and more sure inside himself. When religious people just have a feeling inside themselves that something must be true, even though there is no evidence that it is true, they call their feeling “revelation.”

That description is not a straw man. It is part and parcel of what Latter-day Saints expect to get out of the religious experience, and it is a key reason for believing people to hold the beliefs they do. It’s also the hardest to counter. People have a natural tendency to believe their own experiences, and it’s very difficult to disbelieve your experience when it runs counter to fact. This tendency kept me believing in counterfactual things for absolutely years.

The essay is everything I wanted to say to my kids about evidence (and some things I already have).

I really hope I never piss off James Wolcott. I’d hate to find myself eviscerated in a similar manner to Dinesh D’Souza.

D’Souza has written… something… entitled “The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11”. Yep. If you’re liberal, you’re responsible for 9/11. Nothing’s ever their fault, is it?

I doubt I could add anything to Wolcott’s post, but I’ll try. If I understand correctly, D’Souza’s point is that the Left is responsible for 9/11 because we’re too liberal and Muslims hate us for it.

“There is no way to restore the culture without winning the war on terror. Conversely, the only way to win the war on terror is to win the culture war. Thus we arrive at a sobering truth. In order to crush the Islamic radicals abroad, we must defeat the enemy at home.”

So we need to turn into the kind of people Muslims like so they won’t attack us? Hey, I’ve got an idea. Let’s institute sharia law. They’ll never attack us then!

Talk about an appeaser. Forget that. I like the idea of a liberal secular America, like the Framers intended.

You may not know Frank Luntz, but his work forms part of your mind.

You know how everyone gets so upset about ‘global warming’, but not so much about ‘climate change’? That phrase is Luntz’s handiwork.

Or have you ever had an immediate visceral reaction to the screaming meat of a ‘partial-birth abortion’? Luntz again.

His grubby fingerprints are all over the political discourse. Do you think he ever feels bad about using his linguistic gift for evil and not for good? Well, he’s hacked up a sort of non-apology in the pages of Time. Check out this lede:

In 1994, pollster Frank Luntz helped congressional Republicans sweep into power. Now he says the G.O.P. has become everything it once swore to destroy.

Having aided and abetted the most damaging administration of the last two centuries, it now seems a little late to be hairshirting. But better late than never. Let’s hear what he’s got to say.

What went wrong? Why do Democrats finally appear to be heading toward electoral success and Republicans back into the political wilderness? In a word, fatigue. Americans are tired of the war, tired of watching illegal aliens race across our unguarded borders, tired of high energy costs, tired of wasteful Washington spending, and tired of story after story of political corruption and misbehavior.

Ooo, this sounds good. I love a good redemption story. But wait! the guy’s a linguist, and therefore not one to underestimate. He may just be getting our trust so he can sneak in his poison. Warily we continue:

The leaders of the Republican Party in 1994 were bold, passionate visionaries with the courage to go to the people with a clearly defined agenda. Issues and principles drove them. Today, their agenda stretches no further than the next election. The same people who were elected on a platform of change have become the establishment bulls who fight change today. The 1994 Republicans advocated balanced budgets. Today, they defend deficits. The 1994 Republicans wanted to eliminate government programs. Today, they propose and create them. The 1994 Republicans held themselves and Congress to a higher ethical standard. Today, they seem more interested in protecting their jobs than protecting the people they serve. They came to change Washington. Washington won.

Um, wait a minute. Isn’t this some of that good old anti-Washington crap we’ve heard from the Republicans for years? Pity those good souls — they just wanted to make a difference in the world! And what did Washington do? It destroyed those noble-hearted boys! (Sniff) I’m sorry. I’ll continue.

It is therefore not surprising that in a recent national poll we conducted, 10% of the electorate that traditionally votes Republican, won’t. This time, these Republican leaners (disproportionately older women) will split their tickets. For while Republicans are frustrated with their party, they’re not happy with the Democratic alternative, either.It is therefore not surprising that in a recent national poll we conducted, 10% of the electorate that traditionally votes Republican, won’t. This time, these Republican leaners (disproportionately older women) will split their tickets. For while Republicans are frustrated with their party, they’re not happy with the Democratic alternative, either.

Interesting, but I’m waiting for the exact moment that he tries to stick in the knife.

And make no mistake — the Democrats are no better.

There it is! Thanks for playing — you spotted the real point of the article: ‘They’re all a bunch of no-gooders.’ Which is secretly what inattentive voters think anyway. Why not vote Republican — it doesn’t make any difference anyway.

They have launched a hundred criticisms but offer no meaningful solutions.

Fred: I’ve got an idea. Let’s start wars, destroy the government, enslave humankind, and take all the money for ourselves!

Ned: What are you, a psychopath? That’s a terrible idea.

Fred: All you do is criticise my ideas. You never come up with any of your own.

When you’re the minority party, and the other party locks you out of negotiations, there’s no point in coming up with ‘meaningful solutions’.

They rebuffed efforts to introduce a party platform because they felt they could gain more seats by attacking Republicans rather than explaining what they believe.

See above.

And on and on. This is not a confessional. It’s a fake retreat. Now you see his game.

Meet the real Frank Luntz. Linguist. Republican. Asshole.

How stupid are you? Depends on which of these truly loopy notions from recent opinion polls you agree with. If you go all the way to the bottom, please back away from the computer and call a professional helping person.

The rest of you may find this list fruitful when discussing notions of Rock Bottom on opinion polls. Some posit a relationship between Rock Bottom and Absolute Stupid, but Rock Bottom is believed to be issue-specific, whereas Absolute Stupid is assumed to be more or less constant.

• People who approve of the job Bush is doing: 36%
• People who think abortion should always be illegal: 24%
• People who think that America is ready to elect an atheist as president: 14% (Not that this is a terrible idea. I’m for it, but is America ready? Crazy talk!)
• People who think gas will cost ‘a lot less’ by the end of the year: %9
• People who say the war in Iraq is going ‘very well’: 6%
• People who say that the Foley scandal (where the Republican leadership tried to cover up a Republican pedophile senator) would make them more likely to vote Republican: 4%

Data from Polling Report.