PZ Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris. Unfortunately he is also a self-important, humorless, autofellating, ass hat, or at least that is one theory which Scott Adams has put forward.Having been a reader of Dilbert books for some time, and a reader of Scott Adams own blog for the last little while I am inclined to accept Adams word on this. But then, I also like to think I have the power to make up my own mind (Adams would assert that free will is an illusion, and perhaps that this means I'm not really making up my own mind). Still I visited Myers' blog pharyngula and had a look at his post on Adams' writing. In it Myers admits that he is humourless, although, like many humourless people he then criticises the humour of Adams. Fool, he can't understand that as someone humourless he is in no position to judge humour in others. Imagine if you will, I am a chef (I am not hence the imagination bit) you have come to my restaurant despite having no sense of taste. Am I then going to accept your complaint that the soup is flavourless? Myers doesn't admit to being an autofellating, ass hat, and I can't comment on that from reading a couple of blog posts, but he certainly comes across as self important.
Still, enough deriding of the man who criticised my guru. Onto the meat of the point, why should you accept Adams is a brilliant philosopher, seeking to make the world a better place.
Firstly I would point you to his classic works on the stupidity of western corporate culture, The Dilbert Principle and The Dogbert Top Secret Management Handbook either of which you should find at any half decent bookshop or public library. These works, while satirical are in fact profound reflections on the nature of the world in which many of us are forced to exist. Adams finds ways to illustrate and express what many of us have felt but been unable to articulate.
He goes further on his blog (and in his book God's Debris) with his discussions of theology (of a type), cosmology and free will. For example on a recent post he discusses free will. "My understanding of the human mind is that our reasons are just rationalizations for our urges."
He also expresses why he keeps posting on these topics despite the many cries for him to 'stick to humour'. Or perhaps, how he rationalises his decision to keep posting.
"The part I like the most is the comments. I like the smart comments because they make me think. I like the dumb ones because they fascinate me and make me feel smart at the same time. I like the funny comments because they make me laugh. And the whole process makes me feel connected to something larger than myself."
So despite being a Christian and a believer in free will, my Guru is an atheist who believes we are all 'moist robots'. After all, if you can't laugh at yourself then you're obviously a self-important, humorless, autofellating, ass hat.
1 comment:
If Scott Adams hadn't been lucky enough to be really good at making money off of frustrated corporate drones, he would have been an internet troll. His “musings” are so shallow and unaligned with reality that they don’t even qualify as pseudo-philosophy.
I suppose that if you are fed up with ignorant people who consider themselves experts on your life’s work then you could be perceived as a “self-important asshat”--by people who would like to fellate Scott Adams.
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