Yo Ho Ho
September 19th has come and gone, and those of us in the know celebrated International Talk Like A Pirate Day in what, according to statisticians everywhere, is a perfectly meaningful bid to reduce the chances of the planet over heating by inserting the phrase arrrrrrr into every sentence.
This bizarre, but perfectly provable theory comes from Bobby Henderson, Physics graduate from the University of Oregon, founder of the Church of Pastafarianism and one of burningpants‘ favourite pseudo scientists.
Pastafarians believe that the earth was created not by God (technically known as Yaweh if you want to get all Old Testament) but by a Flying Spaghetti Monster, who looks a fair bit like a lump of spaghetti and meatballs with eyes.
It’s easy to dismiss the idea of Pastafarianisim as a student prank, but Henderson had a serious purpose; he was reacting to the Texas Education Board teaching intelligent design (the idea that the earth was created in seven days by an intelligent being) as fact.
Using the same laws and process that the creationists used, Henderson wrote his treatise and had it published (Villard Press 2006, in case you are interested) and forced the Texas Education Board to consider it, with hilarious and far reaching consequences. His theory forced the whole process to be reconsidered, creating lasting fame for Henderson and a new cult for non believers to follow.
The other part of this is that Henderson as a specialist in Physics believes pretty firmly that the science of climate change is pretty shaky, and hence came up with the theory that the earth is warming not because we have been consuming fossil fuels, but because the number of pirates in the world has been decreasing.
The table shows that as the number of pirates has diminished, the global average temperature has steadily increased and that apparently it’s all worth our while to embrace the eye patch and sword ensemble.
It also heartily proves that statistics are capable of proving the most arrant nonsense and disproving the theory that Americans have no sense of humour.
2 Comments on “Yo Ho Ho”
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Irishman says:
Clever and amusing (my 3 yr old will be keen to get me in Captain Feathersword gear) – but false: intelligent design does not teach a literal 7 days of creation. But don’t let facts get in the way of a good story…
Skeptic says:
Reckon with the level of pirates in waters off Ethiopia and in straits of malacca, we should be cooling off nicely!
Then add the increase in video and music pirates plus the pirates of free speech and we are in for an ice age.
I Like the guy.