It seems some folks are mad at Dr Pepper. The Doctor made the egregious error of using the word Evolution in a rather silly Internet ad. It really is a shame that a corporate behemoth (encouraged no doubt by Obama) has kicked the snot right out of religious freedom violating all sorts of... I don't know, somethings.
I suppose that you can deny the clear trail of evolutionary evidence in fossils and existing species by making some sort of deal about the word Theory - but you know the Theory of Gravity doesn't mean we'll all float off the earth if we quit praying. There is always the issue that Jesus stuck to the Earth (well there is the water thing) ((oh damn, I can feel my feet getting light)) and dinosaurs... well opinions differ between people riding them and Satan planting fossils. A whole chain of oddity crops up once Evolution becomes the Satan's Tool. If science finds something that doesn't match the exact words of a Holy Book it is Satan interfering with belief.
Some of this derives from the inability of even educated people to understand that words frequently have more meaning than the simplest interpretation or definition and that gets even more complicated once they're strung together into, you know, phrases or sentences. There is a rule about those red octagonal signs that say STOP and if you don't follow it you can get into some trouble - maybe real bad trouble. Now, it says STOP but there is something else involved - an understanding that it isn't all you're supposed to do, otherwise every one of those would be a trap where people starved because they never moved; yeah, "then GO" is missing from the sign. The point being that absolute literal interpretation of words is... STUPID.
Language is a complicated thing for a couple reasons and the first is pretty simple to grasp - there is an absolute upper limit of the number of words we can function with so they will cover more ground than is absolutely simple. Then there is the little matter of language also being a thing of beauty and art - a piece of marble on the side of a mountain is a simple plain thing but in the hands of a sculptor it can become a thing of beauty and art and language is just that. I have to acknowledge that in my hands language is a pretty plain thing, but in the hands of some it becomes beautiful and magnificently expressive - it is art.
The idea of the literal interpretation of Holy Books is that the words are extremely limited in function, that those "divinely inspired" authors trying to communicate a basis of spirituality were that limited in their capacity. Plainly said, it means that God has no artistry with words. God, creator of a Universe, is that limited. I don't ascribe to any of those Books, but... WTF?
"God created man in his image," means... um, what exactly? I sure the hell don't look much like my neighbor so literally one of us can't be that image or, hmmm - any of us? Speaking of literal, we've already strayed way off the limits, so something more is meant. Since the can of worms is opened then where we're at is self-imposed limits on the artistry involved and that starts to get to the issue of intelligence... or lack there of.
OK, I really don't care - but these people are so insistent on imposing their stupidity on the rest of us that even a goddam Presidential election starts to revolve around their complete and utter inability to understand their own damn Book and artistry. Folks, we may be seriously screwed here...
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