Is there such a thing as a vegetable?
At some point in all of our lives we encounter that one person who simply must point out that a tomato is a fruit and not a vegetable. I'd like to think that somewhere there is a very deranged nephew of Hans Gruber who is taking random families hostage in exchange for the dissemination of this rather insipid factoid.
Yes a tomato is a fruit of the tomato plant vine (which otherwise is a family of plants that seems to only exist to kill humans) but if you are classifying your produce at that level things start to get weird. You see I am a believer that language is not prescriptive. The point of language is to communicate. So long as that is accomplished then language has done its job. Sure it rankles purists when words take on new meanings but somehow we survive. We survived when "bad" changed to be complementary and then went back again. We survived when we stopped calling the concave pottery we eat soup out of "mortars" and adopted the word "bowl" instead. Surely we will also survive when "navel" starts being a complementary term for a person of high virtue (now you know my project for 2014).
So where am I going with this? Well words often have uses and the word "vegetable" was useful in describing produce that wasn't sweet or a grain. So, indeed, a vegetable can be the fruit of plant (as tomatoes, peppers and squash are) but that is a level of description not needed for anyone that doesn't actually study plants academically. Because at that level of description there are no vegetables, just a bunch of edible non-sweet fruits, tubers and leaves. Which is a pretty ungainly thing to have to say. Which is probably why a word to encompass them was eventually produced.
So, next time you come across someone that insists a tomato isn't a vegetable ask them what is a vegetable then. Because at least one person on this planet would like to know.
Why do people think atheists must put their non-beliefs at the center of their lives?
I occasionally have to tell people I am an atheist. I don't hide it from anyone really. It's just not something I normally feel compelled to talk about as I don't find it too important. I mean, I don't believe that there is a God out there. So what? I also don't believe in ghosts. And I don't go around making sure everyone knows I don't believe in ghosts.
But every now and then someone wants to know things about my atheism that seems to indicate they don't quite understand how it works. I've had people ask me who the "priests" of atheism are. Uh, there are none. There may be some that are notable but that doesn't mean I give a rat's ass about them or what they say.
Still other people ask me where we atheists meet to discuss our agenda and make plans. Well, I hate to break it to you all but that generally doesn't happen. It'd be like asking someone that doesn't like basketball where all the anti-basketball people meet. That isn't how it works. I mean first off just not liking basketball doesn't mean you are actually actively opposed to its existence. Similarly it is possible to not believe in a God and not be actively opposed to all religious or divine belief.
And to be honest, so long as you don't try and make religious activities compulsory, you will probably never know who is and is not an atheist around you. So, like, stop doing that religious people.
And a short one...
Does worrying a lot that you are a narcissist make you a narcissist? Somehow that question popped into my head the other day and I loved the meta properties of it.
At some point in all of our lives we encounter that one person who simply must point out that a tomato is a fruit and not a vegetable. I'd like to think that somewhere there is a very deranged nephew of Hans Gruber who is taking random families hostage in exchange for the dissemination of this rather insipid factoid.
Yes a tomato is a fruit of the tomato plant vine (which otherwise is a family of plants that seems to only exist to kill humans) but if you are classifying your produce at that level things start to get weird. You see I am a believer that language is not prescriptive. The point of language is to communicate. So long as that is accomplished then language has done its job. Sure it rankles purists when words take on new meanings but somehow we survive. We survived when "bad" changed to be complementary and then went back again. We survived when we stopped calling the concave pottery we eat soup out of "mortars" and adopted the word "bowl" instead. Surely we will also survive when "navel" starts being a complementary term for a person of high virtue (now you know my project for 2014).
So where am I going with this? Well words often have uses and the word "vegetable" was useful in describing produce that wasn't sweet or a grain. So, indeed, a vegetable can be the fruit of plant (as tomatoes, peppers and squash are) but that is a level of description not needed for anyone that doesn't actually study plants academically. Because at that level of description there are no vegetables, just a bunch of edible non-sweet fruits, tubers and leaves. Which is a pretty ungainly thing to have to say. Which is probably why a word to encompass them was eventually produced.
So, next time you come across someone that insists a tomato isn't a vegetable ask them what is a vegetable then. Because at least one person on this planet would like to know.
Why do people think atheists must put their non-beliefs at the center of their lives?
I occasionally have to tell people I am an atheist. I don't hide it from anyone really. It's just not something I normally feel compelled to talk about as I don't find it too important. I mean, I don't believe that there is a God out there. So what? I also don't believe in ghosts. And I don't go around making sure everyone knows I don't believe in ghosts.
But every now and then someone wants to know things about my atheism that seems to indicate they don't quite understand how it works. I've had people ask me who the "priests" of atheism are. Uh, there are none. There may be some that are notable but that doesn't mean I give a rat's ass about them or what they say.
Still other people ask me where we atheists meet to discuss our agenda and make plans. Well, I hate to break it to you all but that generally doesn't happen. It'd be like asking someone that doesn't like basketball where all the anti-basketball people meet. That isn't how it works. I mean first off just not liking basketball doesn't mean you are actually actively opposed to its existence. Similarly it is possible to not believe in a God and not be actively opposed to all religious or divine belief.
And to be honest, so long as you don't try and make religious activities compulsory, you will probably never know who is and is not an atheist around you. So, like, stop doing that religious people.
And a short one...
Does worrying a lot that you are a narcissist make you a narcissist? Somehow that question popped into my head the other day and I loved the meta properties of it.
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