In which the pond celebrates a wealth of ad hominem attacks by odd hominems ...

(Above: found here at Behind the Lines: satirical snapshots for 2010, but somehow it seemed to evoke the current loonatic Murdoch media mood).

Dick Gross can be regularly relied on to deliver silliness in the supposed cause of atheism, as if atheism should be an organised movement because of the faith everyone believes in, like, y'know, it's some kind of religion.

Things would be a lot simpler if he just announced he'd rediscovered his lost faith in the attic, put it on and discovered it wasn't just a bad fit - but instead, in The Devil wears evolution, he exceeds himself in silliness.

I suggest that atheist groups transform themselves so that those atheists who so choose can insinuate themselves and reside happily in faiths as atheistic Catholics or say, agnostic Hindus or say godless Jews.

Yep, if you want to do the right thing by atheism, you hang around inside the cathedral, do a takeover and soon enough we'll have an atheist pope. Gross thinks this is such a jolly good idea, he has another crack at it, while delivering a back hander to "angry" atheists:

We should collaborate with the progressives and stop bashing those who believe. We should give Humanism a go for a few decades or centuries but simultaneously join or rejoin our faiths and reform from the inside. There are nominal believers there who would welcome us.

What do you think?

Is angry atheism alienating?

And so on and so forth. But where's all the anger coming from?

Gross's suggestion that atheists need to infiltrate religions, take over and reform faiths from the inside, is so profoundly silly and funny that he generates gales of laughter ...

Well at least it took the pond's mind away from the onerous, burdensome task on a Tuesday of reading that desiccated coconut Gerard Henderson, on call with It's all hot air from the jet-setting eco brigade.

At least Henderson's column quashed the notion of the pond joining the Sydney Institute, beavering away for a century or so, and transforming the place into a haven for liberal atheist secularist humanists, with a scientific bent. Who could stand the mental torture?

Henderson delivers by now the standard bashing of Cate Blanchett, and anyone else who dares to catch a plane and head offshore for whatever reason.

Henderson has never been comfortable discussing the actual science of climate change - he knows he's out of his depth - but he can be found elsewhere discussing the relevance of ad hominem attacks, so what better way of producing a 'get out of science' card, and proving his point about ad hominem attacks than flaying Cate Blanchett for having a very large carbon footprint, living in a Hunters Hill mansion and travelling the world to practise her art.

In which case I wonder why we should listen to righteous sanctimonious claptrap from Henderson, for the Sydney Institute no doubt has a very large carbon footprint as it practices its cabal-ish conservative arts.

But no, instead it's the usual stuff about the "many who live in the inner cities or wealthy suburbs close to the CBD" looking down on the 'burbs, as if Henderson himself has a clear view from his eerie in 41 Phillip Street Sydney, in the heart of the city, and awfully close to the thuggee boofhead ways of the rugby league tribe.

No doubt it's also handily close to a club or two where the conservative elite can gather to discuss their concern for the suburbs, but let's not brood about the amount of carbon produced by the hot air therein ...

Meanwhile, not content with Blanchett, Henderson rounds up an eclectic bunch with personal carbon emissions the envy of most Australians, including Tim Flannery, Tim Costello, Dick Smith, Clover Moore, Al Gore and sometime partner Tipper, and Sting, and then the usual predictable blather erupts once more:

Support for the carbon tax is highest among well-educated Australians who enjoy relatively secure employment or comfortable retirement - many of whom live in the inner cities.

Yep, there it is again, the crime of being well educated and well off. But hang on, what do we make of rich conservatives who are well off, like Gina and Twiggy?

It is true that the wealthy miners such as Gina Rinehart and Andrew Forrest publicly opposed the Rudd government's proposed mining tax. But they were urging others to do the same. It was a case of: "Do as I do."

Do as I do and ship the guts of Australia off to China and become a billionaire? Or do as I do, which is protest in the streets to save the billions for the billionaires?

Who knows, because Henderson, when it comes to the rights of billionaires, is a dab hand at special pleading and somehow this mystical command to 'do as I do' becomes a wonderful contrast to the tree huggers who say 'do as I say but please don't do as I do.'

As for actual climate science?

Well for that we have to turn to Hall and Oates, and diddy doo wop, oh oh oh oh, diddy doo wop, oh oh, well, it starts in my head and it ends when I stop, keep singing diddy do wop ... or perhaps baby do what you do do so well you do do me so swell, do do ...

Oh by the way, a few readers might wonder what ad hominem means, since Latin pedantry has retreated in recent times, apart from Christopher Pearson.

Well the dictionary explains it's appealing to personal considerations, rather than to logic or reason, and it has its very own wiki, which begins

An ad hominem (Latin: "to the man"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to link the truth of a claim to a negative characteristic or belief of the person advocating it.

The wiki goes on to note that ad hominem is sometimes described as a logical fallacy, but in fact sometimes questions of personal conduct, character, motives and such like can be relevant to an issue, which indeed, given Henderson's perpetual state of righteous indignation about the inner city elites, is why the pond feels comfortable calling him a prattling Polonius or a desiccated coconut, or since the terms are not exclusive, a desiccated Polonius ...

Of course it doesn't prove anything for or against climate change science, but it's as emotionally as satisfying as the anal argumentation provided by Gerard Henderson, and his suggestion that all who think there might be something to climate science should immediately stop all international travel and go live in a garret ...

Finally, just a couple of footnotes celebrating wonderful contributions to the pond.

First a gold leaf with egg splatter to Terry McCrann for his efforts in Don't fight a hotter world, prepare for it:

The Prime Minister should try to open an LNG plant or a new coalmine in monthly or even fortnightly lockstep with every new coal-fired power station in China. And if that flags, with new ones in India.

Only economic growth can generate the economic surplus to be spent on building what might be termed the global warming tsunami sea walls, whether figurative or indeed literal.

Well played Tezza and the pond has unilaterally voted that you be the one to stand on the coastline and hold back the tsunami, whether it is figurative or indeed literal. Please start your coast watch duties this week ...

But Tezza saw the gold medal snatched away from him by Alan Jones, featured this week in Media Watch being a vile, domineering, bullying, ignorant and ill-mannered proponent of hyperbolic gestures. (Lessons in hyperbolic gestures).

Whenever The Australian carries on about the ABC, all the ABC has to do is offer me another episode of Media Watch, and all is well. At the end of the segment, you'll see that ACMA has begun an investigation into 2GB's coverage of the climate change debate.

No doubt in due course after much pedantry and paperwork, they'll produce a pigeon feather, and use it to give the station a vigorous slap on the cheek.

Meanwhile, Jones will continue to blather like a first class loon, the loudest, most hypocritical and ignorant loon on the pond. That's why we have a special corner for him, and never, never listen to the man, but loved the way Media Watch nailed him for his breathtaking gall and hypocrisy, as he proposed that David Karoly was a corrupt scientist dancing to the dictates of government because he who pays the piper calls the tune ... as if Jones himself hasn't danced to all sorts of weird pipers and tunes ...

So much ad hominem stupidity in the land, so little time to return all the blows with ad hominem pleasure ...

Meanwhile, as opposed to all the attacks on Blanchett and the like, there's some actual news involving carbon and the climate. Leaked report shows record carbon emissions, and the implications thereto are stories doing the rounds outside the ad hominem crowd. Not that you'd know it from reading the commentariat or the minions of Murdoch.

Keep bringing those brown coal stations on line Tezza ... it's the only way forward ...

(Below: an ad pigginum attack on denialism).