Storm, a vaguely New Age-y type neo-hippie keen on spirituality and whatnot, has just mis-quoted Shakespeare in her attempt to convince fellow dinner party guests that science is a kind of closed-mindedness. Tim replies:
....Science adjusts its views
Based on what's observed.
Faith is the denial of observation,
so that belief can be preserved.
If you show me that, say,
Homeopathy works,
I will change my mind,
I will spin on a fucking dime.
I'll be as embarrassed as hell,
Yet I will not run through the streets yelling,
'It's a MIRACLE!
Take physics and bin it!
Water has memory!
And whilst its memory
Of a long-lost drop of onion juice is infinite,
It somehow forgets all the poo it's had in it!'
You show me that it works,
And how it works,
and when I've recovered,
from the shock,
I will take a compass and carve
'Fancy That',
On the side of my cock.
.....
Life is full of mystery, yeah,
but,
there are answers out there.
And they won't be found,
By people sitting around,
Looking serious,
And saying: Isn't life mysterious?
Let's sit here and hope,
Let's call up the fucking Pope,
Let's go on Oprah,
And interview Deepak Chopra.
If you must watch telly,
you should watch Scooby-Doo,
That show was so cool!
Because every time
There was a church with a ghoul,
Or a ghost in a school,
They looked beneath the mask.
And what was inside?
The fucking janitor,
or the dude who ran the water slide!
Because,
throughout history,
every mystery
ever solved,
Has turned out to be -
Not Magic!
Does the idea that
there might be knowledge frighten you?
Does the idea that
one afternoon on Wiki-fucking-pedia
Might enlighten you,
Frighten you?
Does the notion that there might not be a supernatural,
so blow your hippie noodle,
that you'd rather just stand in the fog of your
Inability to google?
Isn't this enough?
Just,
this world?
Just,
Beautiful,
Complex,
Wonderfully Unfathomable,
Natural World?
How does it so fail to hold our attention
That we have to diminish it
with the invention
of cheap man-made
myths and monsters?
If you're so into your Shakespeare,
Lend me your ear
To gild refined gold,
To paint the lily,
To throw perfume on the violet,
Is just fucking silly
Or something like that.
Or what about Satchmo?
I see trees of green,
Red roses too...
And fine, if you wish to,
Glorify Krishna and Vishnu,
In a post-colonial,
Condescending,
Bottled-up-and-labeled
kind of way,
Whatever, That's okay.
But, here's what gives me a hard-on:
I'm a tiny, insignificant
Ignorant bit of carbon.
I have one life,
And it is short and unimportant,
But thanks to recent scientific advances...
I get to live twice as long,
As my great-great-great-great
uncleses and auntses.
Twice as long!
To live this life of mine,
Twice as long,
To love this wife of mine.
Twice as many years,
Of friends, of wine,
Of sharing curries and getting shitty,
At good-looking hippies,
With fairies on their spines,
And butterflies on their titties.
'And if perchance, I have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,'
We'd as well be ten minutes back in time
For all the chance you'll change your mind.
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