Theological Signficance of the Jewel Wasp.

[prole]

 

Y'all mean the Goddess?

 

[video:youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8S76QKCPucs

[bstach]

I believe the explanation as to why a loving God would allow suffering was covered in The Matrix

[t_rutl]

i think you guys just need a little

 

[G-spotter]

Que? (For Ponderosa).

 

Short summary:

 

-Wasp injects cockroach's abdomen with venom A, paralyzing its forelimbs.

-Wasp injects paralyzed cockroach's brain with venom B, reversing the original paralysis but turning it into a zombie.

-Wasp bites off cockroache's antenna, drinks a bit of cockroach's blood to revive itself.

-Wasp bites antenna, and pulls on it to lead cockroach back to its den.

-Wasp lays eggs on 'roach, then seals roach in den.

-Wasp larvae eat their way into the living zombie roach, then selectively feast on its organs to keep the zombie roach alive while they grow.

-Larvae hatch, roach dies.

-Repeat.

 

 

 

 

 

Cockroaches are an abomination which deserve to be punished this way.

[j_b]

They are named parasitic wasps for a good reason. They are very useful in controlling pest insects, and are therefore often part of integrated pest management strategies (or at least should if pesticide mania abated).

[ivan]

 

Short summary:

 

-Wasp injects cockroach's abdomen with venom A, paralyzing its forelimbs.

-Wasp injects paralyzed cockroach's brain with venom B, reversing the original paralysis but turning it into a zombie.

-Wasp bites off cockroache's antenna, drinks a bit of cockroach's blood to revive itself.

-Wasp bites antenna, and pulls on it to lead cockroach back to its den.

-Wasp lays eggs on 'roach, then seals roach in den.

-Wasp larvae eat their way into the living zombie roach, then selectively feast on its organs to keep the zombie roach alive while they grow.

-Larvae hatch, roach dies.

-Repeat.

 

 

 

 

.

these guys (n' gals) would know just to with these bastards!

[Pete_H]

They are named parasitic wasps for a good reason. They are very useful in controlling pest insects, and are therefore often part of integrated pest management strategies (or at least should if pesticide mania abated).

 

Wikipedia says they were introduced into Hawaii in the 40's for this purpose but it didn't work b/c they don't reproduce fast enough.

[j_b]

Introducing parasites doesn't always work. It is a little surprising to me that reproduction rate be the problem since I can't imagine it to be much lesser than that of cockroaches, and wasps likely attack many hosts over their short lifespan. Other parasitic wasps species are used extensively against flies and moth, especially in horticulture.

[bstach]

Gotta wonder how one would account for this in a sermon concerning the nature of an omniscient, omnipotent being that designed life on this planet.

 

[video:youtube]

 

 

 

 

Its the Circle of Life, fool. Any 4 years old who has watched The Lion King knows this

[Pete_H]

Introducing parasites doesn't always work. It is a little surprising to me that reproduction rate be the problem since I can't imagine it to be much lesser than that of cockroaches, and wasps likely attack many hosts over their short lifespan. Other parasitic wasps species are used extensively against flies and moth, especially in horticulture.

 

Sorry, my memory failed me. Apparently that effort at biocontrol failed because of "the small scale on which they hunt." Whatever the fuck that means.

[JayB]

Gotta wonder how one would account for this in a sermon concerning the nature of an omniscient, omnipotent being that designed life on this planet.

 

[video:youtube]

 

 

 

 

Its the Circle of Life, fool. Any 4 years old who has watched The Lion King knows this

 

 

I suppose it's worth stressing that I don't find this sort of thing the least bit shocking or distressing, but then again I'm not a proponent of creationism/intelligent-design, or of the idea that there's a supernatural being out there with any particular attributes that we should either praise or scorn.

 

There's a gazillion viral mechanisms operating at the molecular level that enable viruses to pull essentially the same maneuver that the jewel uses to hijack cockroaches for reproduction, ditto for cancers, etc.

 

I just find it amusing that proponents of a theism that posits something like the cosmological equivalent of Mr. Rogers is running the show selectively omit the vast preponderance of evidence to the contrary - whether that's the holocaust, plagues, purges, pogroms, earthquakes, or the infinite number minutely calibrated and precisely choreographed parasitic mechanisms that predominate in each of the five kingdom's o' life.

[YocumRidge]

There's a gazillion viral mechanisms operating at the molecular level that enable viruses to pull essentially the same maneuver that the jewel uses to hijack cockroaches for reproduction, ditto for cancers, etc.

 

Except viruses mutate much faster than anyone else to survive immune eradication by the host.

[bstach]

... the infinite number minutely calibrated and precisely choreographed parasitic mechanisms that predominate in each of the five kingdom's o' life.

 

I'm no expert in intelligent design, but isn't this the gist of their argument? So this is an argument they would use in support of intelligent design.

[tvashtarkatena]

... the infinite number minutely calibrated and precisely choreographed parasitic mechanisms that predominate in each of the five kingdom's o' life.

 

I'm no expert in intelligent design, but isn't this the gist of their argument? So this is an argument they would use in support of intelligent design.

 

Yes, you are correct. In any case, 'precisely calibrated' systems are prone to failure. Evolution tends to disfavor them, producing instead more robust 'good enough' systems, which are usually supplemented by a patchwork of back up systems, and crowded with legacy spare parts in the process of evolving into something else or nothing at all.

[JayB]

... the infinite number minutely calibrated and precisely choreographed parasitic mechanisms that predominate in each of the five kingdom's o' life.

 

I'm no expert in intelligent design, but isn't this the gist of their argument? So this is an argument they would use in support of intelligent design.

 

Having said that, neither "minutely calibrated" nor "precisely choreographed" necessarily entails or assumes design.

 

You are definitely correct that they would seize on the sort of language I used in order to make an argument to the contrary.

 

Unfortunately the words that we have available to us to describe particular physical features or interactions that occur in the natural world evolved long before we developed a scientific understanding of the physical and chemical processes associated with life.

 

If most of the words that you have to work with came into being at a time when some kind of intentional human or supernatural agency was deemed necessary to create or maintain a particular order or relationship, it can be difficult to find words that describe either without inadvertently suggesting that there's something other than the operation of physical law at work.

 

Ergo sometimes its next to impossible to translate the said concepts into words without leaving the semantic door open for the creationists to crawl through.

 

IMO there's a similar problem any time that you have to translate concepts that relate to dynamic, self-ordering processes that are governed by broadly distributed mechanisms and local equilibria into words. Economics in particular suffers from words that suggest control and agency by some kind of intentional and centralized ordering mechanism where none actually exists. Which is probably part of the reason why creationism's economic cousin, protectionism, has such an intuitive resonance.

 

""The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design."

— Friedrich von Hayek

 

 

 

 

Edited October 26, 2009 by JayB

[JayB]

... the infinite number minutely calibrated and precisely choreographed parasitic mechanisms that predominate in each of the five kingdom's o' life.

 

I'm no expert in intelligent design, but isn't this the gist of their argument? So this is an argument they would use in support of intelligent design.

 

Yes, you are correct. In any case, 'precisely calibrated' systems are prone to failure. Evolution tends to disfavor them, producing instead more robust 'good enough' systems, which are usually supplemented by a patchwork of back up systems, and crowded with legacy spare parts in the process of evolving into something else or nothing at all.

 

Tvash:

 

Always certain, sometimes right.

[ivan]

 

Tvash:

 

Always certain, sometimes right.

hey tvash, there's yer new sig!

[ivan]

i'm noting w/ irony at the moment that the lower add bar reads "does god exist? click here for 6 reasons why"

[tvashtarkatena]

 

Tvash:

 

Always certain, sometimes right.

hey tvash, there's yer new sig!

 

I was right about one thing....

[bstach]

The conclusion of this thread is simple. God loves wasps, hates cockroaches.

[Stonehead]

I think it’s a disservice to depict the opposition as entirely composed of irrational creationists. What about the theistic evolutionists such as Dr. Francis Collins?

 

Couldn’t the logic you use to navigate life, couldn’t the same logic also lead to God? Perhaps your conception of God is the stumbling block.

[ivan]

Perhaps your conception of God is the stumbling block.

the reality of dog is far more often a stumbling block

 

[Pete_H]

Couldn’t the logic you use to navigate life, couldn’t the same logic also lead to God? Perhaps your conception of God is the stumbling block.

 

I suppose it could really lead to any form of spiritual perception, to include worshipping Gozer from Ghostbusters II, or to none at all.

[G-spotter]

I think it’s a disservice to depict the opposition as entirely composed of irrational creationists. What about the theistic evolutionists such as Dr. Francis Collins?

 

Dude is no more rational than L. Ron Hubbard.

Faith is inherently irrational and opposed to reason.

[Pete_H]

But its nothing you can't find with a fistfull of peyote and a couple days in the desert.