“As parables, God’s Debris and the Religious War suck, just as they suck as fiction. This is, after all, the author of Dilbert, not a noted intellectual.”

Adams is a member of MENSA. Maybe you’ve heard of it, it’s a high-I.Q society. The only requirement to join, literally the ONLY requirement, is that you score above a set level on an intelligence test.

I think that makes Adams a ‘noted intellectual’.

As parables, God’s Debris and the Religious War suck, just as they suck as fiction. This is, after all, the author of Dilbert, not a noted intellectual.

Adams’ works are like the writings of Intelligent Design advocates; they are so frought with bad analogies, mistaken “facts” and debunked philosophical concepts that it would take a proper education or several books to explain why.

Adams should stick to crude scribbles and office humor.

I mean, yeah, the Avatar sure can travel quickly, not to mention find top-secret locations pretty fast, but again, it’s fiction. Deal with it. And where’s the Avatar’s “near superhuman powers”? He’s an old, fragile man, but really smart aware. I found the whole “Prime Influencer” concept just as ridiculous as you probably did, but I guess unlike you, I did what Scott Adams told me to do and remembered that this is fiction and not be taken seriously. He specifically makes sure to emphasize that in the hopes that people could just look past the fact that he’s taking certain liberties to get his story rolling.

And he offers justification for the farting question. He made it a point to explain in the story that the reason for that being as powerful a question as possible is because that while there have been many more insightful and thought-provoking questions out there, this one is different in that:

A) It’s simple and it rhymed. You can’t ask a serious question to a person that’s thought-provoking and expect them to react the same way, like, for instance, “Why was God so childish that he felt the need to banish Adam and Eve and every last descendant of them (read: us) from Eden to live as mortals in a place rife with disease and death?” or “If God made Adam in his own image, and Eve from Adam, then doesn’t that mean God is flawed as well?” or “If God is omniscient, then shouldn’t he have known that this was going to happen in the first place?” or “Why would he bother making humans anyway since he’s supposed to be perfect, meaning ‘lacking nothing essential to the whole; complete of its nature or kind.’” or “If God is so perfect and so smart and so powerful, then how is this the best world he could come up with?” See? These questions will probably leave you pondering the nature of God (as long as you don’t have a closed-mind), but aren’t as catchy or simple. Why does the iPod do so well? Not because it’s the best, but because it’s simple to use and attractive.

B) It was said by the Prime Influencer person, so it doesn’t matter if the question was “If God is so smart, milk milk lemonade, around the corner fudge is made,” she said it and therefore people will listen. Deal with it.

C) THIS BOOK IS FICTION. I DON’T KNOW HOW YOU DO NOT REALIZE THIS.

And finally, it is true that the definitions of faith and stupidity don’t exactly match up with their actual definitions, which I was kind of diappointed about because I was going to use that in a discussion with my more religious friends. But yet again, another one of your complaints is voided by the fact that you want to keep acting like this book is non-fiction, when in fact, IT’S FICTION and Scott Adams can say the definitions of faith is “Don’t worry: I’ve got an idea- an idea so smart my head would explode if I even began to know what I was talking about” if he wants; It’s HIS universe.

Deal. With. It.

the silliness of the events and how they happened reflects the author’s humor and is meant to entertain. i don’t know that many people who would bother to read a dead-serious story on what was almost the end of the world. i’d like to think that’s not what fiction is for.

but the silliness of the events does not overshadow the possibilities shown in the story, which are evident in the realities happening as i type, as you read. people display their arrogance and ignorance by poking fun at other people’s religion (danish comics depicting allah with a bomb for a turban), people leading their countries to attack and invade other countries because of paranoia and fear of people with different beliefs, people are leading their people to kill and die and wage war in the guise of o religion war, in the name of a god they don’t really even believe in. people use other people’s faith to gain power.

what’s so silly about communication being the ultimate tool in worldwide peace, or at least something close to it? if only everyone is given a chance to air out herhis thoughts, the truly silly ideas will ultimately die.