What Does Google Suggest Suggest About Humanity? 513
CNETNate writes "You'll laugh, but mostly you'll cry. Some of the questions Google gets asked to deliver results for is beyond worrying. 'Can you put peroxide in your ear?', 'Why would a pregnancy test be negative?', and 'Why can't I own a Canadian?' being just a selection of the truly baffling — and disturbing — questions Google is regularly forced to answer."
'Can I put peroxide in my ear?' (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is the peroxide question that stupid? The only thing I can think of is that the person probably meant 'hydrogen peroxide', and then I think it's a pretty reasonable question.
Re:Peroxide (Score:4, Insightful)
I do this on occasion. It's been beneficial, imho. Stupid author is stupid.
Re:Peroxide (Score:1, Insightful)
Same with the pregnancy question.
Seems perfectly reasonable to search for information regarding the accuracy of those tests and what can affect them.
Stupid to ask questions? (Score:3, Insightful)
Since when is it now laughable or stupid to ask questions to relieve oneself of ignorance? I'd say it's stupid to want to stay ignorant.
Basing your actions entirely on one or two less than credible sources might be stupid. I wouldn't put peroxide in my ear for instance without making sure I had plenty of credible sources to back that action. However asking the question on a search engine which might lead me to such credible sources is anything but stupid.
Whoever came up with this tripe is the one that's stupid. We don't need to praise willful ignorance, when knowledge is just a google query away...
Re:Stupid to ask questions? (Score:1, Insightful)
It's always laughable to be ignorant. That's why anyone who can't laugh at themselves should be sterilized.
This one is the worst (Score:5, Insightful)
Google suggests: '...into labour?'
Answer: There's an easy and reliable way to test. Is there a brand-new human poking out of your lower body? If yes, then congratulations, you're going into labour. More accurately, you're already in it.
I'm amazed that these guys make fun of a question, act like wiseasses who know the answer, yet did not read the results of the search! The early stages of labor can start DAYS before birth, and false labor is very common.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes.
That's kind of the entire point of that article.
It was a response to people using that same section of the bible to justify their modern day opposition to the rights of gays.
Re:Really? (Score:4, Insightful)
Except that this is not justification for slavery. It is simply teaching folks to do the best that they can in the circumstances that they find themselves. The writer understood that this is not a perfect world, but that as followers of Christ we are to be the best example we can be.
Re:Really? (Score:4, Insightful)
This might imply that it's acceptable for Christians to have slaves.
Re:Many of these questions are legitimate (Score:3, Insightful)
Ok so a little off-topic but if you think you're having a heart attack you should not have to think twice about seeking medical advice - cost should not hold you back. One of the advantages of socialised health care I guess...
Re:Really? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think a lot of the people doing the mocking just stick the powerful sky-being thing.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Half true, half false.
Christians don't have the authority to "come down" on _anyone_.
However, there are several places in the new testament where male adulterousness, male homosexuality, and at least one spot where female homosexuality are discussed and condemned, either by Paul or Jesus.
A quick search for "new testament homosexuality" will let you read about a variety of interpretations of a variety of new testament passages.
Naturally two groups of people can read the same text, both claim to be experts in translating the original written language, and come to different conclusions.
The question of the sinfulness of homosexuality is important not because it grants or revokes a license to stone gay people, but because if it is infact sinful, those who continue to willfully sin without repentance are condemned by God. There are other more practical and earthly ramifications: those who wilfully sin and refuse to repent are not fit for membership (much less leadership) in the church body.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Really? (Score:4, Insightful)
Agreed. It certainly doesn't further the goals of the (Christian) church or the work of (the Christian) God when the _state_ uses compulsion to extract religiously compliant behavior.
If God wanted people to be forced to act a certain way, he would just shoot them with lightning all the time. And when the stupid Isralites long ago kept clammoring for a King to rule over them, God tried to talk them out of it.
God is a libertarian that wants people to voluntarily be socialists :)
Re:Really? (Score:3, Insightful)
But you must not forget that it was customary, if not normal, to own slaves back then. It was normal that after a war you came back with prisoners and enslaved them. From our vantage point it seems odd, even horrible, unthinkably inhuman to own other people. But back then, it was simply the normal flow of operation. You got captured in war, you're a slave. You can't pay your debt, you pay with your head (figuratively speaking). Also, our idea of freedom would have been unthinkable for most of history. Tell our idea of government to a medieval person, used to a feudal system with lords and villains, and he'l laugh at you, at best.
Times changes. So do people and their morals. Claiming that a millenia old moral code should be upheld is strange at best. Dangerous at worst.
Re:Really? (Score:1, Insightful)
If you are really naive enough to believe being raised in a religious household equates with a PhD in theology, you are an idiot.
Do you come on Slashdot and post in physics articles claiming that "because my dad had a PhD in physics my 12 years living in his household gives me a far more vigorous understanding of physics than most physicists."
No, you don't, but people love to have this disconnect about religion that equates "hey, I was raised by religious parents, so my teenage angst fueled anti-religious rebellion is based on a complete knowledge of the Bible."
Shut up until you have something worthwhile to contribute, and stop trying to claim that because daddy told you you were going to hell because you decided to be an atheist you have supported reasons for disliking Christianity.