It's 2007. We no longer use leeches in medical procedures, we don't dip people in water to see if they're witches, and television has gone from black and white to color and HD. So why are there still people who aren't sure if the world is flat or round?
I bring this up because of the video after the jump. It's from The View (shocker!), and shows the ladies talking about whether or not new co-host Sherri Shepherd thinks the world is flat. Shepherd, who also doesn't believe in evolution, says she doesn't know because she's "never thought about it." I guess this is the part of the story where I'm supposed to say "everyone's entitled to their opinion," but I just can't in this case.
Prediction: Jimmy Kimmel will be all over this tonight.














Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
9-19-2007 @ 12:48PM
Editz said...
Leeches are still actually beneficial in some instances, but thinking the Earth is flat benefits no one.
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9-19-2007 @ 12:49PM
Ari said...
please don't compare roundness of the world to evolution. The world's roundness is a fact easily determinable by observation. Evolution remains a theorem, even if accepted by the majority of scientists. It has never been observed.
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9-19-2007 @ 1:02PM
name said...
"[Evolution] has never been observed."
Except by, you know, every single microbiologist.
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9-19-2007 @ 1:02PM
Hair said...
Actually Ari, evolution HAS been observed, albeit on a small scale (insects, etc). Evolution on a large scale, like a whale growing legs, obviously has not been seen. So to say evolution hasn't been observed is incorrect.
Another factoid is that the hosts of the View are retarded. That's science.
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9-19-2007 @ 1:13PM
AkaiWRX said...
Super Flu Bugs! Resistant to vaccines! Were Intelligently Designed! Because He wants us dead! BWAHAHAHA!
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9-19-2007 @ 1:34PM
Bash said...
You know those two planes crashing into WTC I and II could also be easily viewed but still 25% of the nation think that the government actually blew the towers up. And that there was no plane in the Pentagon. And no plane in that hole.
So people might be entitled to their opinion but those people tend to be uninformed and ignorant.
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9-19-2007 @ 1:39PM
Myron said...
Actually, whales have lost their legs as they evolved from land mammals. They have tiny vestigial legs within their body. Or perhaps it was intelligent design that put the vestigial legs there to make it look like evolution. We will never know.
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9-19-2007 @ 1:57PM
Gary said...
After seeing yesterdays View i knew it wouldn't be long before we'd have a post about it. Sherri Shepard has officially become the dumbest TV personality. Not believing in evolution is bad enough but not being sure on whether the Earth is round or flat is just ridiculous. The other women on the View aren't any help by telling her that it's her belief and she's can have it and Elisabeth is just happy that there is someone on the show with less intelligence than her.
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9-19-2007 @ 2:06PM
JennieO said...
She "never thought about it?" Did she skip third grade? What a moron.
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9-19-2007 @ 2:42PM
Chris W said...
She talked about it today. She says she was nervous about talking about her faith for the first time and says "of course I know the Earth is round!" She might have thought it was a loaded question, and with everyone talking over one another, I don't blame the girl for crumbling under the pressure. Give her a break.
In regards to evolution, it's also okay for her to believe whatever she wants. If she wants to have faith in something, good for her. Lots of people believe what she does, and although I don't, I think it's a little presumptive to discredit her entirely as a person because she doesn't believe we evolved from primates.
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9-19-2007 @ 3:22PM
Jordan Running said...
I wonder where Sherri Shephard gets her beliefs--'cause it clearly isn't the Bible. She says "I have a chapter in Genesis that says god created the Earth and he said to his son 'We're going to create an earth.'" I hate to break it to you, Sherri, but I've never read the Bible and even I know that that several thousand years are written to have passed between Genesis and the birth of Christ. The Son wasn't around back then by anyone's reckoning.
And don't get me started on the phrase "God wrote." True or not, divinely inspired or not, it was men who wrote that book, not God.
I don't have a problem with religion per se, but Ms. Shephard is a great example of what's wrong with so many modern Christians: They know precious little about the very texts that form the foundation of their religion. They haven't even read the Clif Notes.
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9-19-2007 @ 4:07PM
jds65 said...
Scientists also don't "believe in evolution". Belief is for things without evidence. BUT evolution does have evidence.
The other crazy thing about what she said was that it had not "been an important thing" to her to know if the Earth was flat or not. Instead she cared more about caring for her children (fair enough). But wait a minute --- she had time to study evolutionary biology to KNOW that it isn't true?
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9-19-2007 @ 4:15PM
plinstrot said...
Ari: A scientific theory is not the same as the everyday "I've got a theory (it could be witches)". Evolution is a theory in the same sense that gravity is a theory, only there's much more evidence for evolution than for gravity.
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9-19-2007 @ 5:28PM
matt said...
What makes it even worse is that she says she believes in Genesis, but then mentions that God talked to his son about how they were going to create the Earth.
whaaaaa?
There is no mention of God having a son in any part of the old testament, let alone in BS Genesis.
Why is it so hard for religious people to believe in whatever incarnation of god they want and STILL have the intelligence to realize that evolution is valid scientific theory. The problem tends to be that these same people just don't understand science.
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9-19-2007 @ 6:15PM
DAVE said...
I couldn't go through the whole video... embarrassing.
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9-19-2007 @ 6:21PM
Joost Schuur said...
plinstrot: I don't think you're being particularly fair, because witches, they were persecuted, Wiccan, good, and love the earth And woman power and all.
Anyway. I'll be over here. I blame the bunnies.
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9-19-2007 @ 6:35PM
SJ said...
I think this shows that a lot of religious people are very ignorant about their own religion, especially in the US.
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9-19-2007 @ 7:40PM
Oreo said...
I guess she never watched a shuttle launch, you can see the roundness of the Earth. Of course she probably belives a shuttle never really launches and it's all filmed in a studio.
"I never thought about it", neither have I, I just know it's fact.
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9-19-2007 @ 7:50PM
Stephen Waits said...
This is not surprising. To be Chrstian is to be ignorant. Often the extremely Christian are also extremely ignorant. (When I say "Christian" here I really mean "belief in God").
Whoopi seems to be the only one with any rational thought skills. The other four are stealing good oxygen from the rest of us.
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9-19-2007 @ 8:50PM
Mariah said...
Stephen - that is a gross misstatement regarding Christians and those who believe in a God. In fact, it's evidence of poor logic while we're at it. Just because you've met/spoken with/judged some Christians to be ignorant doesn't mean all Christians are, just as I can't say based on one comment from an atheist/agnostic that all are rude and illogical.
Check out famous Christians/Theists like Galileo, Albert Einstein, Thomas Jefferson, Copernicus, Sir Francis Bacon, Mendel, Kelvin ... I could go on.
Sherri Shepherd is evidence of an epidemic across the country, not just among Christians, of a failure to contemplate deeper issues, to embrace science and logic, to aspire to greatness.
http://thecourier.typepad.com/popgoestheculture/
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