# I Hate New-Agers More Than Creationists **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 16, 2009, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992 "2009-10-16T04:25:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2009, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/121 "2009-10-19T07:11:30Z")
> [@marshmallow](#): > > New Agers may be aggressively ignorant, but they seem pretty laid back about the whole thing. Great spirit? Crystal vibrations? Whatever! They’re also usually OK with drugs and loose morales in general. In other words, fun folk. At least in my experience. In my experience they are self-righteous and judgmental. “Are you going to put that onion skin in the garbage disposal? Don’t you compost”, “You eat meat? Don’t you know their methane destroys the ozone layer”?. I had a friend that smoked dope around her daughter but went non-linear when her daughter’s friend had a pizza delivered: “Don’t you know there is poison in factory food”? Trying to go out to eat with these moron’s is a real pain: do you have gluten free pizza?, can you tell me every ingredient in the mole’ sauce?, is the wine organic? Mention anything about popular culture and it’s “_I_ don’t own a TV”. Well you don’t own a shaver for you underarms or deodorant soap either. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2009, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/122 "2009-10-19T08:42:24Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > IME the Creationists I’ve met were VERY strongly interested in converting others, and in using legislation to force others to live by thier beliefs. > > The New Agers I have known, although typically blowhards, were at core uninterested in forcing anything on anybody, and had a distinctly “live and let live” attitude. I agree. New Agers aren’t so aggressively proselytising and \*\*DanBlather’s \*\*examples (per the last post) are mostly personal and can be avoided by just not hanging around with them. Creationists are more interested in forcing their views (by governmental means if possible) upon people. However, recently New Agers have developed commonality with the anti-vax, anti-meat, anti-flouride etc movement, but I think that movement has only become influential when it has bled over from New Agers to soccer mums. I think New Agers are too vagued out to be worth worrying about, compared to Creationists who actually seem capably of active lobbying. > [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > I fail to see that evoluton is the cornerstone oif all science, this kind of thinking only applies in the US. This is like concluding that breathing is only important to people who are being threatened with asphyxiation, because you have noticed that they are the only people who talk about their need to breathe. ---
**Author:** ![MidnightRadio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecd19e/32.png) [@MidnightRadio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MidnightRadio)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/123 "2009-10-21T09:46:21Z")
One thing that I don’t think has been pointed out—though I’ve done a bit of skimming, so I could be wrong—is that any scientist who denies evolution shows that they’re willing to disregard the results of scientific inquiry and experimentation simply because they don’t like what the results say. Once you’ve established that that’s an acceptable thing to do, you can do it with any results. Case in point: the “controversy” over climate change. Evolution denial is scientific and intellectual dishonesty and that _is_ a fast track to a new dark age. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/124 "2009-10-21T09:50:23Z")
Oooh, I _like_ dat! ---
**Author:** ![Vihaga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Vihaga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vihaga)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/125 "2009-10-21T14:45:34Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > If my answer were “_God decided to make His creatures similar in many awe-inspiring ways to help us save lives_” I could see the point of the spinal-chord research you do without Wallace and stem-cell without Darwin. It’d not very scientific, but you would still do the resaerch and get the results. > Your kind of research is the kind that accept Evolution as an axiom, but don’r really use it anymore. If you know that, say, guinea pig reitnas work like hyuman retinas you KNOW (because it’s tru) that common ancesntry and evolution give you the reason; but in the actual research you already know that so it’s no worry for you. Untrue. The fact that the organisms are similar in some ways because important mechanisms are conserved and _different_ in other ways because of how they’ve evolved, is HUGE to what we do. Understanding exactly how systems have evolved and what will work on both rats and humans (and also importantly, what won’t) is a vital aspect of what we do. Without looking at the gene sequences, comparing conserved bits of genese, investigating cell phenotypes to determine how they have evolved differently in humans, and looking at the physical and electrophysiological data to see what the similarities and differences are in the systems, all we’re doing is coming up with experiments to treat rat spinal cord injury, which no one gives a rat’s ass (heh) about. /edit: That being said, people can convince themselves of anything. I do believe that someone can follow the idea of evolution and use that in their work, and still pretend it’s not real outside of work. People are crazy like that. It just makes them self-deceiving douchebags. You can convince yourself that your TV works by magic, too, if you call electricity “magic” and say it works by the same rules as electricity (in which you don’t believe). ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/126 "2009-10-21T16:59:44Z")
> [@Vihaga](#): > > Untrue. The fact that the organisms are similar in some ways because important mechanisms are conserved and _different_ in other ways because of how they’ve evolved, is HUGE to what we do. Understanding exactly how systems have evolved and what will work on both rats and humans (and also importantly, what won’t) is a vital aspect of what we do. > > Without looking at the gene sequences, comparing conserved bits of genese, investigating cell phenotypes to determine how they have evolved differently in humans, and looking at the physical and electrophysiological data to see what the similarities and differences are in the systems, all we’re doing is coming up with experiments to treat rat spinal cord injury, which no one gives a rat’s ass (heh) about. > > /edit: That being said, people can convince themselves of anything. I do believe that someone can follow the idea of evolution and use that in their work, and still pretend it’s not real outside of work. People are crazy like that. It just makes them self-deceiving douchebags. You can convince yourself that your TV works by magic, too, if you call electricity “magic” and say it works by the same rules as electricity (in which you don’t believe). Your edit sums up my idea. If you are convinced that the earth flat you can still travel by plane wondering how they manage to get anywhere if they “assume” that the earth is round. The “God-wants-it-to-look-like-that” argument is unbeatable in some senses. You can even use evolution as “method” that neatly describes reality if it is false. You need blidfolds the size of Jupiter, but you could. Just for the record, again, I fully believe in and teach evolution at school. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/127 "2009-10-21T17:44:55Z")
If you were more enlightened you would realize that by hating New Agers you are just hating yourself because we are all manifestations of the one Advaita Vedanta. So why do you hate yourself? ---
**Author:** ![Vihaga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Vihaga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vihaga)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/128 "2009-10-21T17:50:09Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > The “God-wants-it-to-look-like-that” argument is unbeatable in some senses. You can even use evolution as “method” that neatly describes reality if it is false. You need blidfolds the size of Jupiter, but you could. > > Just for the record, again, I fully believe in and teach evolution at school. Ah. I didn’t get that from your response. I thought you meant we could use rats as models just because their neurons resemble those of humans (which wouldn’t work because they aren’t entirely similar), not that you would have to accept all of the “rules” of doing comparative research with a baseline knowledge of evolution and work within them, just calling it a different name. The idea that people grab scientific ideas, act like they aren’t what they are, and use them without acknowledging where they really came from, does infuriate me. It’s like insisting that someone only got better from an illness because of God’s will, even as you watch them suck down the effective treatment. Gah. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2009, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/129 "2009-10-22T14:05:17Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > If you were more enlightened you would realize that by hating New Agers you are just hating yourself because we are all manifestations of the one Advaita Vedanta. > > So why do you hate yourself? Oooh, the Advaita Vedanta looks fresh today. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/130 "2009-10-23T00:00:58Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > If you were more enlightened you would realize that by hating New Agers you are just hating yourself because we are all manifestations of the one Advaita Vedanta. > > So why do you hate yourself? Because part of me is New Ager. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2009, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/131 "2009-10-23T20:17:35Z")
There’s something about an Advaita Vedanta man … ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2009, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/132 "2009-10-23T20:49:58Z")
Does anybody else keep hearing “asafoetida” in their heads when they read that? ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2009, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/133 "2009-10-23T20:54:42Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Does anybody else keep hearing “asafoetida” in their heads when they read that? I didn’t previously know that word, but that’s a good one. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2009, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992/134 "2009-10-23T20:56:55Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > I didn’t previously know that word, but that’s a good one. Clearly, you’ve never had my ex-boyfriend’s chana masala. More’s the pity. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-hate-new-agers-more-than-creationists/513992.md?page=6)