With apologies to Dogma.
OK, yes, it’s a cross in a potato. I’ve seen stuff like this a zillion times, though I’ll admit not one that looks quite so much like a cross with a glow behind it (or perhaps some sort of bacterial bloom). Still.
It’s a potato.
Yet, we get this:
“Everyone was deeply stirred,” [Birgül] Balta [the potato's owner] told the paper. “Some of them even began to weep and to pray.”
Yes. They prayed over a tuber. Seriously, if God wanted to appear to people, would He really pick a starchy root for His sign?
On the other hand, you might think, it worked. People are really excited by this. But I suspect that to the last one, these are people who already believe. If you’re sitting on the fence, theologically speaking, would a potato be what pushed you over the edge?
Now, a sweet potato might be more convincing. After all, like He Himself said, "I yam that I yam".
Tip o’ the shroud to Sandra Prow for sending me the news item.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
Puns like that will lead you to the painful root to hell.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
The holy potatoes, they’re everywhere!
http://www.karincooks.com/holypotato/holypotato.html
http://blog.newhumanist.org.uk/2008/01/jesus-appears-in-potato-salad.html
May 7th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Yes, the cross in the potato ‘fries’ in the face of rationalism, but at least it can ‘starch’ your juices flowing. I have a ‘julienne’ questions, but still ‘Idaho’ if I believe.
Jess Tauber
May 7th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
After a post like the last one, he signs it with Jess Tauber, and not Jess Tuber? WTF?
May 7th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
All of these types of “miracle image” sightings reminds me of this comic:
http://russellsteapot.com/comics/2007/diminishing-skills.html
May 7th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Also, if it was actually Divine, it would have shown up in a French fry, not it’s lowly predecessor.
I mean really.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:35 pm
Ok, Phil, that’s it. I’ve put up with the political rants, the left wing ravings, the anti-religion, and the global warming credulousness…. but I draw the line at really bad puns. I’m outta here!
;P
(OK, so I actually enjoy the not-directly-science posts… but it had to be done.)
May 7th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
> After all, like He Himself said, “I yam that I yam”.
Booooo. BOOOOOOOOO!
If there was a hell, you would surely rot in it for that pun.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Y’all are just jealous.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
You can all try to sound original in trying to best BA’s pun… but you just come across sounding like a bunch of imi-taters.
OHHH I kill me…
May 7th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
God really has not much self esteem and lacks respect for others. I mean, making himself, his son (or his symbol: the thing he got KILLED ON!), and his secret lover (aka Mary) appear on stains, pancakes and potatos?!
That’s pretty lousy.
May 7th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I will never be able to watch the scene where Moses goes to the burning tree in the “12 Commandments” again in the same light again.
May 7th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
My love for Jesus is like a truck….
May 7th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
>>>if God wanted to appear to people, would He really pick a starchy root for His sign?
Ah, but potatoes are not starchy roots. They are actually starchy, underground stems.
May 7th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
If a scientist can be converted by a waterfall then I’ll believe a non-Christian could be converted by a potato.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v448/n7156/full/448864a.html
May 7th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
It must be some sort of tie-in with the International Year of the Potato 2008: http://www.potato2008.org/
May 7th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
As a pantheist I must point out that the potato IS god. Well, part of it. The potato part.
Mmmmm. Numinous and nutritious.
May 7th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
So, if you plugged two wires into it, would you have a holy battery?
May 7th, 2008 at 1:49 pm
That was a great pun….but I believe the quote is actually “I Yam What I Yam….”, not “I Yam That I am….”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popeye
From a person who never grew up.
May 7th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Don’t quit your day job, Phil.
May 7th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
“If you’re sitting on the fence, theologically speaking, would a potato be what pushed you over the edge?”
Well, yes, it would push me over the edge, but the opposite way…
Jesus also said, “I Yam the way, the tuber and the loaf.”
May 7th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
I used to be a potato farmer. This is a manifestation of a condition called hollow-heart which is commonly seen. It is caused by irregular watering or hot growing days which cause voids at the heart of the tuber. These voids are an attractive site for bacterial growth and cause the tuber to rot from the inside out. The cross is just a random shape resulting from this common condition. For example, suppose the potato had been chopped in half on another axis – The cross-section would not have any resemblence to a cross. Some of the great religions of the world have been built on some goofy misaprehension as silly as this! Good luck with the prayers.
May 7th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Potatoes? Ha! Everyone knows we should worship the gourd. Or shoe perhaps… bit of a theological moot-point at the moment, that.
May 7th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
I cut into a potato that had the same thing, but all I wanted to do was throw up!
May 7th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
I guess that this is now the root of evil.
May 7th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
scratch the last post it suppose to root of good, since monet root of evil.
May 7th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
in gourd we trust, you shall not have any other gourd but me and from battlestar the gourds of Cobalt, thanks penny.
May 7th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
If we’re going to larger issues of plant and plant part nomenclature, then I point all of you to the (e)pistils of the apostles. Do you have the stamen, huh? And what about Christ’s Anthem- hmmm? And they call Him the Prince of Peanuts…
Jess (if it weren’t for ‘u’ I’D be Jesus) T(a)uber
May 7th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
“Seriously, if God wanted to appear to people, would He really pick a starchy root for His sign?”
Of course not. He would appear as pasta and meatballs. You know.
May 7th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
What would they have done if the potato had contained a Star of David, an Islamic crescent or (FSM forbid) a pentagram?
May 7th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
“Hole-y” spuds? I would think religion would use fruit. (Unless that is forbidden. Not sure how they handled that.)
Specifically I’m thinking they usually go bananas.
May 7th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Oh great, another cartoon website to while away my time without classes when I should be preparing lessons…
May 8th, 2008 at 4:06 am
“And thou wilt knowest him by his tubers?”
May 8th, 2008 at 4:14 am
This is clearly the flying spaghetti monster mocking foolish people carving food and stuff. It is an extra-dimensional joke.
May 8th, 2008 at 5:27 am
Oh, damn, we all gonna go to hell after this one
)
May 8th, 2008 at 7:01 am
“They prayed over a tuber.” ? I tried it…didn’t help!
May 8th, 2008 at 8:58 am
“I yam that I yam”.
*headdesk*
May 8th, 2008 at 9:29 am
” I yam , that I yam,,,”
,,,and I suppose he smokes a pipe and eats lots of spinach???
Hmmm, sounds a bit like me,,,
GAry 7
May 8th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
Malcolm, if I understand you correctly, you could deliberately produce any amount of these “holy” tubers through bad growing practice? And the only variation would be the internal shape?
Methinks there is a chance to start my own cult in my own backyard…
May 8th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
“If you’re sitting on the fence, theologically speaking, would a potato be what pushed you over the edge?”
Depends on how hard it’s thrown.
“After all, like He Himself said, ‘I yam that I yam’.”
I swear to Oz I initially took this as primarily a Popeye reference. You know what? I’d pray to Popeye. Dude gets stuff done.