I just got the oddest e-mail--re: Some of the Parts

[vixengrl]

By tracking my Sitemeter, I guess the sender viewed "Out Campaign" people and got my e-mail from my blog profile--and just wanted me to know--that he, he being Garry Rzeppa, was fronting $64k to call out Dawkins, read him from a kind of children's book he wrote ( http://www.someofthepartsbook.com/ ) (Don't blame me guys, I didn't write it, and I'd've picked a better font)--and then ask him one question.

Now, I have a dumb sense of propriety, so I really don't see why the good doctor should rise to the bait of a $64,000 question that could be anything from "So, are your dead loved ones really dust?" to "Boxers or briefs?" Yet I also have a vicious curiousity: Whatever kind of question could this dude ask that would be worth $64 large of his own funds? My best guess is, since the book is free on the website, he's looking for publicity to get anti-atheists to just buy the thing, and it will boil down to some lame question that really wouldn't make a person who has gotten over religion say "Dash it all, I shall proceed to the nearest temple of my forefather's choice immediately!" In other words, he's latching onto the atheist-best-seller-basklash-coat-tails. (Could there be such a thing? And yet I could suppose a niche for it in the current environment.)

So I doubt Dawkins should really cater to the whims of a dumbass--checking amazon.com, the kinds of people who've read this cat checked out D'souza and Dembski--one likes Christianity because it just seems "nicer" than atheism, when you boil all his puffery down, and the other is (as far as this somewhat mathematically-challenged person has been able to determine) a person entirely able to produce a proof against the likelihood of evolution by working *backwards* from the answer he expects (bad mathemetician--don't do that.)But if he follows the logical course--we don't get to hear the illogical question!

So: madness, marketing, or metaphysics--what do you suppose the question would be?

[progressoid]

1. I read about this at Pharyngula too.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/04/more_money_than_sense.php

I vote for this being a publicity stunt. Although he could be borderline mental.

Ya know, I could use the money, but it would make my eyes and ears bleed to read that. I could barely get through the "First Part".