What I’m Watching: Man From Earth

This is up on ‘zon prime, and written by Jerome Bixby, who (very relevantly) wrote the Star Trek TOS episode Requiem for Methuselah.

An apparently 30-something history professor (David Lee Smith) is leaving his job and town, and a few colleagues and friends (hey, the asshole biker professor is William Katt! He looks like shit 30 years since I last saw him, but he’s still alive!) show up for a going-away party. They notice some oddities in his furnishings, and he tells them a story, that he’s a 14,000 year old caveman, and the things he’s seen, people he’s met. They react with incredulity, get a shrink in…

The entire thing is shot in and just outside a little cabin, with a fireplace. Mostly one-camera, calm, long shots, actors mostly in character and reacting appropriately. I could wish for them to all speak a little more Howard Hawks, New Yorker speed instead of slow and laconic, I don’t buy that some of these people are professors, but you work with what you can get on indie flicks.

The writing’s not fantastic; he does question & answer, with often terse answers, not technical or detailed, and often interrupted by snarky people. There’s one or two, where he’s recalling scenery or people, that get something like actual SF writing. What I would like is long monologues about his people, about life in Sumeria, or Rome, or Paris. There’s a Poul Anderson book, The Boat of a Million Years which covers a similar character, which has much longer expositions of the nature of living forever.

He has a story of meeting another unnamed immortal, which he puts in the 17th Century. It might possibly be a reference to Le Comte de Saint Germain, a reputed immortal and courtier, though he did eventually die. This is the kind of detail that would’ve improved the story.

And then there’s a religious argument, with a devout true believer, because apparently one random decade in the Mideast 2000 years ago is more important than the other 14,000 years. I think this argument scene is defective in a few ways. First, the believer thinks the King James Version is a “recent” and “accurate” Bible, when in reality it’s 400 years out of date and a known shitty translation, most modern Protestants (the theist here is openly anti-Catholic, which is hilarious if you’re screaming “blasphemy!” at someone; a “religion” that splits into reformations every couple years is obviously not divinely inspired) use the New International Version, New Living Translation, or New American Standard Bible (for hardcore Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek literalists). I mostly quote KJV because it’s poetic and used in so much English literature of the last 400 years, but I’m absolutely not trying to receive “truth” from it.

And while the voices of reason in the room explain the places where Christianity is copied from prior less-shitty religions, the theist is only capable of denying and crying, can’t make any rational arguments. SIGH. Look, I’m an aggressive, mocking atheist, but we should be better about presenting the opposition argument than the Christian God’s Not Dead idiots.

But I do like his 100-word New New Testament better than anything Christians have ever written in the last 2000 years. They would all be massively improved by switching to this belief.

★★★½☆

There is a sequel, Man From Earth: Holocene, written by the director of the first with no input from Jerome Bixby who was by this time dead, and the comments are harsh: “I’ve just finished watching Man From Earth: Holocene and this is less a review than a warning.” Well. Maybe if I’m angry at myself I’ll watch that for punishment.

There’s also a movie on Netflix, He Never Died, starring Henry Rollins(!!!), about another immortal, though it’s more religious/magical, if played for… not comedy, but funny horror? ★★★★☆ for that.

Atheism Reading Assignment

The things that deconverted me as a child:

  • National Geographic Concise History of Religions: Either one of these is right, and it’s not yours, or none of them are right. I’m particularly fond of the Aztecs, since they believed at a depth no rational person can comprehend… and were just totally wrong. Huitzilopochtli didn’t end the world when the sacrifices stopped.
  • Carl Sagan’s Cosmos, book (most importantly) and TV series (often streaming online, or get the boxed set). Explains the scientific method, and how we have learned what we know. I don’t recommend Neil Degrasse Tyson’s version, which is much more pop-culture.
  • Isaac Asimov’s Guide to the Bible: Explains where the Bible came from and how it was written, and why.

Additional:

Harry Potter Contains Actual Curses and Spells, Says Local Idiot

“These books present magic as both good and evil,
which is not true, but in fact a clever deception.
The curses and spells used in the books are actual curses and spells;
which when read by a human being risk conjuring evil spirits
into the presence of the person reading the text”
—Dan Reehil, soi-disant “reverend”

This is a thing an adult Human, supposedly in charge of “educating” children, wrote in the 21st Century. This person actually believes that magic and evil spirits exist, that a series of children’s books actually let you violate physics and produce effects with no cause by waving around a stick and saying some Latin doggerel. Which is at least consistent if stupid, since Catholic doctrine is that saying Latin doggerel over wheat crackers and wine turns them into manflesh and blood. If his lunatic premise was correct, we would be in the middle of a magical apocalypse the likes of which the Book of Revelation would say is “too much, man”. Any child in this idiot’s care is being misinformed and mentally abused.

Stop treating this nonsense as if it’s a valid opinion. End religion. Ban the Bible, or at least replace it with Asimov’s Guide to the Bible. Read more fantasy novels with the understanding that they’re fiction.

He Is Risen!

I obviously don’t celebrate the one who died and was risen again, Osiris and his detachable penis, nor Ostara the goddess of the dawn, any more than I do christian syncretic myths (super NSFW, but you’re not working now so go read all of Ghastly for the weekend).

It’s a pseudo-random weekend in spring, because an obsolete lunar calendar doesn’t match up with modern calendars. Hoboes dressing up as bunnies handing out eggs and candy aren’t a holy celebration, just training kids to be furries (not that there’s anything wrong with that). A fairy-tale rabbi (not rabbit) not attested to by contemporary historians didn’t come back from lawful execution by magic, and won’t be coming back again to take you to rock candy mountain while us sinners burn. Cocoa is a New World plant, so chocolate bunnies or penises or whatever are obviously heretical new additions to any mythology. Tasty, tasty heresy.

Also, merry pranksmas.

Anyway, I was raised from the dead too early, going back to bed. Try not to form any religions about me while I’m out.

Our Illiterate Nation

Many Americans are devoted readers of Scripture: More than a third (37%) say they read the Bible or other Holy Scriptures at least once a week, not counting worship services. But Americans as a whole are much less inclined to read other books about religion. Nearly half of Americans who are affiliated with a religion (48%) say they “seldom” or “never” read books (other than Scripture) or visit websites about their own religion, and 70% say they seldom or never read books or visit websites about other religions.

Pew 2010 U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey