Welcome to Interesting If True, the podcast that tries to wash clean the stains of Catholicism only to suffer the pruney fingers of failure to fallacious French fielty. I'm your host this week, Aaron, and with me are: I'm Shea, and this week I learned that oftentimes, men will have a lower antibody count after receiving the vaccine than women, but have a higher unclebody count. This Week’s Beer The Rise Guys P1 Pilsner - Thomas Creek Brewery Donated by the awesome Mr. Bible Pants * No BA Score… * Pilsner * 5% ABV * Aaron: 8 * Shea: 7 https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/2454/401299/ Reasonism Today I'd like to talk about the religion of science and rationality. You know, "scientism" or whatever evolution-denying idiots call it. More accurately, it's "the Cult of Reason" or originally Culte de la Rasion, their motto, two scoops of la rasions in each theory. So, let's visit France in the late 1700s. Some of you might be aware that it was a terribly boring time in human history. Everyone just sat around eating cake and teasing baby Napoleon about his inability to defend the tiny island nation of Pulau-Pulau from the Daring Dragoon. All in all, it was a boring time so the French sought to spice things up by taking a break from bread-theft to kick the Roman Catholic Church out of their glorious republic. And so, we can introduce revolutionary minds like Joseph Fouche—who I think still practices medicine in Washington, smart guy; Jacques Hebert—not the author of all-time best selling sci-fi series Dune, lame; Antoine-Francuis Momoro—a pioneer in name hyphenation; and Jean-Paul Marat, a bath-time trailblazer. Jean-Paul, who was still nearly 200 years from becoming Pope, spent his idle time eating cheese in his bathtub and working on L'Ami du Peuple, or "Friends of People". According to historian Jeremy D. Popkin, it was "the most celebrated radical paper [of the time]", presumably because of its excellent coverage of the early X-Games. Jean-Paul was himself a fan of the half-pipe. So much so that he spent almost the entirety of the last three years of his life in his bathtub perfecting his sweet, 720* slip-splash maneuver, now called, to use the jargon of the sport, *le Dermatitis Herpetiformis" — you'll have to forgive the pronunciation, my French is pretty rusty. The maneuver apparently required the liberal application of vinegar to the forehead followed by a series of bath-time spins until the "perennial" region was properly red, blistered, and itchy. He really suffered for his art. But it was this selfless dedication to his pursuits that, in 1795, led him to become the face of the Cult of Reason. Literally, they replaced crucifixes in Paris with bust sculptures—because, living in a tub no one had ever seen him below the collarbones—of Jean-Paul. Still, weird water sports aside his writings would spark a fire in the bellies of the anti-clearicalist francophones and, in 1792, Antoine-Francois Momoro founded the Cult or Reason as a replacement for Catholicism. The conversion saw famous sites like Notre-Dame's Cathedral being converted to a Temple of Reason, complete with a new altar inscribed "To Philosophy". A number of churches were similarly converted all over France as the Church of Reason became the official state-sponsored secular religion. Venerating philosophers the temples were decorated with ornate busts of history's best thinkers... well... those who were considered history's best thinkers by drunks in 1794, but still, better than pedophiles. Speaking of Catholic Priests, many were rounded up and informed their services were no longer needed.