Category Archives: The Evidentialism Files

‘You Were God’s Favorite Creature, But You Never Had A Future’


Less time separates humans from Tyrannosaurus rex than separated T. Rex from stegosaurus.

Compared to dinosaurs, humans have occupied only a speck on the timeline of Earth’s history. Modern humans appeared on the stage 200,000 years ago (up to 7 million years ago if you include the whole human family), while dinosaurs roamed the globe for about 165 million years. Despite the large span of time stretching across three distinct geologic periods (Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous), many people view the “Age of the Dinosaurs” as a monolithic moment in history when dinosaurs all lived together. In fact, more time separates stegosaurus and Tyrannosaurus rex than separates modern humans from “the King of the Dinosaurs.” 

Stegosaurus roamed what’s now modern-day North America during the late Jurassic period, about 155 million to 145 million years ago. Although it didn’t live alongside the ferocious T. rex, its contemporary, the allosaurus, was also a nightmare of powerful teeth. T. rex didn’t arrive on the scene until some 68 million years ago, during the late Cretaceous — a difference of some 80 million years. So while a comfortable 66 million years separate humans from the dinosaur’s dramatic, likely asteroid-induced downfall, the stegosaurus and T. rex lived even farther apart. This startling fact doesn’t even take into account Triassic dinosaurs, such as herrerasaurus and eoraptor, which are twice as chronologically distant from the T. rex as stegosaurus is. Turns out, the “Age of the Dinosaurs” is much more complex than its name suggests.

The Monday Night Miracle


I hesitated writing this column out of fear it may jinx his chances. But since a dead man spoke Saturday, it’s okay for me to. And even if, fates forbid, Damar Hamlin’s condition were to worsen, the unbelievable should still be noted.

And believed. Because Monday night was nothing short of miraculous — if science didn’t do it so on the regular.

Hamlin, a safety for the Buffalo Bills, took a helmet to the chest that was so precise — a YouTubing cardiologist called it the kind of blow “you only see in medical textbooks” — that Hamlin had a cardiac arrest on field.

My brethren in the news media have done a poor job of explaining cardiac arrest, so let me attempt one.

Hamlin dropped dead. For 13 seconds, an NFL player was dead in midfield Cincinnati. And science, in the form of Bills assistant coach Denny Kellington, manually pumped blood through that dead man. Not unconscious; not woozy; not paralyzed. Dead. That’s why the players were weeping. They’d never seen a man killed. Few have.

Seconds after that, more science, this time in the form of a defibrillator that re-triggered his heart.

At the University of Cincinnati, neurologists said Hamlin’s early brain function may be fully intact.

The New York Times obtained audio of the Bills medical crew the moment Hamlin died. A supervisor ordered a gurney immediately after seeing the collision because he didn’t “like how he went down.”

And today, Hamlin is tweeting: “When you put real love out into the world it comes back to you 3x’s as much,” he wrote in his first Instagram post since his collapse Monday. “The Love has been overwhelming, but I’m thankful for every single person that prayed for me and reached out. If you know me you know this only gone make me stronger. On a long road keep praying for me!”

Indeed, the nation surely will. The Bills — a team that once went to four straight Super Bows but has never won one — is my new favorite this playoffs.

But, should this long road bring Hamlin back to the sidelines, in any capacity, I hope Kellington and the UofC crew are equally hailed.

After all, it’s not often you see a resurrection.

And Walnuts Can Sulk

Pistachios can spontaneously combust.

It turns out there’s a price to pay for how good pistachios are: Under the right circumstances, they can spontaneously combust. Everyone’s favorite shelled nut is especially rich in fat, which is highly flammable. Thankfully, that only becomes a problem when pistachios are packed too tightly during shipping or storage. It’s important to keep the nuts dry lest they become moldy — but if they’re kept too dry and there are too many of them bunched together, they can self-heat and catch fire without an external heat source. 

Though exceedingly rare and easy to avoid if the proper instructions are followed, pistachio self-combustion is a real enough concern that the German Transport Information Service specifically advises that pistachios “not be stowed together with fibers/fibrous materials as oil-soaked fibers may promote self-heating/spontaneous combustion of the cargo.” Don’t worry, though: It won’t happen in your pantry with just a few bags, which means you can indulge in the nut of your dreams without worrying about their flavor becoming unexpectedly smoky.