Wow.
We actually did it.
Thanks to all of you watching, and liking, and sharing, we’ve finally hit one million
subscribers!
There are just so many we need to thank: you, our loyal viewers, our sister shows, and the
entire Test Tube and Discovery team.
Now, over the past few years we’ve spent a lot of time looking at religious figures
like Jesus and Muhammad, but we’ve been saving one of the most influential for last:
His Noodly Appendage, The Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Because we’ve PASTA million subs, we wanted to know: just how powerful is the Flying Spaghetti
Monster?
Well, first off it may help to explain that the “Flying Spaghetti Monster” is the
central deity in Pastafarianism, which is actually a protest or parody religion.
Religious satire has been around almost as long as organized religion has, stretching
back to Ancient Greek plays in 400 BC.
Today, organizations like the Temple of the Invisible Pink Unicorn, Last Thursdayism,
or Jedi-ism are created to point out flaws in belief-based logic, usually related to
Christianity.
For example, Last Thursdayism believes that the universe was created last Thursday, parodying
the biblical interpretation that the universe is less than 10,000 years old.
One of the most famous religious satires is Russell’s Teapot.
This was a thought experiment by philosopher BERt-rand Russell.
He proposed that a small teapot was in orbit around the sun, and challenged anyone to prove
him wrong.
Since it would be basically impossible to locate such a teapot, it is basically impossible
to disprove its existence, which parodies a central argument for the existence of a
God.
Similarly, the Flying Spaghetti Monster was invented in 2005 by Bobby Henderson after
the Kansas State Board of Education enacted controversial educational science standards
including creationism, or intelligent design.
Henderson argued that there was just as much evidence for his belief in a flying, omnipotent
heap of spaghetti and meatballs as there was for creationism, demanding that pastafarianism
was taught as well.
There are a few important central tenets to Pastafarianism.
Pirates are the most divine beings, and likely go to Pastafarian heaven, which is full of
beer volcanos and stripper factories.
Additionally, the slow drop in the number of pirates worldwide is directly attributed
to the rise in global average temperature, earthquakes, hurricanes, and other natural
disasters.
As such, full pirate regalia must be worn at all times..
The religion claims to have ten million followers, roughly two thirds the size of Judaism, and
roughly two hundred and twenty times smaller than Christianity.
But as a matter of fact, Pastafarianism is officially recognized in a number of countries,
including Poland, the Netherlands, and New Zealand.
In 2015, a woman in Massachusetts was even allowed to wear a pasta colander on her head
for a driver’s license photo, claiming it was religious headgear.
Above all else, the Flying Spaghetti Monster represents the growing face of atheism and
the religiously unaffiliated.
Today, those without a religious preference make up the third largest religious group,
after Christianity and Islam, with more than a billion non-adherents.
From 2007 to 2014, atheists and agnostics in the United States rose from about 36 million
to more than 55 million.
Meanwhile, the conversation about the place of religion in a secular world has only gotten
larger and more heated.
So just how powerful is the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
[Ahh, Spaghettabout it]
Thanks for being one in million TestTubers, we couldn’t’ve have done it without you.
If you want to learn more about the changing face of religion worldwide, and what the next
few decades will look like, check out this video up top.
If you want to catch more content from us on social media, check out our Facebook page!
Also, make sure to look out for a big announcement from us in the upcoming days.