Penn Jillette tells the compelling story of an encounter with one such—with no nonsense, no evasion or dissembling, just straight up, no chaser.

Watch the whole thing; it is truly fascinating to watch Jillette—who is a brilliant man, a great entertainer, and a devout atheist (I see no contradiction in those last two words, since in my view atheism is just as surely a matter of faith as religion itself is)—wrestle with the implications of the encounter.

Via Francis, whose post you should read in its entirety and carefully contemplate as well.

Update! A hilarious Penn Jillette story, one of many highlighting the aforementioned genius of the man.

In July 1999, Jillette was granted U.S. Patent 5,920,923 for the “Jill-Jet”, a hot-tub jet specially angled for allowing a woman to masturbate against the water stream. The patent expired in September 2018. He has credited Debbie Harry of Blondie for suggesting the idea, as the two of them were once in a hot tub and Harry made a remark about changing the jets for a woman’s pleasure. Jillette liked the idea enough to pursue a patent application at the USPTO under the patent title “Hydro-therapeutic Stimulator”.

The abstract of the patent explains that a “discharge nozzle is located within the tub and connected to the outlet, mounted to the seat so that the discharged water from the circulation pump automatically aligns with and is directed to stimulation points (e.g., the clitoris) of the female user when the female user sits in the seat.” An article in the June 2006 issue of Playboy shed additional light on the invention. Originally, it was to be called the “ClitJet”; however, he stated that “Jill-Jet” was more suitable because it included his name in the title.

On the Penn Radio show, telling the listeners about the photo shoot for the Playboy article, Jillette mentioned that he has a Jill-Jet installed in a tub in his house, and that several of his female friends and friends’ female spouses enjoy it a lot, but he is not aware of any other installations of a water jet in such a configuration anywhere else.

Heh. Love him or hate him, you gotta admit that’s some truly funny shit right there.