The "Flying Spaghetti Monster" was first described in a satirical open letter written by Bobby Henderson in 2005 to protest the Kansas State Board of Education decision to permit teaching intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in state school science classes.

Flying Spaghetti Monster, the deity of what began as a parody religion and grew to become a social movement. The adherents, who call themselves Pastafarians, purportedly number in the tens of thousands and are primarily located in North America, western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.

The Flying Spaghetti Monster is the god of Pastafarianism. It is often seen as a parody religion and thus has become popular with people opposed to the idea that God or gods created the world. Followers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are sometimes called Pastafarians.

Bathyphysa conifera was nicknamed the Flying Spaghetti Monster, for the satirical deity of the Internet, by the oil workers who first saw it in 2015.