gcol

Exactly! As rare as rocking horse manure, and if found, both should be pickled in aspic for the wonderment of future generations. A woman of true virtue being so rare, and 99.99999% of ordinary males being lumbered with the other sort, mysogyny is perhaps the natural state. The dirth of virtuous women could drive a man to miscegenation. Now there is an association of ideas. Is the one enough to make a man consider the other?

No problem at all. I mean, Religion can be just so annoying, somehow. All those do-gooders continually sticking their noses into peaceful folks everyday business. All that shoutin' and hollerin' and goddam preaching, makes me want to do some ass-kicking in retaliation, tha's all. Just keep off my grass and I wont put weedkiller on yours. Fair enough?

Martin, I think you may have a hidden agenda! Trying to show that not only religion can be controversial and lead to discord. But how about this: Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies.Proverbs (ch. XXXI, v. 10). Ah, such words of wisdom from the old-time prophets Not a song, but possibly a seminal source of many mysogynistic lyrics. Blame religion again, or use it to justify misogyny?

Directional sign at a U.K. hospital: (I have the photo to prove it) Family planning advice Use rear entrance

most people are trying to be so damn nice it is depressing, but could not help laughing at that. Perils of the English language. Difference between what you meant to say and what you actually said.

Well, we may not be citizens of the self-designated "land of the free" but when we think the spooks are not tapping the wires, we commit the occasional thought crime. I really enjoy the frisson of excitement that the occasional non-pC thought can bring. don't you just love the way Dawkins and others quietly go about their good work of trying to prise open closed minds...... so subtle! Trying to have some fun filling in the blanks I have created in Sev's previous post. The possibilities are hilarious. Any ideas?

Wow, just how reasonable, logical and thoughtful can you get Just the sort of response that killed the religion forum. Was that not a gross ad hominem? With critiques like that, you deserve much worse than the forum moderators will allow in return.

He was interviewed about it on UK television recently. Newsnight, with Jeremy Paxman. Very interesting, enlightening and reasonably put. Nothing in it that has not been well chewed over in the now unfortunately defunct religion forum. A must read for those concerned about the creeping malaise of creationism. By the way, a nice wheeze to get religion back into the general forum. Very clever, long may it last. Are you looking, Jim?

[quote=Pangloss; Sorry Hugo. People just aren't that stupid. They are certainly not stupid enough to say what they really think after they have counted the greenbacks in their wallets. To paraphrase someone or other: When you have grabbed people by the wallet, they will say whatever you want them to. (But keep their thoughts to themselves.)

To put the ALF into perspective, here is a link, Congressional testimony FBI which plainly calls them extremist terrorists. http://www.fbi.gov/congress/congress02/jarboe021202.htm Supporters and apologists might beware the midnight knock on the door!

A contributor to this thread has stated, in another thread, that they valued a chimpanzee over the life of a human child. I wonder if they will produce similar arguments in favour of fish in general over the wellbeing of fishermens' families? I would be sympathetic to arguments that favoured subsistance fishermen over the highly mechanised methods of stripmining the seas to species extinction, as an olive branch.

I am no food technologist, or even a passable cook, so I may have this wrong but: If trans-fatty wotsits are added to food to prolong shelflife, and a restaurant makes its own food from scratch, why would it need it? Perhaps only food outlets that buy in bulk and just reheat to order will be affected. I think I am making a distinction between real restaurnts and fst junk food purveyors

A nicely selective example, emotive certainly, of the worldwide malaise of trade protectionism. People who live in glass houses built on protectionism should not throw stones. The big question is whether protectionism can ever be justified. Those who benefit from it in any way will surely say yes, even those who object to a specific example.

Is this not a typical act of a new breed of terrorist, "Ethical Terrorists". They say their destructive actions are O.K. because they are morally justified. In my opinion they have no morals or ethics, merely twisted prejudices. In principle their justification could be used to condone any terrorist act. They are surely to be condemned for setting a dangerous precedent. I had a nightmare the other day where marauding bands of meat-eaters torched fields of captive vegetables to liberate them.

It seems as if IMM agrees with terrorist acts if the act is in support of her own views. This is an egocentric argumenent at best, naive at second best, and lastly possibly dangerously stupid. I note she advises on ethical investment. Does she consider terrorism ethical? If so, can she define ethical terrorism?

Not sure I completely understand that point, but my viewpoint is that logic is cold, hard and impersonal. When logic does not support prejudice, and conflicts with items on our personal wish-list, we tend to tie ourselves in knots trying to escape its consequences. trying to live by logic puts us at odds with most of the whims of the human condition.

Sorry, not phrased well. Just tidying up by trying to confirm that black holes, either single massive or clustered small, would form part of the null gravitation effect at large scales, and when a black hole was in a null gravitation region, it would thus cease to accrete further mass/matter? If so, then (1) could I reason that at large scales all masses tend to settle into a nicely balanced gravitical position? And (2), at large scales, beyond a certain "fuzzy" boundary limit, perhaps the minimum angular size, there is no relative movement caused by gravity? I may be stating the obvious, but I am definitely wet behind the ears in such matters. Trying to get "the big picture".

Sisyphus: Assuming you are correct, it expands Martin's answer nicely, thanks. But for me, it also begs another dumb question: 1. Would a cluster of (smaller) galaxies count as one larger one for this balancing out effect? 2. Also, presumably, black holes would similarly balance out and be part of a self-limiting size mechanism?

I suppose that might mean they lead the space junk race, too?

For one who did not completely understand the question, you nevertheless gave a perfectly satisfying answer. Well guessed!.

Pets are essentially our slaves. As there were some benevolent slave owners, so there are some caring pet owners. A pet, as any other animal, has no legal right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". We keep pets for our own benefit and gratification, not for theirs. They have no choice, there is no benefit for them. We have the power of life and death over them Why do we keep pets? To gratify selfish needs, the needs that some people can not satisfy in their normal social interactions with their own species. Pets are our unwilling prisoners, no matter how touchy-feely we may profess to be about them. It is self delusional and a denial of reality. Which free-born animal would swap its normal environment for forced domestic captivity?

I thought it was tried, it was called slavery. Otherwise, look into BDSM.

At first glance, that was a good soundbite., but it should not be true. The very basis of the scientific method is constantly under attack from creationists and IDers and lines of research stymied by religious lobbies. If science wants to retreat behind its ivory tower fortifications, it must not bleat when the walls begin to crumble. There is no such thing as a true vacuum. If science thinks it can operate or think or discuss within one, it is deluded.

A tug of the old forelock to you, Jim. I have had the impression for some time that some influential members were more comfortable dishing it out than receiving it. They appear to retreated to a safe haven, the forum has capitulated. Science does not work in a vacuum, nor should its work be conducted in a sociologically sealed environment immune from criticism. Its ethics should be questioned using its own methods, and one thrust of criticism comes from religion. In the broad view, therefore, there ought to be an arena for the debate. I thought it might be here, but science appears to have found the pace of philosophical battle too hot. The scientific method is the loser. A victory, then, for religion and closed minds.