mistermack

Catholic priests do. All the time.

I didn't claim to be holding evidence. You're kicking a straw man. I merely repeated something I encountered long ago. It's not important to me what the numbers of Dholes are. From other sites, I read that there are less than 2,500 left in the wild. So huge packs are surely a thing of the past. But if you don't like wiki, do your own research. I'll be happy to follow your links. As far as climbing trees go, they ARE excellent tree climbers, in the context of the thread. That big male reached about thirty feet in just over two seconds. They are less than excellent at descending, but very good at climbing. A smaller female would have been quicker still. So escaping from dogs wouldn't be a problem so long at there was a suitable tree in range. Comparing them to Leopards is a distraction. A Leopard can virtually RUN up a tree, and catch monkeys on occasions. But that's irrelevant to the subject of dogs and Tigers. This page mentions rumours of packs as large as 100 so I don't think I dream't it. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/radical-conservation/2015/jun/25/dhole-asia-endangered-tiger-ignored I think 50 years ago, when the forests were yet to be demolished, and game was far more plentiful, the pack sizes would have had the capacity to be much bigger.

Don't kid yourself. The reason it continues to persist is the intensive indoctrination of innocent defenceless children. Same reason all of the religions persist. Bullying child abuse pays off. I had plenty of it, but kicked it. Most are not so fortunate.

So that would mean that the reaction would gradually die away, without the input from the neutron generator. That would make it inherently safe and controllable. The big question would be how powerful a neutron generator could be included, and that would influence how close to a critical mass you would need in the reactor. But I guess that if it's below critical, then it's not possible for it to go to a runaway chain reaction, so close to critical would not be inherently any more dangerous than half-critical mass. I suppose the danger of a melt-down would be higher though, but the reaction would be dying down at the same time.

Suits me. Your expectation of a pat on the back, for the lamest of argument is tiresome. And claiming a consensus for it, as justification is laughable. What it says is, I can't justify it with my own words, but these clever people think so too. There's a consensus of clever people in the Vatican. Sorry, like a fool, I disagree with them.

Historical methods would have a great spirit in the sky as the explanation for the whole shebang. There are few better attested beings from antiquity than Jehova. Then of course you have the Greek gods, very well testified too. And Allah and all the others. Who can deny that these gods exist, when so many people bear witness to meeting them and talking to them? Their evidence is much stronger than Jesus's. Of course, a great number of religious historians believe exactly that, for their own preferred version. In short, historical methods are routinely used by religious historians to say what they want them to say. They all do it. An historical method that insists on saying "we don't know" when they don't know, would be much easier to respect. (as Ten Oz keeps telling you) But as I pointed out earlier, religious history is totally different to civil and political history. Religious historians need to be viewed with far more suspicion of bias, because most of them ARE biased.

Too long ago, but it's pretty much what I read. Wikpedia says packs of over 40 have been observed. Maybe they are rarer now, I'm remembering from fifty years ago. The quote was over a hundred in exceptional circumstances. Wiki also says " On some occasions, dholes may attack tigers. When confronted by dholes, tigers will seek refuge in trees or stand with their backs to a tree or bush, where they may be mobbed for lengthy periods before finally attempting escape. Escaping tigers are usually killed, while tigers which stand their ground have a greater chance of survival.[41] Tigers are dangerous opponents for dholes, as they have sufficient strength to kill a dhole with a single paw strike.[6] " Of course Tigers can't match Leopards in tree climbing, but they are still pretty good. ( Good enough to get away from any dog, anyway). Let's put it this way. If you ever meet a wild Tiger, don't think climbing a tree will do you any good.

Dirtychai, my post about Eherman was self explanatory, you just cut out the relevant bits. Ehrman has an educational history of a seminary etc, and that is actually fairly typical of bible scholars. Not all, but a hell of a lot of them. I gave Ehrman credit for using his faculties, and abandoning the stuff he was indoctrinated with. That still doesn't make him unbiased. He's believed in a real Jesus all his life. That's a bias of sorts. He's still tainted with a lifetime of belief in that particular aspect of the faith. I wouldn't blame him, or be surprised, if contemplating a lifetime of study of someone who didn't even exist, was a jump too far. My use of the phrase, "proper historian" isn't mysterious, or ambiguous. Proper historians can be biased by their faith, their years of acceptance of something as a fact. It doesn't mean they aren't proper. I would have thought that you would have understood my use of the phrase to mean "non-fundie-Christian historians". You can't be a proper historian, and swear that every word in the old book is the true word of god. Although plenty claim just that. Again, as far as Paul goes, you completely ignored the context. Eise called me a crackpot for my posts, and that was a reminder, clearly stated, of some of the crackpot postings he's made. And no, the answer you people gave doesn't come close to being credible. You seem to think you've dealt with something, by giving a ludicrous answer. No you haven't. The problem remains. Paul's epistles are a strong sign of a non-human Jesus. And no pathetically contrived excuse for them negates that problem.

I found this on google maps about a year ago. I concluded in the end it's more likely to be volcanic. At 8 km diameter it's pretty impressive, and at first sight, it certainly looks like an impact crater with spreading ripples. It's not listed anywhere, it's in Siberia. https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@70.9226117,103.0752019,14016m/data=!3m1!1e3?hl=en

Wouldn't the neutrons from the generator cause more neutrons to be produced, magnifying the effect of the neutron beam? (although I agree that it probably isn't viable, just on the basis that it would have already been done)

Would it be possible to have a core that is well below critical mass, that you stimulate using neutrons from a neutron generator? So that there is no possibility at all of an accidental explosion and the overall size is smaller?

Accounts of torture often include the subject passing out. Maybe they do, or maybe they fake it. But people who have been tortured often include passing out, and being revived by their torturers, so that they can begin again. Maybe we should ask Dick Cheyney. Oh no, that was just enhanced questioning.

Pot? Kettle??? You asked why Matthew would have him coming from Nazareth. I posted why, in Matthew's OWN WORDS. Your response is that Matthew is lying about that. And your argument appears to be, why would they bother to lie. This is pretty much as crackpot as it gets. If Matthew and Mark lied about Bethlehem, what else are they lying about? Like, maybe about someone who didn't exist? The Jesus story could easily have started out as a "Son of God" cult, stories about a heavenly son of God. This is perfectly possible, it happens all the time. Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Norse, they all made up stories about Gods having sons and daughters. Sometimes with human mothers. The Jews were not special. Just look at all the different Jewish cults at the time. Then people decide the Son of God story went better with a human link, and bingo, the embellishment starts. Match it to various folklore to give it credibility. That's why there is no earlier mention of a real Jesus, and why Paul ignores Jesus the man. Your arguments are so contrived. "Why would these liars tell this particular lie?" and "why would Paul hardly mention the real son of god, who lived for thirty years on Earth, just a few years ago?" Of course he wouldn't. And you call my posts crackpot. You certainly are single-minded. I grant you that.

Matthew is the new testament. But he's the one you're taking seriously, when you discuss the Nazareth question. You should try to be a bit more consistent. You are rubbishing his writing here, but relying on it as a clue. If no historian would take his gospel seriously, then it's case closed. You're just cherry picking from the gospels, in the same way that your beloved "consensus" has done for years. Matthew wrote " that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene." That shows his motivation. Whether it's right or not is immaterial. You posed the question why. You have your answer. Having said that, if Matthew got it wrong, you would have thought that he would have been called out on it at the time.

The Tiger would probably be ok for up to ten great danes. Great Danes should not be compared to wild animals. They are clumsy and slow, and have a much weaker bite than a much smaller wolf would. In the wild, Tigers have stood off packs of 50 dholes, the asian hunting dogs. But there have been reports of packs of up to 80 or even 100, and for sure they could do a tiger some damage. What people forget though, is that a Tiger is an excellent tree climber, so the reports of huge packs of dholes killing a Tiger are probably about sick old infirm or injured Tigers. Tigers are solitary killers, so if anything they are more formidable killers than Lions, which tend to bite and hold, rather than go for the single handed kill. Lone Tigers can and sometimes do kill wild Gaur, which are the world's biggest wild cattle, sometimes more than a ton in weight and bigger than the American Bison. A couple of clumsy Great Danes are not in the same league. They would be dead in seconds.

It's pure speculation, trying to second-guess motives from 2,000 years ago, of people who were making stories up and embellishing current ones, but as it's all we've got, here goes : Matthew 2:23 | View whole chapter | See verse in context And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene. So have him satisfying both sets of prophecies. Born in Bethlehem, brought up in Nazareth. That's what I would do, if I was inventing a Jesus figure. What was ACTUALLY going on in their heads could be literally anything. Of course, the truth could be one possibility. But just one of a huge number. And we do know that the truth was not highly prized at the time.

Mining, melting and pumping are all expensive processes, involving a lot of infrastructure. Mining would be full of problems, as you would end up wasting a lot of the berg, over time. And if you mined it inside out, it would weaken as it got smaller. And you would need to melt it, before you could pump it. And once you get it onshore, you have to store it, so you need more infrastructure. Maybe, you could enclose the berg in a gigantic plastic sack, so that as you tow it northwards, you don't lose water, and it gradually melts. So that by the time you got to the destination, all you need to do is pump the melted water out of the sack, as it is required.

The technology isn't there, to move icebergs using renewables. And even if you managed to get a giant iceberg to the coast of Australia, how do you get the water onshore, and where is the market for such a sudden glut of fresh water? There are an awful lost of unsolved problems before you get the water to a customer. Desalination plants can be designed and sized to supply an existing market, and can supply water continuously, rather than intermittently.

Because the main cost is fossil fuel. And there's not much that improved technology can do about that. As fossil fuels get scarcer, the cost will go up.

Yes, but I'm just pointing out how much of a start desalination has, on towing icebergs. Also, desalination has a limitless supply of water. Icebergs are a finite resource, and removing them could possibly damage the local environment.

The tide of history is against this idea. It's not yet being done. Desalination is currently a big and growing industry. Iceberg towing will get more expensive over time. Desalination will get cheaper as new technology gets developed. Desalinated water is ready to use. An iceberg needs handling to get the water to where it's wanted. I like the idea of the saltwater greenhouse. I actually thought of it independently, and researched it, and found that someone was already doing it. I have my own variation in my head, where you pump up salt water into greenhouses, and you grow mangroves in the greenhouses. Mangroves can grow in seawater, you can cultivate mangrove oysters among the roots, use the leaves as fodder, use the wood as fuel, and catch the condensation as fresh water.

I very much doubt if dead people have power over hawks. Hawks have enough to think about, just surviving and raising chicks, and coping with the weather etc. In any case, it takes a great deal of knowledge and skill to train a hawk, especially if the hawk is Austrian, and the dead person speaks English. And how would the dead person know where in Austria to go, to take control of a local hawk, and how would they know the address to send it to, and the exact time and day that the person would be looking out of that particular window? Anyway, there's nothing in the bible to say that people will be able to control hawks after death. In fact there's a complete lack of any mention of controlling other species as a spirit. When you think of all the billions of people who have died over the years, you would expect lots of contact with the "other side" if it was something that spirits were able to achieve. I would personally choose an African Grey parrot, rather than a hawk, if I wanted to send a sign to the living.

This is one of the surest facts? What on earth makes it so sure? I don't think Paul ever mentioned it, so it must be coming from those highly suspect documents, the gospels, and acts. All written long after the supposed death of Jesus. And as far as I'm aware, there's no mention of the name Nazareth in Jewish or Roman writing till approx. the third century. There is an active process going on right now, I believe, to forge a history for Nazareth, and build a theme park. So any evidence that emerges from now on has probably been deposited there by fraudsters. Some highly questionable coin finds have cropped up, when previous work found nothing. And of course, the very sources that first MENTION Nazareth, the gospels, have Jesus being born in Bethlehem. So if this is one of the surest facts, it ought to be case-closed.

It seems to me that the price of pups is what is driving the ever reducing gene pool of dog breeds. It's expensive to keep a dog fed and healthy over it's entire lifetime. if you do it properly with good health insurance. I personally don't like the idea of the extreme selective breeding that's going on. I would rather see everyone keeping mongrels. However, if I was going to keep a dog, I would spend as much as I could on a high-pedigree bitch, and breed it a few times, to get some of the money back. Money trumps ideals with me, unless I win the lottery.

There's a big difference in the way that the opinions of Christians ought to be viewed, when it comes to expert opinion. In physics for example, I'm willing to accept that someone could be a devout Christian, and still have valid opinions about the big bang, etc. Or in biology, even if they declare that they don't accept evolution, I'm happy to believe that it's possible that they can compartmentalise their work in the field of Biology, and keep the religion separate. What I'm not prepared to accept, is that Christians can be objective unbiased Bible Historians. I think it's ludicrous to suggest that they can. It's like respecting the opinion of a flat-earther astronomer. To be a Christian means you have to believe that Jesus existed, died on the cross, and revived after three days. Otherwise, you don't qualify.