bombus

Oh please. Is the middle east guilty of anything?

The middle east isn't to blame as its a region made up of many innocent individuals trying to live like everyone else in the world. The leaders are to blame for some things, but remember, most of them were put in place by the West - including Saddam Hussein! The reason why the West hates Iraq is because they overthrew the western puppet (the Shah) and replaced him with someone they wanted who was extremely anti western (the Ayatolloh), because the west had toppled Mossadegh and stirred up anger. I am no fan of either the Shah or the Ayatollah, but it was the West that toppled Mossadegh who led to them both. Its a mess the west created - as usual. So, who is really to blame?

One thing bombus? So far, your whole viewpoint is centered on soundbite pesimism founded on baseless, blow hard hate america first philosophy.

I'm not anti american, I'm anti capitalist as just leads to wars and suffering. I'm not a communist either mind!

Do you have anything substative to back up your claims of war profits?

Loads, and it would take up most of this site! But hey, you should be finding this stuff out, not getting me to tell you! Why not subscribe to New Internationalist magazine or something - really!

So far all we have is a skyrocketing deficit and 3 dollar a gallon gasoline to show for it.

Yup, the american people (your average joes) are just as messed about as anyone else. Your taxes pay for these wars and the profits go to the rich. It's a con and the US citizens are being conned too. Americans are among the most sincere, kind and caring people in the world, but are in general kept in the dark about what's really going on (as most in the west are). It's your leaders that are to blame - and it's not like you're given much choice in those.

Oil companies make money whether we're at war or not.

Yup, and make even more when they own even more oil fields.

Rich people can get rich a ton of ways easier than manipulating the US government.

The rich ARE the US Government! That's the point. You could do some research on the backgrounds of all your major politicians! You'll be surprised...

I know you don't believe that, because it's funner to just blame the US for everything.

I don't blame the US. I blame the companies, many of which are multinationals, but they have the power to manipulate Governments.

And you don't have to back up any of your conspiratory claims.

Firstly I do. Secondly, its the application of occams razor anyway. Look at the situation and try any explanations you like. This fits perfectly, and we know its been done before, (in Central and South America, in Korea, in Vietnam and Cambodia, in Afghanistan, etc etc etc) so why stop now?

You know, it's funny how people like to point out that half the world hates the US, but no one points out that it's only ONE part of that world that targets and kills civilians of that country.

The US is unfairly blamed when it's really just capitalism, but the US is the most capitalist and powerful economy (for now) and so has the most influence. It's a bit like in riots when they always target McDonalds as a symbol of all that's wrong with capitalism.

On your other point, what about Northern Ireland? What about the London bombings? All home grown, Brits killing Brits.

Why is it the rest of the world is expected to keep their heads, but the middle east gets a free pass?

Its not about a free pass. Its just that you have to look at why the situation is what it is before you can really make judgements about what should be done.

The prejudice on this globe is stifling...

 

Oh, and Bombus, in case you forgot...the middle east is made up of governments that had no problem taking our money for presence as global marketing. The governments of those countries don't have a problem with profit. (While it might seem a little weird...profit actually isn't bad...it's just made bad by people who aren't any good at it).

Well, like I said, the governments of many of these countries were put in power, or sustained by the West. The people of the middle east are really nice too in the main, and they get ripped off too.

However, one thing. Saddam Hussein was an evil bully, and ruled Iraq with an iron fist, but life for most citizens was actually OK so long as they kept their heads down and didn't try to overthrow him. Not ideal I know, but miles better than what they have now, and no different to Franco in Spain in the 1970's - and we didn't bomb madrid, no, we just went on holiday there and drank Sangria!

I think your trust for Iran is going a little too far when you say they weren't in any danger. They were being held captive in a hostile country... the potential for danger had to have been there.

Iran aren't really hostile to us Brits. Cold maybe (and with good reason) but not hostile.

Also, I don't think Western nations have the ability to think 10 years in advances. Most politicians don't think past the next election. The government is planning an Iranian invasion in ten years? That's an unfounded statement. And the only thing you have to support it is your irrational distrust and fear of our own government, and your strange love for our enemy.

The politicians have very little say. Its their advisers who are unelected and stay even when the governments change that have the real power. They plan a long long way ahead. e.g. the plan for the american 21st century - that Rumsfeld and his pals developed. This Iraq situation started in 1990 - its the same war.

They used diplomatic options instead of fighting. Appeasement. I think we know where that lead.

Appeasement an option with Hitler. If we had been more diplomatic and 'nice' to Germany after WW1, he'd never have risen to power.

Well the fact 'the rest of us would be forced to eat sh*t' clearly indicates that it wouldn't work. Besides, like I said, work would directly effect the communities well-being, and profits / revenue distributed fairly...so not really similar to your example.

 

Like I said in the OP, it was 'a fleeting thought' and probably 'utterly ludicrous' so it's not surprising it fell flat on it's face. Sometimes a fleeting thought does bear fruit, but this, without a shadow of a doubt, isn't one of them.

No, it's not in any way ludicrous. Its absolutely possible, and actually the ultimate end point of capitalism. My arguement is just that it is where we came from. Socialist ideas did good stuff (first from Biblical teachings in Victorian times, and then from the Socialist movement) like set up pensions, health service, public utilities and all that, but this is all now being reversed by unbridled capitalism. Forward to the 1840's!

I was once speaking about anarchism and this ultra young conservative piped up, saying how he was in favour of anarchism as it was the perfect situation for capitalism to thrive. Scary stuff!

You stand up to evil, not cower down to it.

Evil? This isn't Star Wars, or Lord of the Rings!

Like the author, I have a hard time saying this because I have not faced anything remotely like the situation the Brits faced.

They are in no way heroes! They weren't even in any danger, and were bound to be released, I can't understand what the fuss was all about. The Western public are just being buttered up for war agaist Iran, in about 10 years time, once sanctions bite and their army is to weak to fight - just like what happened in Iraq.

Hi 5, Bombus. Good to see someone else here with their eyes open.

 

We in Australia are now in the same predicament. We have a right-wing party who pretends to be left-wing, and a right-wing party becoming ever more fascist to differentiate themselves from their rivals.

 

It seems to me our countries are sandboxes for testing dictatorial policies before they are implemented in America.

That makes two of us in this mad world. I think we are copying the USA though, they've had this system for years!

Sorry to differ, but I have eyes. I saw the Iranian president looking very strong and in full control. He dominated the "event" and made the U.K. look weak. Did you see Tony? His head was down most of the time and with few words to say he looked a beaten man.

 

I didn't miss a thing.

 

 

 

I stand by the statement I made. As a girl, the last place I would want to live is in the middle east. The oppression of women and young girls in the mideast, which includes Iran, is well documented. It is a pet peeve of mine and I have many links if you want to see them. I won't comment further since others have done it for me.

 

Again, as a girl, I have no love for the middle east.

 

Bettina

Some would argue that women in the West are victims of their own oppression. I can't be bothered to explain to you why, find out yourself. To say you have no love for the middle east when you know so little about it shows just how niaive you are. I assume you have been brought up on a diet of anti Iranian news, and you probably aren't aware of the other side of the story. Did you know (for example) that in the 80's the USA shot down an Iranian civilian airliner killing all passengers - and never apologised? I think you are a good example of why scientists should stay out of politics! Sorry if I sound a little irrate - I am!

Use of force is a failure in diplomacy. Diplomacy takes two. Both sides win and lose. Look at WWII. We won that war, but we've lost so much as a result of it as well. Some of the problems we are dealing with today can be traced back to it. This is the case with all wars. That doesn't mean it isn't necessary. Hitler would talk to you all you wanted, while his army rolled over your country.

If diplomacy, restraint and mutual respect had been in place after WW1, Hitler would never have risen to power. Once he was in power, war was invevitable. What the West is doing in the middle east is creating the conditions for extremist leaders to thrive. We are creating the conditions for War. Why would any sane Government want to do this? Well, the answer is PROFIT

In case you weren't covered in American history, we had a civil war too. The slaves were freed, the union preserved and the federal government had its way. It solved quite a few problems actually. I know you don't like it, but violence is human nature for a reason - it works. Sucks huh?

There was a lot more going on than just slavery issues that caused the American Civil War, as I'm sure you know. And what is slavery anyway? - A manifestation of a lack of respect for other people. Also, it was a war that could actually be won (like WW2) involving essentially two 'states' with armies, generals etc etc etc. The current wars we are involved with can never be won (unless we kill all the civilians as well!) because they create new recruits on the enemy side faster than they are killed. But, of course, that suits the war profiteers just fine!

We are not controlled by Halliburton or any other rich dude gang you've got fabricated in your mind. Geez, I've heard this conspiracy crap so many times I'm starting to wonder if facts mean anything to people anymore.

 

Anyway, that's pre-packaged single level thought kind of stuff. Things are a little more complicated than your underdog vs "the man" fantasies...

Oh yes you are! It's no conspiracy, it's just plain fact! The companies rule the USA. They own your president, all your services and your media. Your government is nothing more than the standing committee for the companies, and your military is the armed wing of the companies.

You have such poor democracy in the USA that you have only two parties to vote for, and they are both virtually identical albeit with a few frilly fringes of difference. And even when elections are lost, they can be won by manipulating the results!

The USA is a good example of why totalitarian regimes needn't bother! Just set up a sham democracy and the public will never realise they have no say, except in the most trivial of issues!

Not that the UK is much different mind you, but as we are less powerful the effects are much less.

Don't you know what the the current Iraq war is all about? And don't say 'oil' - its far more worrying than that!

I don't see it that way. I see Iran as a bully and the UK caving in by apologizing for being in international waters under a U.N. mandate.

 

Iran doesn't care what the U.N. thinks, what the world thinks, or what the U.K. thinks and Bush is right. They are hostages.

 

Sorry, but I see it like it is.

 

Bettina

That's fine. You're just wrong that's all.

Its simple to see that this was a test instigated by Iran. They capture British soldiers in international waters like pirates and the British give up their men and their ship without firing a shot. That ship was there legally under a U.N. mandate yet the British let it be boarded.

 

Tony Blair, acting diplomatically, is laying concessions whether you see them or not and he's showing the mideast that the U.K. is made of paper. Thats what makes me mad, and I'm not even British.

 

Watch what happens in the next few weeks. Iran and the U.K. will come to an "agreement" where the British will no longer condemn Iran for that action and Iran will claim a victory. Just watch.

 

Ahmadinejad wins.

Wrong! Everyone wins.

I don't want to scare you, but diplomacy around the world is not only a failure but it will continue to get worse in the years to come. Diplomacy has to be backed up with strength which unfortunately puts the UK in a non bargaining position. But again, why are you weak?

 

Why does the U.S. have to assume leadership? I don't want them to.

 

Bee

To resort to force or the use of force is real weakness. To say that diplomacy is a failure is completely wrong. It is war that is the failure.

In case you are too young to remember, there was a civil war going on in Northern Ireland for 30 years. It solved nothing and led to misery for all involved.

Diplomacy, restraint and mutual respect has lead to peace, and will maintain peace into the future.

The USA resorts to warfare because it is a country controlled by those that profit from war. It's a common misconception that the USA 'run the world'. They mess up the world actually. It's only the power of the dollar (because of its use in the oil business) that maintains US 'dominance'.

certainly, smaller acts of aggresion have instigated war in the past. I agree though, people should be taking this a lot more seriously. What little trust I had in iran is completely gone. And the libs still want them to help out in Iraq? It's ridiculous.

What little you trust Iran indeed!

You have no idea what you are talking about! You have no idea how the world is run, and what it's all really about.

I suppose you have no idea that the USA prior to this kidnapped eight Iranian diplomats and is holding them with absolutely no charges and no legal aid, or even access to the outside world!

I suggest you read more sonny!

Yeah of course it would work. It's called feudalism and serves the rich and powerful very well. The rest of us, however, would be forced to eat sh*t and like it.

Kiwi in Denmark eating a, a, um...an Ilex berry...(ahem)

Hoo-ya unneeded complexity!

Well, if time travel (back and forward) is possible this 'complexity' would be needed in order to prevent 'problems'.

You could of course be right, and time travel is simply impossible, but if it is possible, it would probably need this 'complexity' to work.

Its also similar to certain theories on reality and conciousness that stem from Quantum Theory - I'm sure I don't have to explain why, you guys know all of that stuff don't you...

I'm unconvinced QM is even relevant to 'free will'. Even if quantum events are stochastic rather than deterministic, does that actually affect things at the scale of a whole neuron, or does all that probability just 'cancel out' to give a nice average value by the time you get to the scale of a whole cell?

 

Remember, neurons don't operate on a quantum scale; they're actually fairly sizable cells, and some particular ones have axons so large they can be seen with the naked eye, such as the squid giant axon or Mauthner nerves.

 

Mokele

Neurons might operate at the quantum scale (or the microtubules might at any rate) - in fact that is exactly what Hammeroff and Penrose are suggesting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_consciousness

IMHO Conciousness is the ability to affect the movement/states of sub-atomic particles - it's a micro form of telekenisis. It's this ability that gives us free will. Of course I cannot prove any of this!!

Either that or we're just in it for the ride - a horrible thought!

The AAH is part of the story. There is ssooo much evidence supporting it, I can't be at all bothered to start listing it here, but the point is, and it has been well made above, is that the AAH does not in any way exclude the other theories (Savannah and Neotenic), and in fact supports them too as it explains the things they don't.

I guarantee in 50 years time it will be one of the most accepted theories...

 

Now, the information about the talapoin and proboscis monkey are potentially very potent falsifiers of AAH. Have you looked at either to see if there are adaptations -- compared to other monkeys -- for moving thru water?

The proboscis monkey has a flap over the nose to prevent water entering via the nostrils when swimming. It has become a sexy to other proboscis monkeys!

Actually the proboscis monkey is heralded by AAH supporters as evidence for the theory.

Bombus: wear a sweater. After a while you get used to cooler surroundings, and your body compensates for it. So much so that you walk into somebody else's house and it feels icky and muggy.

I've only just moved from a place half way up a mountain that only had an open fire! I had to wear thermals and woolly hats indoors in winter - but you are right, you do get used to it and now I can't stand really warm houses. I don't want to still have numb fingers when i type though!

I will take the advice though, boiler on low and radiators on high.

Thanks!

Dominant species? What does that mean? There were always far more insects and even more bacteria etc etc, and what about plants?

Anyway, that aside, it could be argued that dinosaurs didn't all die out. Birds are really a form of dinosaur. In fact its very difficult to determine exactly what separates the birds from the dinosaurs.

Maybe dinosaurs were partially warm blooded i.e., on their way to developing full warm bloodedness, and a cooling climate (or a bolide impact) helped lead to their demise as they got too cold. I.e., reptiles survived because they could go into torpor and don't need much energy to survive, birds could fly to food sources, were small and were totally warm blooded and insulated by feathers, but dinosaurs, stuck in a half-way house, died out.

Also, genetic experiments on bird embryos shows that they still have the genes for teeth, it's just that these genes are turned off, so when global warming hits home and temperatures rise to what they were in the Jurrasic Period, it might favour dinosaurs again and not mammals, and they may come back (from birds).

This is exactly what I thought, but I have been told by a central heating guy that it is best to have your boiler on max (so that it heats the water as quickly as possible and then turns off) and the radiators on as low as they can be to produce the temp you want.

The thing is both answers seem credible!

My central heating system is quite old and non-pressurized and there is no thermostat in the house - I'm not sure if that makes a difference to the answer.

When it packs up I'll replace it with a condensing boiler system, but the question would still remain - which is the most efficient??

OK Chaps, can you apply your knowledge to something practical?

Is it more efficient to have ones boiler on high and the radiators on low, or the other way around. Apparently the answer isn't as straightforward as one would assume.

Bombus

It isn't a problem. It is impossible. The problem only comes about when analyzing the situation anachronistically. Most people follow the person instead of the time line. What most people do is essentially repeating the events, but the events are different the second time around. If you analyze the problem correctly, the problem disappears. The time traveler doesn't appear in the past after he or she decides to travel back in time. The time traveler was in the past when the past happened the first(and only) time. Any future time travel to the past has already effected the present. If any travel to the past(specifically, a point previous to now), and the traveler left any marks, say a picture, then they would be in the picture now(possibly even before their birth). So, it is impossible to go back in time and kill your father before you are conceived, for if you do, then you won't exist ever(in the past or future).

 

I did a fantastically horrible job explaining it, but you can probably get the idea. Basically, if you draw a time line with how most people analyze it, then you get a loop. However, if you do it correctly, you get a straight line and the problem is non-existent.

I disagree. The question is not whether you can go back in time and kill your father (I'd say yes), it is whether after doing so can you go forward in time to the same place you left (I'd say no!) If you went back in time and killed your father, you would live in a universe where you went back in time and killed your father, who would never live and never have you, but you'd know that he did once and you were born, enabling you to go back in time, except that all the necessary events would no not occur, but you would still exist as you would know the true 'history'.

I see time and events like branches of a tree - infinite branches on an infinitely long tree!

Time travel would be a totally personal experience. You'd know the truth but of course wouldn't be able to prove a thing!

In the sticky thread "Human evolution" the last post is mine tracing our ancestry thru transitional individuals to A. afarensis.

 

There was a hypothesis advanced called the "aquatic ape" hypothesis. The hypothesis tried to account for our relative hairlessness by saying that one of our ancestors after our lineage separated from that of apes lived predominantly in the lakes and streams of East Africa, or in the adjacent Indian Ocean. It does not contradict Darwinism but simply hypothesizes how the species between the ape-human split and A. afarensis lived.

 

The aquatic ape hypothesis has been discarded. It simply did not work and caused more problems accounting for our features than it solved.

 

 

thanx

Been discarded indeed! It's the most plausible explanation to date, and is gaining more supporters as the evidence piles up. It's just been largely ignored because, like all new theories, people cling on to the old ones for as long as they possibly can.

Which problems does it cause rather than solve exactly? The savannah theory is the one that really throws up problems and explains nothing very well...