toastywombel

We cannot ask whether a scientific theory accurately describes the world around us, we can only ask if it works by predicting outcomes accurately. That is the positivist approach by Karl Popper. It is funny you ridiculed it and used quantum theory in your defence of the criticism, because in-fact one of the champions of quantum physics, Steven Hawking, used the positivist approach in his "Origin of the Universe Lecture". I even "favorited" the video of this lecture on our youtube channel here. So I guess Steven Hawking is one of these people trapped in their "old mindsets"? Furthermore, public opinion does not determine what science is. It just does not work that way. Any sound scientist would cringe at that statement. Next, I never talked about dealing with things in absolutes; where you derived that from, I do not know. The positivist approach never says anything about absolutes. Predicting a result is not necessarily an absolute. Your entire criticism of my post was really completely irrelevant. Finally, Documenting something like the unfounded claims by monatomic gold or telepathy is great. Let's just say you are right and in a study of these things there might be strange things that baffle scientists, but if one cannot devise a theory predicting how these things happen then the studies are practically useless. Say, if we studied fire all day: observed how it started, observed how it gave off heat, observed how it spread. If we are unable to find out why fire started and how fire started then the observations are of little use to us. We would simply be watching something we don't understand and just accepting that we don't understand it. However, if we did find out how it started, how it spread, how it gave off heat, we can make a hypothesis like, "Fire uses wood to burn." Then we can test that hypothesis, when we do we find out that it is obviously true. We can then make a prediction; to start a fire we would need wood. Can we say without a doubt if the fire exists? Or if the wood exists? Or if any of it exists? Can we say without a doubt that another force isn't acting on the fire that causes it to appear as if it burns wood? No we cannot, we can only go by our observations. We can only predict what we will observe. And a good theory will predict results with accuracy over and over again. One more thing, don't talk down to me please. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedJust so you know, I posted the positivist approach, hoping you would try to take it and formulate it into an argument against me. And you did just that. Without actually looking at the statement you turned it into determinism, which it is not, then formulated an argument against determinism. By doing this you proved that you were more interested in formulating an argument against me than discussing the facts. That my friend is close minded.

Check out this video. It is a bit juvenile, but rather informative.

We cannot ask whether a scientific theory accurately describes the world around us, we can only ask if it works by predicting outcomes accurately.

I second that.

I am a twenty year old male and trust me, sexting is a common thing. From my experience I would think that atleast half of teens participate. I know this evidence is anecdotal, but consider me a primary source. I guess if you have daughters I would be the guy you love to hate.

Really everyone on this forum is aware that it is a scam, I was attempting to show you that monatomic gold is a scam, but you are not interested in hearing that.

As fun as this been SaintGermain seems as if he/she does not accept known science, such as how the brain works and about monatomic gold. I am now going to withdraw from this conversation as it seems he/she will advocate for monatomic gold no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary.

Again, off topic. By a belief I guess your referring to the belief on how the brain works. Which has much more scientific backing than any study of telepathy. But this is off topic, if you want to start a new thread about how the brain works I would be happy to respond to it.

No, quite on the contrary I am defending the facts based on how the brain works. It is one thing if one can show strange coincidences of "telepathy". I would like to see any of these studies explain how these strange phenomena happen, in a scientific manor. For telepathy to be proven as an actual scientifically sound pehnomena, one would need to explain how an electrical signal travels from a neuron from person A's brain to a neuron in person B's brain without the use of synapses or neurotransmitters. Studies showing telepathy happening do not suffice, you have to explain how this happens. This is off topic though and more appropriate for another thread so I suggest we stay on topic at hand (monatomic gold). Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedFurthermore, I would appreciate it if you stop attacking me personally by statements such as, "someone is defending a belief, not facing the facts". If anything is wrong with the facts I have told you about the brain point them out in a specific, scientific manor. Also you said, "I think one is in trouble when he lets others do the thinking..." The only way I can take that statement as a direct insult at my intelligence suggesting I do not think for myself. Ask anyone on this forum, I admit when I am wrong, I am kind and I don't partake in personal attacks. I even wrote an extensive blog on the subject. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedThe problem I have with you answering the thread about white powder gold is that you are retarding the knowledge of the questioner by advocating for something that is a scam.

I formulated that argument based on my basic understanding of the brain and how it works. The brain is comprised of of about 100 billion neurons connected together by 100 trillion synapses. Synapses are key in the transfer of electrical signals through neurons. The electrical signals travel along the synapses than release a neurotransmitter to transfer the data to the neurons. This is from wikipedia: "Neurotransmitters are endogenous chemicals which relay, amplify, and modulate signals between a neuron and another cell.[1] Neurotransmitters are packaged into synaptic vesicles that cluster beneath the membrane on the presynaptic side of a synapse, and are released into the synaptic cleft, where they bind to receptors in the membrane on the postsynaptic side of the synapse. Release of neurotransmitters usually follows arrival of an action potential at the synapse, but may follow graded electrical potentials. Low level "baseline" release also occurs without electrical stimulation." So using my basic knowledge of the brain I concluded that the transfer of signals (which are essentially your thoughts) between neurons depend on a link through synapses and the release of chemical neurotransmitters. Without synapses and chemical neuro-transmitters the transfer of though/electrical signals between neurons would be impossible. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged Anyone can write anything in a book. I have an open mind, but I remain skeptical of anything, especially if it has not passed the peer-review process. The peer review-process has successfully carried us from the days of horse transportation to the world of cell-phones, cars, planes, space-flight, the Internet, transistors, and nano-technology which we live in today. So I would say the peer-review process has served us very well. This is off topic though and maybe more appropriate for another thread, this thread is intended for the discussion of monatomic gold/ white powder gold.

I don't know site the peer reviewed studies and how about everyone here take a go at attempting to find flaws in the ways the studies were conducted. Oh yeah, there are no peer reviewed studies on the subject, well I would love you to site any study supporting these claims.

To see more on what Quackwatch says about the Institute of Noetic sciences here is a link to their article: http://www.quackwatch.org/04ConsumerEducation/nonrecorg.html

You sited Dean Radin doing an amazing job by researching telepathy and such. Now I won't completely touch on the obvious physical flaws of telepathy, which include the ability of an electrical signal from a neuron in the brain being able to transfer through the skull, through the air, and then through the receiver's skull all without the connection of synapses or the transfer of the chemical neurotransmitters. But Dean Radin works for IONS (Institute of Noetic Sciences) has been reviewed by the non-profit organisation Quackwatch. Quackwatch has stated they view IONS with considerable distrust because of wild scientific claims which have not even been submitted for peer-review. Suggesting that if these scientific studies were accurate and factually sound they would submit them for peer-review. Obviously another less than credible source. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_of_Noetic_Sciences But I don't know if you consider Wikipedia a credible source, because David Icke has publicly criticised Wikipedia as being part of the conspiracy to cover up the truth.

Saint Germain, since you seem to have misplaced your logic in the defence of "white powder gold". I will attempt to clear up your misunderstandings. "White powder gold" is what some producers call their non-colloidal gold. Monatomic gold is another name some companies call their "white powder gold" products. White powder gold, supposedly, is a water soluble gold salt that is dissolved in water. The gold salt MUST be water soluble to create an ionic solution. Laboratory testing of products labelled as white powder gold have determined they are really gold chloride (Chlorauric acid). Which is a water soluble gold salt. But, gold chloride is a neuro-toxin, so if it does have amazing abilities hopefully they outweigh this fact. Some of these companies are trying to avoid the problem of selling gold chloride (a known neuro-toxin). So they have stated that their white powder gold is gold hydroxide. The problem with that claim though is that gold hydroxide is not water soluble, therefore it does not even match the description of their original product. The preceding was a paraphrase from http://www.purestcolloids.com/ionic-gold.php If you do a general search on Google you will find many articles that claim this to be a scam. Another very simple flaw with white powder gold is that when you ionise gold it turns black, not white. That is common scientific knowledge. Furthermore, the person who has claimed to discover monatomic gold is David Icke. David pronounced himself as the "son of god" during an interview with Terry Woogan in 1991. I don't know about you but It seems funny to me that the "son of god" would need to sell monatomic gold. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Icke

White powder gold is a bunch of hooey! Seriously though, like many have already said above me, it is. Like Mr. Skeptic said, let us see the scientific studies.

Yeah I think this is a little outdated update.

I know it is not recommended but have you ever seen mercury? A couple years back a friend of mine broke open some electrical components and started collecting the mercury inside. It is a very curious substance. It is the only metal that is a liquid at room temperatures. It feels very strange too. Of course I did not touch it much because I was afraid of getting mercury poisoning. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedSorry I meant Europa not Titan, my mistake

Good points Mr. Skeptic, I have heard by some that Venus might be a planet which is easier to colonise if we lived in the upper parts of the atmosphere. Even mercury has been suggested. There is a small area near the poles that remains within a safe temperature range, and it would be very easy to obtain energy through solar panels. Also Titan, which is warmer than one would think because of tidal heating by Jupiter. Titan would be tough though because it is so far away. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedAs for the gravity well thing DH, why would it be hard escaping the Martian atmosphere, maybe I am missing something here.

I agree, those who have committed a crime should be picked up, but you cannot pick someone up just because they might have committed a crime, or might commit a crime in the future. It creates for a legal quagmire.

That's why pre-emption is a bad policy. You pick someone up because they may attack American targets in the future, but you can't try them because they have yet to commit any crime, but then you can't release them because you afraid they may attack American targets in the future and now they are even more likely too because you essentially captured and held them for no reason.

We cannot do this because firstly we are not anywhere near designing a model of a working "warp drive". Furthermore, a space-ship on the scale of the enterprise would require so much in cost. 1. It would take decades of research on how to design such a craft, and billions if not trillions of dollars of materials and labour to put it together. No engine or rocket, currently in production could propel a ship of that size effectively. 2. The problem of having enough food, water, and supplies to support a crew as large as the one on the enterprise is also an issue. All the above listed are extremely heavy, therefore they would have to factored in to the construction of an engine or rocket. As far as being able to move a space-craft like the enterprise at the speed of light through space-time? No it would not be possible. Photons (the fundamental particle of light) move at the speed of light partly because their rest mass is zero. It would take an infinite amount of energy to get something with mass to get going at the speed of light. Furthermore, even if it was possible one would run into the problem of being able to stop the craft. If something is moving at the speed of light it has essentially infinite momentum because it has infinite mass. Also travelling at the speed of light would be tricky. Your path would have to be determined exactly right, and even then you run the risk of running into a lump of dark matter or whatever unknowns may be in the path of where you are going. The type of computing and instrumentation needed to plot these paths would also have to be designed.

I believe there will be a reason in the future to move to another planet, how far into the future? I do not know. But population growth, the need for new raw material and expansion for survival are all reasons to consider going to Mars. Plus, Mars could also be used as a base to harvest minerals and materials from other parts of the solar system. Of course the cost would be expensive, but humankind will eventually need to expand beyond Earth if we want to survive. The moon is another good option, especially since the recent discovery of ice-water.

I am working on a new blog about inhabiting Mars sometime in the future. I am aware there are many issues we would have to confront before we could actually pick up and migrate to the red planet, but I would like to hear some suggestions from you guys, issues that might not be included. I would say that the biggest problem is the fact there is no dynamo effect on Mars, thus limiting the ability of the Martian atmosphere to hold in certain gasses essential to life as we know it.

One more thing, when I say evolutionary tree this is an example of what I mean. It is a term though, often called the Phylogenetic tree. Here is a link.

Maybe I am trying to personify evolution too much, but what I mean is that humankind seems to be the ultimately adaptable creature. I guess that is not totally true, but given a relatively short amount of time humankind can adapt to a much wider range of environments than any other animal or living thing, maybe with the exception to some microscopic life. It just sometimes amazes me that such small biological differences can cause a plethora visual differences. Your right, chimps do have a culture as well as many other mammals but it is not nearly as complex as ours.