Phi for All

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Accepted without question? Then it wouldn't be science. As Cap'n points out, the fallacy here is a type of false attribution. You are applying the attributes of bacteria and their resource systems to humans and their resource systems and forming a conclusion based on that.

I don't see this working either: PfA: "I want you to eat this ice cream." JC: "Why?" PfA: "No reason." JC: "Then I'll pass, thank you." PfA: "Why not? I know you're quite partial to ice cream." JC: "Because it's creepy that you 'want' me to eat it. What's wrong with it?" PfA: "Nothing's wrong with it. Stop acting like it's poisoned! Just eat it because you like it and I insisted." JC: "FOAD." Another alternative is to trick the person into eating the salad, but that's not very civilized since you think it might be poisoned.

As Cap'n Refsmmat mentioned, we have had a number of mods, myself included, slow down on their time spent here. There are many reasons but no excuses. I fervently believe that anyone who comes here, to Science Forums, wants to apply scientific methodology to every argument, whether it's in the hard sciences or in Politics or even Religion. It's a way to ensure that the ground beneath you is solid enough to support the weight of your ideas. This has always been a problem when applying science to something that relies on faith. Science can refute most claims made by religion when such methods are applicable. As soon as religion claims things outside the natural universe, it becomes supernatural and science should no longer be interested.

If the person poisoned the salad, he wouldn't eat it. If the person didn't poison the salad, but knew that it might be poisoned, he still wouldn't eat it. And if the person is like most humans, if he felt he was being forced to eat something, he probably wouldn't eat it. I also can't imagine "forcing" someone to do anything in a "civilized" manner.

! Moderator Note This argument cuts both ways, and is why your arguments seem to push an agenda of your own. You fail to explain why the reader should ignore all the other statistics presented in favor of your own, some of which have been culled from questionable sources. It's not easy to press a strong argument without strong support. You are not being specially persecuted; science-minded people pounce quickly when asked to ignore weak foundations so they can see past them to the real merits of an idea. It's a methodology that ensures productive thinking. This thread had degenerated to arguing about rules, so I'm recommending it's closure unless something puts it back on track. Further argument about our rules will hasten closure.

! Moderator Note You are basing much of your supposition on immigration figures and people are objecting because you draw conclusions which aren't supported using common per capita measurement. You can't ask them to look past that and spend time seeing merit in your hypothesis. This stumbling block is keeping this thread from proceeding rationally. Until you deal with it, everything else is just hand-waving. Please modify your approach.

! Moderator Note Thank you. Especially in Speculations, it"s important to explain a strong statement so people don't misinterpret the context.

This kind of denial is rampant in the creationist camp. Iirc, the Creationist Museum in Petersburg, KY has a whale skeleton that has the vestigial hind leg bones removed. "Hey, if we take them off, you can't see them so there's no such thing, right?"

A favorite tactic in business in the last several decades (at least). Lobby to suck the funding out of a federal program and then protest how ineffective it is and how it needs to be privatized to be effective. We're seeing the effects of an active campaign against public education right now.

I think soldiers need to believe in what they fight for. Maybe politics reminds them that belief can be manipulated?

Collision detection equipment could obviate the need for more weight in a vehicle. That could be the start of an automated system though, and if we move towards that then we might as well embrace mass transit. I always looked forward to flying cars (back in the 70's, we were told we'd have them by 2000), but I think we are still several decades away from consumer aviation at that level. Iirc, in California, a "motorcycle", having a narrow profile, is allowed to pass between cars when traffic is slowed. Upon checking, I see this is referred to as lane-splitting or white-lining. As long as it's done safely it's not a problem. If a wider 4-wheeled vehicle was classified as a "motorcycle", it seems to me that lane-splitting would be less safe.

It's abundantly clear that you have listened to nothing anybody wrote. You don't understand what a theory or a fact in science really is. The scientific method is trusted because it's capable of figuring out where mistakes lie and fixing them. This is one of the reasons why we say there is no 100% certainty, because we want to be able to adapt when new evidence comes to light. 100% certainty is what people of faith say they have, with no room for doubt. Science needs that little bit of doubt to keep itself healthy and honest. Nothing is sacred in science, but you need some major proof to attack a good theory.

People see and hear all kinds of things they mistake for something else. If you're ghost-hunting, every creak of the foundation shifting is a ghost, every vague wind current is a spirit, every cold spot must have been made by a haunting instead of a thermal inversion. When things that exist are seen many times, we don't think twice about it. When something is unexplainable, we call it a sighting, and it remains unexplainable until... we explain it, and then we understand it.

But they are perfectly understandable because we are using the quote function to time stamp what we are replying to. It's the best way for multiple people to discuss the same thing with each other. Unless, of course, you were replying to a post I can't see.... For one thing, the tests where people note how much of what they fill the test tube with, and what temperature the thermometer reads, are reproducible by others. For as long as people have been hunting ghosts, there has never been any observations done that could lead someone else to reproduce the phenomena. Cold spots don't always remain cold, spirits who manifest themselves to someone never do it when anyone else is around (and never in a predictable fashion), and sounds heard by one group are never heard by anyone else, no matter how they try to recreate the original circumstances.

The problem with your line of thinking is that no amount of logical explanation of each and every instance of supposed supernatural occurrence would get you to say, "It looks like ghosts don't exist". I could explain that the two old people were really a high-backed chair and a standing coat rack seen peripherally while I was thinking of my long-dead grandparents. You would still probably say, "OK, maybe this time it was a trick of the light, but many others have seen the real thing!" How many ghost-sightings could we explain using natural occurrences (so far, the number is: all of them)? How many would it take before you would admit there is no evidence? Most importantly, would you continue to believe in ghosts if their was no evidence, ever?

You sound like someone who doesn't really know science but is prepared to define it without such knowledge. Scientific theory is the height of the scientific method, a way in which we can be sure that each piece of knowledge we put together has been thoroughly tested and discussed. Interpretation doesn't come into play as much as you may think, and that's one of the reasons the scientific method is so trusted. It's not open to interpretation the way you might think, so there is no faith necessary. We don't have to believe because we have tons of evidence which allow us to make predictions. When those predictions keep coming true, when each new fact supports what has gone before, we start to use the word theory.

! Moderator Note This thread is being abused by off-topic discussion of a moderator action. Please stay on topic if you wish to continue to post in this thread.

I think I should do this now. The moon is mine, I say. If any government is opposed to this claim or wishes to buy me out, please contact me openly, via this thread. The first 3 countries to respond will receive discount passes to MoonForAll Excursions.

This makes so much sense that it makes me think there is a reason why we don't do it. It doesn't have to be a good reason, I've found. DMV here in Colorado should be checking to make sure motorists are insured to state minimum levels. They could withhold license plates for those who don't have an active policy, but they don't. All you have to do is sign a form that says you have the proper insurance. Every uninsured motorist who causes an accident signed that paper to get their plates, lied in writing on a government form. The reason they don't do this simple checking? They make more revenue from people who lie but pay to get their plates than from those who couldn't get their plates due to lack of insurance. Both get fined when they cause an accident, but the first guy at least paid for his plates. So maybe the unemployment thing is like that. Someone making enough money so the system won't be changed.

Let's be clear here. Intelligent Design does NOT exist. ID is a proven attempt to introduce religious teachings into public science classrooms in the US. Every single claim that ID proponents have made has been thoroughly debunked as creationism. Every. Single. Claim.

I think it will only take 50 years for aliens to start friending people on Facebook, but it will take them another 200 years to take care of all the requests to play FarmTown. During that they will have no time for politics.

! Moderator Note lemur's off-topic speculations regarding the atom have be split off into a new thread at http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/56512-a-speculative-model-of-the-atom/. Please stay on topic.

Astronomers mistakenly see many things, but they are not alone in associated neck ailments. Not falling asleep while listening to some rockhead lecture me about dirt is a pain in the neck and elsewhere. I agree with others here who have said that science is the methodology used to approach knowledge of the physical world.

! Moderator Note lemur- You need to stop derailing threads with off-topic comments like this. If you want to talk about alternative energy saving measures, start another thread. This one is about the efficiency of light bulb wattage.