Phi for All

This is a typical stance of people who are too lazy to learn why they don't understand accepted ideas. I knew the comparison to Galileo was coming. Everyone who takes some criticism for a hyothesis suddenly becomes Galileo. Well, you're not a Staff member, so why should you? It's up to us to handle things when enough members complain about some crackpot who keeps ruining everyone's threads on accepted science with his own ramblings. Everyone is tolerated as long as they obey the rules of the comunity. This is hardly a new concept, or do you wish to challenge that too? I'm not sure what you're seeing. What I see is someone who thinks he knows better than everyone else. Our positions are asymmetrical, I assure you.

I don't even take it that far. There's evidence that a perfect god doesn't exist, but I don't have to rule out all higher beings. Just the omnipotent ones, to be sure.

You're no martyr, just a person with an idea who is acting like a jackass by braying about it even when others are trying to discuss something else. Like others before you, you ignore the Speculations part of Pseudoscience & Speculations and cry that you're being repressed. You're just being told to confine your speculations to threads where they are appropriate. No need for all the hand-waving, it takes away from the energy needed to defend your ideas.

Absolutely not. ID says that certain things in this universe can't be explained by current science and provide evidence of an intelligent designer. ID uses all the old crap creationism arguments to create a "controversy" that science can't explain, then argues that public school kids should be taught both viewpoints and make the choice themselves which side of the "controversy" they're on. ID proponents want it taught right alongside science in the schools. I think the only way it would be appropriate for an evolutionist to tell a child there is a tiny probability that God made everything the way it is, is if that child's pastor would then tell the child that God is not capable of countermanding His own physics. That seems a fair trade.

Let's please keep this specific to the OP, and not just bash creationism in general. How about wisdom teeth? Some people never have any problems, others get impacted and require surgery. Not wise, not intelligently designed. Is this for humans alone? I remember reading where anteaters develop teeth while in the womb and then lose them before birth. They never need or use them while they have them.

To extract one gram of radium you need three metric tons of uranium ore .

ID isn't science but I see Pangloss' point. In terms of the IDers we've had here, they were of two distinct classes. The first are the OWTs, the One Way Thinkers. They think information should pass one way, from their mouths to your ears. They also think their way is the One Way. I, for one, don't think they think very much at all, by the way. The other person who spouts ID here is the guy who listened to a OWT. Since the OWT misrepresented science purposely in the first place, his ID arguments make sense to the person that doesn't know any better. These people are (hopefully) looking for better truths than they've gotten elsewhere. It's our duty to recognize which of the two we're dealing with and respond appropriately.

I agree. No one would take the job if that were the case. The administration did a lot of effective demonizing prior to the invasions (not that they needed much help). Whether it was their intention all along to torture prisoners or whether they just reasoned that Al Qaeda fell outside the GC definition of what a prisoner was, they acted as they did and they should have stood by their decisions instead of pardoning themselves on the sly like this.

This is NOT a request but a requirement from now on. No more attempts to convert.

I've seen similar claims from the Bible. In the end, both religious texts are reverse-engineering and cherry-picking from the best results. Not intellectually honest, especially when the aim from both is to lend scientific credence to their respective religions. This is an attempt to convert non-believers and as such is a violation of SFN rules. No more preaching, please. Thread closed.

Would one charged particle have gone through both you and your dad's retina's simultaneously though? We do get some cosmic rays on earth on a fairly frequently, the most energentic happening only a few times in a century but less powerful ones get through all the time. Perhaps, if it was a cosmic ray, it somehow excited other molecules there in the room in order to get the flashbulb effect. Sounds more like a papparazzi ray to me.

I know that argument and it's preferable to what ID wants. History of religion is very different from the religions themselves. What religions have done historically is documented (though contradictory in some cases). An objective overview would be illuminating as a public school course. ID's "controversy" stems from inaccurate science ("We're descended from monkeys", "Nature couldn't randomly come up with something as complex as the eye", "The fossil record is incomplete"). There is no need to teach the "controversy"; it's much simpler to debunk the bad science in it's proper setting, a science class.

Possibly a chemical reaction? The way you describe the light starting small and growing instantly into a grapefruit-sized ball sounds similar to the way a chemical reaction might occur. I'm not sure if a cosmic ray is ever visible in the spectrum in which we see. They do contain quite a bit of energy though. I believe we can see them as radiation on x-rays but it's been a while since I read that article.

This was a couple of years ago. Can you tell us if the bill passed the Senate? Even better, if it passed, can you tell us who voted for it?

Since such a charged particle would be traveling at close to light speeds, I doubt it. I had something similar happen once when I was a kid but it was the headlight from a car turning around in my street. The light came in through a small opening in my drapes and glanced off the chromed surface of a model I was building. It looked like a flashbulb went off. It wasn't until I put everything together that I realized I'd heard the car out in the street and the model was right where the flash went off.

I agree with you in general but how is ID a logical argument? The whole thrust of the movement is that there is a controversy which should be made public in public schools over evolution and the origins of life. ID proponents are taking a conflict between religious beliefs and secular schooling and claiming it's a controversy which the kids should decide. How can there be a logical argument for teaching religion (and one religion in particular) outside a religious setting, especially in a public school system?

Very wise words. I hope you apply them to your own reference frame as well.

I'm guessing it's the Long George Bush Terms, two presidential terms that have probably impacted the lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transsexual communities a great deal and seem to go on with no end in sight.

I should change my title to Formerly Señor Butt Monkey.

This should be taken care of right away. What he means is, "This is so easy and profitable that I want to fix it before it cures itself." I have some good news and some bad news. What he means is, "Good news, I get a Mercedes, bad news, you pay for it." This may smart a little. What he means is, "Last week, two patients bit off their tongues." There is a lot of that going around. What he means is, "My God, that's the third one this week. I'd better read up about this."

And a good one. It's true, after a point a username just becomes the user. A snail may be slow but Snail isn't. Although I think Cap'n is missing an opportunity if he doesn't rename Snail to Señor Butt Monkey (The Guy Who Knows His Black Holes).

Yes, let's focus the conversation there since there are more replies. Thread closed.

Come on, not all of you. It was meant as sarcasm because your signature is getting pretty Pimp City. I promise to get on IRC more often and scream at you about it.

We have Chat?!

This is a great point. Part of my concern are the stories we never hear, and possibly because some of these immense corporations also happen to own parts of the media. Spin is such an art form these days that we'd probably never know if they were suppressing stories about suppressing technology.