Dekan

Depends what you mean by "evolution". Obviously you're thinking of the old-fashioned "Darwinian" system. That does still apply to primitive wild animals. Because they lack speech. So they can't pass on very much of what their brains have perceived, to their offspring. But this has all changed. The poor outmoded animals have been superseded by a modern species, Homo Sapiens. Our species has invented talking, and especially - writing. These wonderful innovations, enable us to educate our young. And pass on to them, all our achievements in art, culture and science. We are throwing into the dustbin of history, all that horrible, cruel and disgusting Darwinian nightmare. Human evolution is now gloriously Lamarkian! And shouldn't we welcome it, and rejoice in progress?

JPWroble's OP raises a point that has always slightly puzzled me. Why should bicycles be better than walking? What I mean is this - suppose you make a journey from A to B. The distance is, say 20 miles. And you have to cover the distance by walking. It will probably take you at least 5 or 6 hours. And you'll arrive at your destination feeling quite leg-worn and tired. Whereas if you have a bicycle, you can get on it and ride the distance in an hour or so. And dismount from your bike, with much less sense of fatigue. I wonder why that should be so. Because looking at it logically, there are two situations: 1. When you walk the 20 miles from A to B - you only have to move the mass of your own body 2. But when you use the the bike - you have to move the mass of the bike as well. Just to make point 2 clearer - suppose you don't actually sit on the bike. Just walk alongside it, wheeling it along with you. Holding the bike's handlebars in your hands, and pushing it along. Won't this effort of pushing, make the bike an added burden - and make you arrive feeling even more tired? So why does sitting on the bike make things better?

Isn't there one modern theory which appears axiom-based - the Theory of Relativity? It seems to rely on this axiom: That the Laws of Nature should be the same, for all observers who move with constant speed relative to one another. Which produces, as a kind of consequential axiom: That the speed of light should be the same for all such observers. So Relativity Theory looks at heart - axiomatic. It started from an intuitive idea of what should be the case. Later it got apparent support from facts - like observations of solar eclipses, an explanation of the anomalous Mercurian orbit, and in our time - workability of GPS satellites. But these facts didn't generate the Theory - it came from an axiom.

But why do you need "blister packaging" of pills? To keep the pills from scraping against each other? No - the pills could all be put in a small brown bottle, with a white plastic screw-cap which could easily be undone. The purpose of this difficult "blister-packaging" must be: 1. To make the pills look impressive ( sealed in their tough plastic shells ) 2. To make them hard to get at, without tearing a fingernail or using a sharp knife 3. To give a sense of achievement when they're finally swallowed. Pure placebo effect - which is all the pills probably do anyway

As you say, the stories don't match up. So why does the Bible get taken seriously? The answer's obvious - it offers a prospect of avoiding death, and obtaining Eternal Life. This Eternal Life is supposed to be obtained by belief in Biblical fairy-tales. But does that really convince anyone? No! Death will be ended by human Science. Our Science will investigate, learn about, and eventually control our DNA. Such control will give us everlasting life, by scientific means. No religion needed! Immortality, for everyone. It's sad to think that us posters here, are at the tail-end of a stage in human evolution - the stage when death still exists. But it won't exist much longer! This thought obviously leads back to the Bible. Isn't that book a kind of wishful thinking, a pre-scientific attempt to conquer death? Nice try, Bible - but Science beat ya!

Well obviously, you make a small pill look impressive, by putting the small pill in a big package. This benefits the pharmaceutical industry, the packaging industry, and the pill-swallower via placebo-effect.

Do modern humans need to drink crude water at all? Surely water can be replaced by more civilised fluids - like beer. Beer has a high water-content, especially in the USA. US citizens who visit Britain are always impressed by the alcoholic strength of British beer. This leads one to wonder about the US Apollo flights. Did the astronauts depend solely on their American pluck - or were they fortified by a judicious swig of Jack Daniels?

Your questions strike deep. Perhaps we need a "Sacred Book" - which no-one actually reads, but which by its existence, inspires us. Like in Science - has anyone actually read Newton's "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica" or Darwin's "On The Origin Of Species" - from cover to cover? Probably not. Books like that would get punched full of holes by any modern scientist. But that's the point - books can have a value which transcends their mere content. Does the Bible inspire Science, do you think, or retard it?

Yes, comparing Earth to a dynamo, doesn't seem intuitively obvious. Because normal dynamos have to spin round fast, in order to generate current/magnetic field. Whereas the Earth takes nearly 24 hours to complete just one single rotation. That seems quite slow. But perhaps it's only an effect of scale. I wonder, suppose we consider a scale-model. In which the Earth is reduced from its diameter of about 12,800 km, down to a sphere of (say) 10 cm in diameter- ie about the size of a normal dynamo. How fast would this 10 cm dynamo be spinning, if it goes at the equivalent rate of the Earth - and would it generate any significant current or magnetic field?

Deeply interesting question. The "butterfly effect" in time-travel was explored in Jack Finney's 1970 SF novel "Time and Again". A worried time-traveller, who's just made a brief excursion back to the 19th century, is reassured: "You made no interference with events, except - that your very presence was an event. A tiny one, but people saw you, spoke to you, momentarily at least. What trains of thought might possibly have resulted? Influencing events that followed....but there is no least evidence that your presence affected subsequent events in even the slightest way. This confirms a theory we've been calling "twig-in-the-river" - Time is often compared to a river, a stream - what happens depends on what happened upstream earlier. It's possible that even the smallest of twigs might have an effect, might lodge and eventually cause a barrier that could affect the entire course of that great stream. But what are the chances? There is virtually a 100% probability that a twig tossed into that enormous and incredibly powerful current, into the momentum of that vast Mississippi of events, will not affect it one bit." Of course, that was "famous last words" - or was it? I heartily recommend the book. (Haven't SF writers thought of everything already!)

Sadly, recent history shows that the physical fitness of some athletes is not entirely health-related, especially the cycling ones.

Delta, many thanks for a thought-provoking post. But - isn't there an obvious objection to your coin/atom analogy: A coin lies where it is, inert. Until some person picks it up - and gives it a "flip". Who or what flips the atom?

I don't understand why the speed of light is involved in all this. If light travels at a certain fixed speed, why should that affect the time when something happens. For example, suppose at this present moment, a star 10,000 light-years away is exploding in a supernova. We on Earth in 2012, won't see it for another 10,000 years, as it will take light that long to reach the Earth. But surely that doesn't mean the event hasn't happened. Or are we supposed to think - no event happens until it's been seen by us on Earth. Isn't that a bit Geocentric?

Thanks Inigo - of course you're right - ramjets need some kind of independent fuel injected into them, to energise them. The ambient air by itself, won't do. Mind you, sailing-ships manage to go along with just air-power. Obviously that's because the air is blowing on the ships, in the form of wind. And suppose this wind was blowing on a car fitted with sails - oughtn't it make the car go along similarly. So I wonder why we don't have wind-powered cars. Is it because the car wheels, as they roll round, make too much friction with the ground? But ships must also make friction, with the water. In fact, shouldn't they make a lot more friction than car-wheels. I reason like this: 1. With a ship, the entire length of the ship's hull at the waterline (perhaps hundreds of feet), rubs and drags against the water - hence, much friction. 2. With a car-wheel, only the few square inches at the bottom of the tire, rub against the ground - hence, less friction. Is my reasoning wrong?

That's right - especially when it comes to war. Wars kill lots of innocent people on both sides. The question is though - which side wins the war? The winning side will not be asked to justify its actions. Even if those actions include the mass slaughter of civilians. Like in WWII. The British and American leaders ordered the "Strategic Bombing" of German cities in WWII. This resulted in the deaths of millions of civilians. But we won the war, so our "good" leaders got away with it. The German leaders also ordered the killing of millions of civilians. But the Germans lost the war - so their "bad" leaders got put on trial at Nuremberg, found guilty of evil war-crimes, and hanged. Tough on them for losing! If the war had gone the other way, and the Germans had won - wouldn't the "evil" (possibly psychotic) Churchill and Roosevelt, have been tried, and convicted of war-crimes, for ordering the callous mass "terror-bombing" of German cities? In matters of "good" and "evil", the winner defines.

There are certainly very attractive military possibilities here. Bacterial-weaponisation offers the benefits of large-scale population destruction in an enemy country, with no cost to ourselves - our own population will have been safely vaccinated. We'll have to be careful, though, that mass application of such a weapon, by armies in the field, doesn't rebound on us. For instance, suppose our military labs develop a bacterium which induces the desire to commit fast suicide in anyone infected by it. Then we spray these bacteria over enemy troops - in the expectation that once infected, they'll all speedily shoot themselves. But they might not do that - they might give expression to their suicidal tendencies in another way - by fearlessly charging at us, in a last death and glory attack - heedless of their own casualities! This could well result in them overwhelming our troops and winning the battle. We obviously don't want that - turning every enemy soldier into a "kamikaze" warrior would hardly be to our advantage. Are there other ways in which the suicide-bacillus could be profitably employed?

The above posts are very interesting, and have caused me to wonder this: Humans seem to have the widest range of diet of any species on Earth. We jump in and eat all kinds of things. In contrast to other animals, who are much more specific in their diets. For example, a cat won't look at brussel-sprouts in any circumstances. It would rather die than eat them! It's true that a kitten can be brought up to eat some dubious items. Like Marmite-smeared bread-crusts. And even Mars chocolate bars. But there seems to be an inherent limit to what non-human species will consume. They seem to know, intuitively, what foods are good for them, and what foods are toxic. Whereas humans will eat anything, if it's served up presentably. Do humans have any instinctive aversion to a thing which looks edible, but may be toxic?

Thanks Greg H, I appreciate the link, which I've studied with interest. It shows that even sub-sonic ramjets are possible! Even if not very efficient. I hadn't realised that before - I'd thought they had to go at Mach 3 + Thanks for enlarging my understanding of the subject! However, may I just go back to InigoMontoya's post #3. It seems to suggest that ramjet engines contravene the Second Law of Thermodynamics. That can't be right surely?

What about "ramjet" engines - don't they work on similar lines to what TheDude suggested in post #1?

It's possible that we're overlooking a factor - the human mind. Our minds often make us do things that don't make sense genetically. Like caring for handicapped old ladies, who've long passed reproductive age. So they can't produce more babies to strengthen the community. Or help the community in a more passive sense - by looking after children. If the old ladies can't even do that, because of physical or mental enfeeblement, shouldn't we kill them off, and eat their flesh? Perhaps mindless animals might do it. But our human minds recoil in abhorrence from the idea. Even if eating granny might be pro-survival. We don't do such things, because our minds can override the programming of our genes. We have the freedom to do the opposite of what our genes try to make us do. The most spectacular example, perhaps, is consciously and deliberately committing suicide. Does any other animal do that? (Lemmings long ago bebunked!) The point is, the human mind is not, despite Dawkins, just a computer programmed to control a survival-machine. We have broken free from our genetic programming. And don't we rejoice in this freedom? It enables us to take pleasure in doing what Nature doesn't intend - in being "perverse". As Edgar Allan Poe wrote: "I am not more sure than I breathe, that the assurance of the wrong or error of any action is often the one unconquerable force which impels us to its prosecution...resulting from the spirit of the Perverse. We perpetrate such acts, merely because we feel that we should not." And this I think, is why gay sex has such a powerful attraction for humans. It appeals to us not despite the fact that it's perverse and against Nature, but precisely because it is. So while the propensity to indulge in gay sex may have some somatic genetic component, a hormonal imbalance for example, I think it's mostly the product of an innate human impulse - to rebel against Nature, and take delight in doing so.

Things don't need a "purpose" to exist. Things be created without any purpose. For example, suppose when you get up tomorrow, you make a cup of coffee. Then accidentally spill it on the floor. Your carelessness will create a pool of liquid, possibly with microbial life-forms transiently pullulating and dying within the spillage. But has the spillage got a purpose - to justify its existence? If some pool-dwelling microbe cried: "What is the Purpose of this Pool" - what answer would you give?

Yes, warmly glowing incandescent light-bulbs seem so agreeable! The nicest way humans have invented to illuminate our homes at night. They make home look pleasant: softly-lit, and relaxing. Not like with those awful CFL things, which emit a cold bleak light - which might suit an office, or other place of work, where all that matters is maximum light output, at minimum expense. However the CFL light looks quite wrong at home. I've tried using CFL tubes. They induce aversion, as soon as they're switched on. A feeling of "I don't like this". Could this dislike be an instinctive reaction, arising from the way humans evolved to use artificial light? To us, for hundreds of thousands of years, artificial light at night meant only one thing - fire, flames, burning torches. Then candles, oil-lamps, and gas-light, as we developed better technology. The point is - all these light-sources burn. And the filament of an electric light-bulb also burns - albeit in a kind of slow motion. But it's really the same principle as the burning wick of a candle. So could humans have evolved to instinctively prefer the light from burning things?

A good point - in Science, the test is what matters. This suggests a possible scientific way to test whether the Christian God exists. Look at it this way: God supposedly sent Christ to Earth, in order to preach His message to us. The message is recorded in the New Testament of the Bible. By reading this New Testament, and accepting the message it contains, and believing in it - we will be saved and go to Heaven. The New Testament is therefore of supreme importance. It's a text which is absolutely essential for our salvation. And to get this text to us, God went to a lot of trouble - He had to create a "Son", ie Christ. How He did this seems mysterious, as there's no sex in Heaven. It must have been a major effort on His part. And not likely to be something He'd lightly repeat - if He exists. So to put His existence to the test, suppose we try this experiment: We gather up all the printed books of the New Testament - every copy in the world, and burn them all. Also we erase the NT text from all non-print media like CDs, computer chips, every possible storage medium. So all traces of the NT are completely wiped out. Then we wait to see whether there's any reaction. Should we try it, do you think?

Yes, but doesn't that imply unrealistic group altruism? More likely, the pain cry is based on self-interest. It evolved to startle and inhibit an attacker. I'm thinking here in human terms - suppose you got someone really mad at you, and they started hitting you. And you didn't make any kind of vocal response - just submitted silently to their blows. They might carry on punching you until they'd worked off all their rage, and seriously injured, or even killed you. But what if, when they land their first blow, you scream out loudly - in an agonised shriek full of pain and distress. Won't that tend to make them realise what they're doing, and curtail their assault? So the pain cry in human society may be an individual defensive response to perceived danger. The response would naturally be employed most often by the most vulnerable members of our society, such as females. And in support of that, don't we see that in situations of danger - it's always the women who start screaming first?

Looking at this picture, one notes immediately that the squares have different colours. Does Kanzi need different coloured squares to point at? What if the colours were removed, leaving only geometrical shapes in black and white - as used in Chinese characters. If the squares contained only monochrome Chinese characters, would Kanzi cope? Or - as I suspect would probably happen - be either completely flummoxed, or at least be a much poorer performer. Has this experiment been tried?