Reaper

Yeah, I would agree w/ Hawking. That or Kaku.

I feel unconfortable with the fact that we are losing track of potentially lethal asteriods. We need a better monitoring system, or at least work on our current one until it can track all the near Earth asteroids.

I think it has been made clear that the various reports, data tables, deductions, etc are based on empirical data and observations. What we have here is that you are denying the data itself. Do you have a (peer-reviewed) report that confirms this, because 1veedo has already proven that this just isn't the case. We have a very large amount of data that seems to confirm that the recent rise in global temperatures are directly due to humans. Its more than just recent sunspot activities, we also have large amounts of data from ice cores, ancient trees, etc.

Can genes actually be reduced in computer terms, you speak of kb and bp which are usually applied to computer memory systems. Anyways, I have yet to find it on any other scientific publications. It seems to me that this guy is probably trying to go for publicity so far. And in any case what he does has pretty much been done over and over again for several years now. I don't think it qualifies for artificial life.

I've read the emails you've sent, its just that I haven't got the chance to really sit down and get started on any articles yet. I've been tied up with finishing up a bunch of college work... This thursday I'll get a 10 day break, so I'll send in an article by this weekend.

Nope. There is a lot more that you can get from meat other then vitamins. Meat is loaded with essential protiens that the body needs. Its actually much easier to be healthier by including meat in your diet. In anycase, I would have to agree with ParanoiA here. Who's to say what they feel at the time of death? If your criteria is humaneness, they probably were not better off in the wild, with what being hunted by humans and other animals. I would have to say that nature is more cruel than humans are.

This is one thing that I am trying to figure out. It is a well known fact that the voter turnouts in recent elections, presidential or otherwise, are rather low. A quick look at the charts on PBS website shows that since the 60's, voter turnout has been on the decline: http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/votestats.html It seems to me that people don't really seem to care anymore. Indeed, in an article about this on CNN, one guy who was interviewed, when asked this question, said "it doesn't make a difference to me". Other people I have asked said similar things and expressed similar views, that their either "too busy" or "i don't have time to think about it" and so on. Could cynicism help end our democracy here, after all nobody seems to take advantage of our right to vote.

Oh, ok. I was not arguing that at all then. This thread is longer then I thought. Well, as I said earlier, you and Bascule don't need to flame each other over this, because earlier you guys were throwing insults, and both of you seemed to be bringing up irrelevent topics. Sorry for my accusations earlier... Anyways, I stand by my points. I don't think the teacher should have been fired.

But he didn't say it to a classroom! It was a discussion he said outside of class. And he wasn't implying or trying to prove that religion was ever false, just that the stories in the bible should not be interpreted literally. He wasn't forcing anything down anyone's throats. You are not only making a strawman here, but you are accusing anybody who disagrees with you as some sort of bigot. Your not addressing anyone's points. Instead, your making a bunch of claims that aren't true, or even relevent. And I'm going to say this again, we all know that the teacher was going over the impact of religion in this course. We were not implying that he wasn't, the impact on politics and abortion are already well known. And if someone in the University finds information that contradicts or discredits their beliefs, so what? It isn't about respecting beliefs, its about teaching facts and getting people to think critically and re-evaluate what they believe. They have no right whatsoever to sue them over a rather trivial matter. If they are immature enough to be offended by someone's opinion, maybe they should just go back home and crawl under their bed. The world is filled with people with contradictory beliefs and facts that prove them wrong. You are mistaken, it is you who have lost it.

Now your just making a strawman out of our argument. First, we never suggested any of the sort. Of course we know to discuss religious impact, that was exactly what the teacher was doing, however he said that one should not take the bible literally in order to really understand it. He did not force any beliefs down anybody's throat. Second, we know the Adam and Eve story to be wrong if taken literally, so how is calling it a "fairy-tale" wrong or insulting. The only people who are offended are those fundamentalists who believe in a literal interpretation (which is by the way wrong!). Claiming that one should respect the belief that the Adam and Eve story to be true is like claiming one should respect the belief that 2+2=5. If anybody came up to you and said that they believed 2+2=5, you would call them a loon. How is the Adam and Eve story any different? This isn't about hating religion, its about whether or not he should teach anything that either contradicts one's beliefs or at least provide an opinion or fact that challenges it. You, Pangloss, are assuming way too many things. Just let your pride go.

What are you guys talking about, they wouldn't have done it were it not for the galaxy far far away! yeah, its a shame, isn't it. But I think it will happen one day, just be patient. We'll get there when we do. That is, if an asteroid doesn't hit us first, or some other calamity that happens to wipe us out...

Pangloss and Bascule, I don't mean to play referee, but you guys really need to calm down. It seems to me that you guys have gotten into the habit of making a strawman out of each other. And there is absolutely no need to throw insults. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Anyways, the argument seems to revolve around whether is was right for the teacher to make a statement that contradicted the beliefs of a few students. First of all, all evidence is against the truthfulness of the Adam and Eve story, so I don't know why the students should be allowed to get him fired over his statement. Second, one of the goals of higher education is to get people to think critically, and so it is inevitable that they will run into information or courses that either challenges their beliefs or even contradicts them. So I guess the real question here is should the teacher have been fired for making his students consider the possibility that the Adam and Eve story was a myth, or at the very least that it should not be literally interpreted? I think not. There really was no justification for firing the teacher, because it really isn't about "respecting other beliefs". And besides, we really don't know what really happened that day in the classroom, since they didn't go over any details. There could have been a legitimate reason to say what he did before going on to describe its impact. I seriously doubt he was doing something akin to "straping them to a chair, propping their eyes open, with a big screen blasting 'THE EARTH IS ROUND' " sort of thing.

Atomikpsycho is a douche bag, how can you not comprehend that?

Recently there has been news that Craig Venter has made an artifical life form, but so far all of the articles come directly out of the mainstream media, and so far there really is no details about the experiment. Instead they dove right down to implications without explaining what they actually did. Also, I can't seem to find it anywhere in major scientific journals. Here is one such article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/oct/06/genetics.climatechange Here they at least go over some of the details, and it doesn't seem like that they really created an artifical life form, rather they just took some existing chromosomes and modified it somewhat, which is something we've been able to do for a couple of decades now. What is your take on this? So far it seems to be an attempt at publicity

I was wondering that too. I did a search and apparently he is a banned member, here is his profile: http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/member.php?u=2237

A lot of these awards are quite....interesting to say the least. Its amazing to see what scientists and engineers do when they have lots of free time on their hands... I especially like the "Gay bomb", its pretty funny

I know, but the fact that it was allowed in the first place should cause some concern among us all.

Mind you, there have been several successful predictions made a while ago using climate models with regard to global warming, and our models are not statistical in nature, but are based on the laws of physics. Here is a link to how they are done: http://www.logicalscience.com/skeptic_arguments/models-dont-work.html

Well, what constitutes civilized? After all, the imperial powers of the 19th century were so civilized that they segregated their subjects based on race and ethnicity, and commited unspeakable atrocities among the natives. Second, even if it is a right, it is basically up to the person to take care of his or herself. Most of the people in the hospital nowadays are there because of reasons that are entirely preventable...

And then of course there is always wikipedia, their science articles are pretty decent and they provide lots of links to other science related websites.

Brian Greene's books might suit your fancy. Though they are pop science books, they should give you a good overview of what is going on. You might also want to try going to this site too if you are interested in the mathematical foundations of physics: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/hframe.html Here are some nice simulations you can play around with: http://web.mit.edu/8.02t/www/802TEAL3D/visualizations/electrostatics/index.htm and http://phet.colorado.edu/new/simulations/index.php?cat=Top_Simulations

That's pretty high, especially given that the other theories are much more obscure in the public realm.

I guess your right. The reason I called it dull was intended as an oxymoron, but I guess it wasn't a good one... Besides, I'm not sure how many people will actually read it, even though I do promote it and market it. If you want to rename the thread to something more interesting you can.

I guess its not quite as bad as suing God...