dichotomy

I've been just thinking, as I do, and thought.... What volume of iridium would produce the same gravity as earth? How much smaller would a sphere of this be than the earth? Hope someone can help here.

Thanks guys, I thought it might be a tough one. It does give me some rough idea though which is better than none. cheers.

Does a 'superposition of two states in one basis' mean there is time, in QM?

Yes, how many generations would be interesting estimate too.

How many mutations are there estimated to be, to get from microbial life to homo sapiens? Are there such estimates?

Yes, but these things have lots of evidence surrounding them. I’ve eaten lambs brains, cut open rabbits skulls to reveal their brains, so it isn’t ridiculous to assume ‘without a doubt’ that I have a brain, without ever actually seeing it. If there was a nation called Rebukoloza, I would doubt its existence until I had solid evidence. Even though from past experience I've gathered that many nations do exist. If I cracked open a live rabbits skull that I had just caught, and it was completely empty, I would doubt that I had a brain until I had more solid evidence. An MRI would be incredibly helpful here.

What about people who believe, without doubt, in things they have never seen, are they mad?

I still look at time as really being an abstract measurement of motion. Motion being the real physical property being observed here. Couldn’t we just replace the word 'time' with the word 'motion' and operate just as effectively (if not more)? With the exception that we can actually see motion and its effects – decay, movement, speed, growth, etc. Whilst time remains a greek myth of sorts, possibly a contemporary delusion? I mean, cycles of the radiation used to define time is movement in itself?

So do you think defining whether something is actually mad or not, is really defined by environment? Or is true madness the complete inability to adjust to the ways of a new culture? When I went to Bali Indonesia, the driving habits, if transferred to Australia would appear as mad. But in Bali, it was completely acceptable.

The local Melbourne sea gulls don’t attack. Some will in fact hover beside the unwound window of a car when they suss–out that you have fish and chips in there. I’ve fed gulls like this, whilst they are hovering next to my open window, they snatch chips straight out of your fingers. Quite comical when they are flying against a strong southerly wind.

The magpie that injured my ear was an Australian magpie Gymnorhina tibicen. And yes, it stung for at least 30 minutes. I’m glad it didn’t target my eye . They are a local menace to posties and bike riders. But I respect their protective behaviours of their young. They are a strong black and white colour. You must have seen some young ones that are a mottled grey white black colour. About 30cm tall. They do have a nice call, and can be taught to mimic human words. I had a lost young one in my yard and it didn’t hesitate to run up to me squawking for food, so I obliged for 3 weeks. I now know they love tinned cat food and eat at a comical machine gun pace. “The Injury Surveillance Information System (ISIS) is a national collection of hospital emergency department attendance records. Their data shows that of 59 magpie attacks, the eye was the birds’ most common target.” http://www.abc.net.au/science/scribblygum/July2002/

I could have believed what I saw if it was corvids. But the fact that there was such an obvious size difference amazed me. Tough little buggers. A Magpie did swoop me from behind last spring, and it drew blood from my ear!

A while back I observed a hawk with a Indian myna bird in it’s clutches. 3 more Indian myna birds appeared abruptly and started squawking and pecking at the hawk. This group harassment was effective enough after a few seconds (4 or 5) to make the Hawk, which was about twice their size, release the bird it had in its claws. As the Hawk flew away the Indian myna flew after it squawking and pecking as they went until the hawk completely left the scene. The Indian mynas appeared to aggressively defend their own kind in the face of a very capable opponent. Is this a common occurrence with Indian myna? Or in fact any bird that is smaller than the bird of prey? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Myna

That’s assuming that the mind is still like a 'bolt of lightening' all of your life. Realistically, everything eventually succumbs to dissipation. And then ultimately reuse for other things in nature. Well, at least everything alive. But I agree that whilst the mind is “good” there are infinite things to learn and discover.

IMO, boredom, feelings that things are mundane and apathy are all driving forces that ultimately drive us onwards to new success, or new failure. The point being that out of 6 billion homosapiens there will be a percentage that will ultimately succeed for a while. This seems to be enough to ensure the ongoing dominant future survival of the h-sapien species; of course, environmental conditions still need to be favorable to them. So basically, we are all lumped with varying degrees of the same driving forces.

There seems to be some pulsating hostile amygdalas being triggered by pioneer.

I’d think it would be a two edged sword. They both put us on the path towards logical thought. Statistics and probability allow us to drive with at least part of our windscreens defrosted. It’s better than driving with a window that is completely frosted up. The average age of death for a western male is about 75. Does this generally produce polluted logic or rational acceptance? To me it produces a rational acceptance of my probable fate, with the currently known information. Someone in their 20s might find this comforting, whilst someone in their 60s might find it fear inducing. If anything, stats and probability are very handy tools for accumulating harder evidence and facts. And like any tool, their effectiveness depends on how they are used. A politician could use statistics to generate fear or happiness, depending on what outcome they are hoping to trigger.

I want to coat outdoor slate tiles in either oil, or a lacquer. Any advice on which way to go? Or another good alternative? They will be walked on. Any experience with this is appreciated.

False disaster prediction could also be used entirely in a political way to gain status, like - ‘If we don’t invade and control Vietnam the world will be dominated by communists’. Except, when it is used by politicians the majority tend to agree with them, at least initially.

Yes athletes are a good demonstration of shared chemistry, but depending on the athlete the intensity and type of body language, and the quantity of chemical release would differ between athletes. So, I speculate that the intensity and type of body language is shaped by nurture (culture/ subculture); the chemical reaction of being successful (testosterone) or unsuccessful (cortisol) is shaped by nature. The quantity of an individual’s chemical release is shaped by both nature and nurture and is very much dependent on how success/non-success is perceived by the individual involved?

When eating or drinking from glass containers, do we consume any microscopic particles of glass? And if so, are they harmful to ones health over time?

Hi iNow, how’s it going? My point is that on one hand they suggest a 'universality' of behavior existing, and then on the other hand they suggest it is not so after observing western athletes. Which suggests, to me, that pride and shame behavioral expressions are sub-cultural and not cross cultural afterall. Universal is universal, otherwise they should choose a different word like, cultural. I just don't go for their observations as being 'naturally' global. I also think that the global spread of the mass media will make things very difficult to differentiate when behaviours are 'natural' to when behaviours are 'conditioned'. We are all heavily exposed to seeing how US citizens express emotions to things in film and TV. We rarely see televised P.N.G mountain tribes people express emotions to events. If you break things down we have a testosterone release (I suggest is linked with pride) and a cortisol release (I suggest is linked with shame). We all share these chemicals and their effects. But what I’m saying is that the intensity/expression of behavior that results from these chemicals is cultural/subcultural. I am, as per usual, open to experts, and others, differing opinions on this. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080414174855.htm Testosterone Levels Predict City Traders' Profitability whaa? :confused: sorry, you have lost me here.

I remember reading about this story years ago. It really does demonstrate how powerful the unconscious is. The unconscious does have an ancient language of symbols that the conscious mind often finds difficult to interpret, until of course you get to the ‘Eureka!’ moment as you put it, and it all makes sense. I struggle with why we find our own unconscious difficult to interpret; it seems so useful when you get the occasional Eureka moment. The evolutionary transition from unconscious control to conscious control of our actions seems like it would have been a tremendous struggle, if it wasn’t for some ability of the conscious to ‘translate’ the unconscious. I wonder if interpretation of the unconscious was easier at an earlier point in evolution? Is it emotional logic we are discussing here, or might it really be unconscious logic?

I suppose one of the reasons I post on a forum like this is to see if some of my thoughts are influenced too heavily by emotion, or are just plain wrong . My thinking, which might be wrong, is that anonymous people whom are genuinely interested in science will be more likely to disagree with emotional and wrongly assumed comments, whereas most people at home and in the workplace tend to nod their heads more readily, which gives you a nice warm feeling of being right, but is not necessarily very helpful to oneself. The marketing (as well as Political) industry likes to tap into emotions. So words like Terrorist, Cancer, Death, Quality, Bargain, Health and Beauty, all have immediate value to them in the form of gaining their audiences attention, and giving them greater control over their audience. So, I can believe the mere mention of ‘Terrorist’ to a population that is not used to terrorism has a high impact on their decision making.

I was using higher life forms to demonstrate that chance survival has given birth to an active component of survival, in something like say a mammal. ‘Active’ - being more able to choose movement, select and plan. ‘Chance’ -being a total reliance on things like wind, and, or water to move them towards successful survival. No ability to plan, select and choose movement. But I do agree, more so after your 'active' prodding, that even higher life forms rely primarily on chance for their survival than they might rely on planning, selection, fitness and choosing their movements. That is, the right environmental conditions existing for them to exist in the first place is pure chance and very primary. Being mentally active helps in selecting a fit mate. It's another very handy tool for lifeforms to use for successful survival. But again, other chance factors are still more important for survival, like oxygen and hydrogen, in the right quantities, forming water for e.g. Is there a theoretical percentage of how much chance we rely on compared to active choice when it comes to survival? Or, are there too many variables?