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dimreepr

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Everything posted by dimreepr

  1. Without medical intervention, no sex = no offspring. Life sucks when you let it suck. The point of this thread is to establish the conditions when the act of killing is considered lawful.
  2. Except there will be no increase in social housing. This law will simply create a bigger underclass of people who slip through the welfare net. They will be left with a stark choice, live on the streets or be imprisoned, because let’s face it, by definition; they will not be able to pay any sort of fine. Can we really afford to overload, even more, an already creaking prison system? As I stated in my previous post “A tweak in the law to make it easier to evict squatters from a primary residence” to deal with your only objection. In the 70’s the problem was dealt with in a much more sympathetic way that worked reasonably well.
  3. In the original story by H G Wells the Aliens were from Mars and “regarded this world with envious eyes” (so not habitual invaders) and had long since eradicated disease from the planet. I think H G was trying to suggest, having done so they overlooked the effect viruses and bacterium would have, add to which the accelerated evolution of such organisms. The premise of the book is much more plausible than that of the film, as not enough background is present in the film.
  4. I’d live in Douglas Adams “hitchhikers” universe (another one you missed), if I could be president.
  5. I revisit this thread as “The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness” is relevant here. http://networkedblogs.com/BBW18
  6. The problem is much bigger than most people think, if taken as a world issue, it has been estimated that 1 in 7 people are squatters. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squatting If this number is even close, in Britain, then the new law will create far more problems than it solves. Joatman Whilst I agree that your home is your castle, so to speak, I really don’t think, many home owners will come back from their annual holiday to be faced with a squatter issue. Besides which a tweak in the law to make it easier to evict squatters from a primary residence, would address that issue reasonably well. This law, however, isn’t really aimed at the ordinary homeowner, for me it smacks of protectionism of the wealthy upper middle and upper class’. Do we really want a return to the inequities of the Victorian era?
  7. Squatter’s rights dismissed... a triumph for landlords? Or a draconian Law, that marks the beginning of the end of a decent society?
  8. I watched this episode today and for some reason this thread sprung to mind, I can’t think why... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zrk00nYqbsI
  9. The phrase “Live by the sword, die by the sword” seems particularly relevant. Fear seems to be the prime motivator for the imagined need of such instruments of death, how often, I wonder is the actual need?
  10. As swansont points out, there is no real way to compare. Local topography is important and affects the weather in many ways, Britain being a prime example, without the large coastline (not to mention the north Atlantic currents) the temperatures, both winter and summer, would be much more extreme and thus negate the need for the citizenry to travel for their sunshine and skiing holidays. http://www.weatheronline.co.uk/reports/wxfacts/North-Atlantic-Drift-Gulf-Stream.htm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_in_Britain
  11. The truth of the matter is the opposite; the northern hemisphere Temperature exceeds the southern by an average of approximately 2 degrees C. http://itg1.meteor.wisc.edu/wxwise/AckermanKnox/chap14/climate_spatial_scales.html http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/trends/temp/jonescru/graphics/glnhsh.png
  12. “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” probably the most profound and well known statement ever uttered by any explorer. His shoulders will be so often stood upon, he will be greatly missed.
  13. Good answers, it’s given me a new perspective on the term. JMJones this quote from Mark Twain is particularly pertinent “It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”
  14. Too often I hear this used as a way of belittling others, especially academics or experts who don’t happen to share a mechanical or constructional bent. For me the definition is something we all should know without an education, such as fire burns or walk in front of a moving car is dangerous, however friends insist it includes a standard education, but what is that? And when is it completed? For the average non academic most learning is done outside of the ‘school’ environment and it never ceases, so when can we say common sense is complete and therefore a term that can reasonably be used to deride others when violated: 20 40 60?
  15. The best way to survive such a society is to become a clown. Cannibals don’t eat clowns, they taste funny. Back to topic, I don’t think a vegan only world would last very long, as pointed out in the above post’s there is no ethical way to deal with the livestock, consequently starvation would result as the livestock starts to compete with us for the available food (how long this would take is up for debate). Sooner or later some exceptions would be allowed (the thin end of the wedge) and we’d end up where we are now. All we can really do is treat the livestock well, while they wait to become food.
  16. No this is an example of surface area to volume ratio, one example would be why whales have grown to the size they have or another would be the Eskimo (short and fat increases this ratio). The conductive property of air, isn't all that good, so trapping air between hairs is a way of increasing this ratio without the need to increase subcutaneous fat, which requires a lot of excess energy, which is hard to come by and we humans need the extra energy for our huge, relative to size, brains.
  17. Ok now that you've moved the focus to something that can now be reasonably discussed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_the_United_Kingdom The Uk's struggle to integrate different cultural influences has meant such laws as "Racial and religious hatred act 2006" completely unnecessary and an example of kneejerk legislation. "The terrorism act 2000/2006" is an example of the government using fear to impose (unreasonable) controls at the behest of the public. The above laws could be seen as self imposed, driven largely by fear and a media in constant search of the sensational, in order to sell itself to the public. Fear is a large part of what is deemed necessary to censor, maybe you should stop worrying.
  18. I call “reductio ad absurdum” no one here is attacking free speech let alone to the point of being a “Nazi” or trying to establish a universal dictatorship, as Ecoli has pointed out this is a private forum with its own set of rules, this doesn’t extend to society in general. This is the reason for the opposition to your position.
  19. So any one who disagrees with your, somewhat, skewed version of reality, is guilty of trying to establish a dictatorship or is a Nazi? Seriously! Do you not see the ridiculous position your taking? It's just laughable; I'll refer you to Swansont's post #20.
  20. As zapatos suggests this isn’t an example of the slingshot effect (gravity assist) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slingshot_effect It’s an example of an elliptical orbit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_orbit Besides which how would you harvest this power? and if you could harvest the power you would just diminish the orbit until it crashed to earth.
  21. Can you not see the fallacious nature of your argument? You HAVE been allowed to argue your point without censorship and unlike a religious or other dogmatic environment; no one has shouted heresy and demanded you be punished. However as has been pointed out the forum has (very reasonable) rules, as with society, every society.
  22. Having read the paper I think the statement that’s most pertinent to this discussion is “While objects will not be observed to cross the event horizon, light from them will be exponentially redshifted, so that within a time frame comparable to the longest lived main sequence stars all objects outside of our local cluster will truly become invisible.” Krauss & Scherrer As has been suggested my use of the term “blink out” is wrong, that however doesn’t mean the galaxies won’t disappear for a future observer.
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