Ophiolite

H2O ?

In the context of general English language usage you use the term perfectly correctly. You do not appear to be using correctly from the standpoint of science. That is more than a trivial observation, but calls into question your competence to engage in scientific thinking. I offer that observation as serious advice: call it a hypothesis and you encounter less resistance to having the idea considered. Whether or not you agree with McLuhan I do not know of any of his critics who would have called him superficial and shallow. His iconic "the medium is the message" phrase lies at the heart, for example, of marketing technique. You are posting here because you have been totally unsuccesful at marketing your idea. I am suggesting that part of the problem may be the medium you are using by which to communicate your message. Last resort or not, Youtube does not tend to convey a sense of professionalism or academic expertise. I think you ignore this point at your peril.

I don't have any books to recommend, but the following papers look interesting. They are some that turned up in a Google Scholar search for "American Megafauna". http://www.esf.edu/efb/lomolino/courses/MammalDiversity/Disc1/All1.pdf http://www.geography.wisc.edu/faculty/williams/lab/pubs/Science%202009%20Gill.pdf http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/mbinford/GEOXXXX_Biogeography/LiteratureForLinks/FiedelHaynes_2004_premature_burial_overkill_JAS.pdf http://snr.missouri.edu/fw/faculty/pdf/gompper/extinction-risk.pdf Etc - out of the 340+ hits, I should think there are at least a couple of dozen relevant ones. And this just out a week ago: http://www.pnas.org/content/99/23/14624.full

I have not yet looked at the video. I shall do so later. People are generally not against hearing new theories, however you probably don't have a theory, you have a speculation, or a hypothesis. A theory would be well validated by many independent observations and experiments. 'People' are confronted by many 'new theories' all the time. These almost never offer anything of value, but reflect misunderstandings, or even ouright ignorance on the part of the proposer. Statistically it is likely that your 'theory' will fall into the same category and so 'people' are reluctant to invest time in considering it. The fact that you call it a theory rather than a speculation, or provisional hypothesis adds to the suspicion that you have nothing to offer, since you seem not to understand the scientific process. I do not intend to sound critical, but wish to answer your question honestly. Would you consider summarising your hypothesis in writing? Youtube videos are also not the ideal way to communicate a formal idea. McLuhan said, The medium is the message. Youtube sends the wrong message.

Pymander, no part of your post #16 addresses the central point I am making. You have made a claim. I have demonstrated that your claim is invalid and that your ignorance on that topic calls into question every other point you argue. Do you still maintain, despite observations to the contrary, that 'Main stream science' is required to be accepted without question at an academic institution.? When and if you respond this time please address the point and not ramble on about other matters. It may fool the artichokes, it doesn't fool me.

Assuredly you are not my pal. In the context of the post where you address Ringer (?) your use of pal comes across as snide and aggressive. Poor understanding is more often accounted for by poor writing than by poor reading. Please do not make unwarranted assumptions about the extent of my knowledge in this area. Now where is the evidence that would demonstrate your knowledge in the area? You have no idea what 'people like myself' are. People like myself have read extensively in this area. People like myself have explored the possibilities, not only through reading, but via experiment. People like myself have dismissed these ideas because there was no meaningful evidence to support the ideas. Your perception seems to be flawed. Where is the evidence to support this view? No one, that I can see, is questioning that research was carried out, by real scientists. Real scientists also investigated phlogiston. What is in dispute is the outcome of that research. Where is your evidence? I didn't tell you how to phrase yourself. I asked you for evidence. You are running round the houses with all kinds of irrelevance, when all you are being asked for is the evidence. If you don't want to be dismissed by a pedantic scientist don't talk bollocks and do front up with the evidence. Finally. I'll look at it. You wanted an opinion? My opinion is the backlash was appropriate; the debunking necessary. Everything we perceive is just a perception. Give me a frigging break. There is a methodology in science that can overcome the dangers of perception and perspective. Your naive approach breaches that methodology and should be challenged. If you wanted calm, considerate analysis of your ideas you should have presented them with evidential support for comment, not in the manner of a gullible pseudoscientist.

I would always favour having my car fixed by a mechanic rather than a physicist. I'd be patronisingly sympathetic to anyone who thought otherwise.

No I frigging well don't agree. Here again is your statement: That statement is bollocks. It is bollocks for the following reasons: Definitely as a post-doctoral researcher and generally as a doctoral student one is required to challenge and probe the current findings and understandings of 'main stream science'. That is the precise reverse of what you claim. Secondly, even as an undergraduate one is encouraged to explore alternative explanations if one has demonstrated how to do so within the process of the scientific method. You are blithely unaware of the importance and reality of these points even when they are explained to you, so I say again bollocks! You do not have a clue. Ignorance is not bad, intransigent ignorance is.

So, as asked by others, where are these released files? You are making the claim, the onus is on you to produce, or retract. Do you understand that, pal?

Bollocks. As a single example I recall challenging staff over identification of current geosynclines. My argument was not only accepted, but incorporated into future lectures. Why? Because I provided evidence through peer reviewed papers that they were unaware of. In most cases, however, and rightly so, when studying at a university one is meant to be learning the basics. Until one has these thoroughly grasped then it is arrogant and frigging infantile to go wandering off and waffling about alternative paradigms.

I return to this opening statement, already addressed by Bignose and uncool. The depth of misunderstanding and ignorance embedded in this statement tend to render anything that follows it irrelevant. The others have pointed out how badly flawed the statement is. It prompts me to ask you these three questions: Do you now recognise that the statement reveals your deep ignorance of how science today is actually conducted? If you deny this misunderstanding will you provide evidence, not opinion and assertion, to justify that stance? If you do accept that you were ignorant in this regard, will you concede that such ignorance hardly qualifies you to pontificate on matters as you do?

Surely you speak in jest and mean ingest.

You have not demonstrated that this is the case. You keep asserting it without a) offering a reason why this must be so, or b) explaining why other causes should be discounted. Please do so now. No - why are you considering only the stars in the spiral arms of this galaxy. You appear to think that all stars in our galaxy are located within the spiral arms. That does not incline me to believe that you have any idea what you are talking about. Perhaps you just misunderstood me, so why would the stars in our galaxy, not in the spiral arms not be effected?

While many things do indeed change over time and this change is sometimes characterised as a form of evolution, in most contexts evolution refers specifically to some form of biological evolution, involving heritable characteristics mutation, natural selection, adaptation, etc. In this sense then, evolution does not apply to everything and it may be misleading to say that it does.

Please answer these questions that I asked you earlier. Your illogical response above does not address these. Why would creation of new matter in the centre of the galaxy cause stars to move outwards? Surely with increased gravitational attraction they should move inwards? Why are you only considering the stars in the spiral arms? Are you predicting that only these will be influenced? Why are you discounting other factors that might cause migration inward or outward?

As far as I am aware there is no general tendency for either of these things to occur. What is it that makes you suspect this might be the case? Is it simply that this would possibly provide evidence for the creation of new matter? No one is going to take you seriously if you pick and choose whom you will answer. Also, I think you will find that is against the forum rules - you know, the ones you agreed to honour when you joined here. Why would creation of new matter in the centre of the galaxy cause stars to move outwards? Surely with increased gravitational attraction they should move inwards? Why are you only considering the stars in the spiral arms? Are you predicting that only these will be influenced? Why are you discounting other factors that might cause migration inward or outward? Thus far there seems to be little logic and less thought invested in your idea. Clear, concise answers to my questions may persuade me otherwise.

This is an unscientific, unqualified, vague statement and as such is of little value. It certainly fails utterly to justify giving any serious consideration to the claim that the world will end in 2012. Now, I took the time to respond to your post in detail. Will you now show me the courtesty of answering the questions I raised in that post and, ideally, addressing the points I made. Thank you in advance.

Please learn to distinguish advice, no matter how unwelcome, or how phrased, from insults. When I choose to insult you I assure you that there will be absolutely no doubt that I have done so. The collateral damage could spread through several threads.

What would go a long way to avoiding conflict would be if you stopped being so frigging hypersensitive and starting interminable threads about how rude people are and how hard done by you are, and how the moderators don't do a good job of policing things with a fair hand, etc, etc. It's getting frigging tiresome.

As others have noted the current theories of natural selection are not incompatible with god using evolution to produce humans. This would also require that he had, for example, directed the bolide strike that wiped out the dinosaurs and a host of other unique events without which humans would not exist. This may have happened, but there is no substantial evidence that it did happen. There remain many unanswered questions on the evolution of humans specifically, and life in general, that might have a teleological explanation. Again, there is no compelling evidence to give this possibility serious attention currently. Arguments such as those of irreducible complexity are attempts to generate such evidence, but thus far they have been found wanting. The following books address, at least in part, what you are looking for. Mark Perakh Unintelligent Design Prometheus Books 2004 ISBN: 1-51902-084-0 Eugenie C. Scott Evolution vs. Creationism University of California Press 2004 ISBN: 0-520-24650-0 Kenneth R. Miller Only A Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul Penguin 2008 ISBN 978-0-670-01883-3 Michael Brant Shermer Why Evolution Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design Henry Holt and Company 2006 ISBN:0-8050-8121-6 Robert T. Pennock Tower of Babel Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2000 ISBN: 0-262-16180-X

Incorrect. The Mayan calendar comes to end of one of its cycles. This is not equivalent to the end of the world. Please specify in which sura and in which verse this claim is made. (In other words I am stating that, again, you are incorrect and that the Quran does not make such a claim.) Where is this claim made within the Hindu religion? Firstly the Kali Yuga cycle and the Mayan cycle do not begin, or end, at the same time. Secondly the ending of a cycle is not equivalent to the ending of the world. Science has a great deal to say about it. Psychologists, sociologists and anthropologists are all interested in the gullibility of humans and the powerful desire in some members of the species to believe in 'End of World' scenarios. Their attachment to these and their desire that the end occur within their lifetime and preferably soon is often seen as a compensation for feelings of inadequacy, as individuals or as a society. Thank you for providing the opportunity to point this out.

What evidence do you have for this? Radioactive decay generates progressively less heat over time because there is less material to decay. Temperatures may be restrained in their rate of decrease, but decrease is what they do. What justification do you have for asserting the opposite? Uranium is a lithophile element. Nearly all of it is present in the crust, not the mantle, not the core. Herndon's position on this is as a minority of one. Volcanic activity along the mid-ocean ridges is in small pockets of which there are a great many. Your assertion is refuted by the facts. Argument from incredulity will carry no weight around here. The universe doesn't care that you can't understand it. What is a 'greatly insufficient subduction site'? The asteroids are not the remains of a planet. Some information that may help you: this 2012, not 1912. so the evidence that demonstrates why these are fallacious is wrong? Or you just don't like it? Or you've found a neat way of ignoring by.....ignoring it? That is correct. You are unable to do so. That speaks volumes about your approach to science and nothing about science. Who am I to disagree?

1. It's a frigging discussion forum. Opinions are implicitly sought. 2. You opened this thread with these words: "I'd like a second opinion on something I was faced with elsewhere."

Rubbish. I have stated, not that his writing style is immature, but that his writing style could be interpreted to indicate that he is immature. I am advising him, in good faith, that it might be worthwhile for him to consider adjusting that to avoid the formation of such an impression. I strenuously object to you acting in moderator role based upon an opinion that is poorly formed. Feel free to apologise.

pmb, the way for you to make that happen is for you to stop engaging on this point with anyone here. Allow inow to appear as a surly misanthrope, a role he doubtless enjoys. You are appearing as a something of a whiner, a role you do not enjoy. You can end it, yet you choose not to. That seems foolish to me.