Moontanman

An appeal to authority? Is that really the best you can do? I think it's more likely that humans share a tendency towards thinking certain things are significant when in fact they are not... On yeah, the jewel thing, I wanted to ask... ruby, emerald, and gold... right?

Please elaborate, I see equal amounts of evidence for both concepts....

If frogs turn out to have invisible wings we will be faced with explaining why they bust their little slimy butts every time they jump...

So far in this thread all we have is horse feathers being used to support unsupportable assertions about reality and the nature of human dreams, thoughts, and awareness as thought those things are unique to humans and using this collection of horse feathers to say something concrete about reality... nothing used to support more nothing is still nothing... no matter how complex it sounds....

Care to support that with something you haven't pulled from where the sun don't shine? Just what does Puma Punku have to do with either bigfoot, UFOs, or neanderthals?

I'm not going to say i have never given neg rep because I was too lazy to respond but most of the time it's because response simply doesn't work. There are a couple of threads currently ongoing where rational response is being ignored and totally unsupported horse feathers is being used to support unsupportable assertions. I have neg reped a couple of times in those threads once it became obvious that the people replying had no interest in any thing other than the sound of their own key boards.... Actually pos rep can be used to show a negative response as well by supporting someone who is making a rational argument against someone who is nucking futs, far too many good posts get lost in the confusion of batshitcrazy threads and supporting the lone voice in the wilderness is almost as good as neg reping the bad posts... I have posted on "another forum" where the recipient of neg rep gets a notification of who did it and you have to defend your neg rep, puts a bit of a new spin on neg rep... sadly the one time I did neg rep it was due to a misunderstanding and i was flamed big time for it... I run out of pos rep regularly, I like to encourage new people as much as possible and sometimes one thread will use up all my pos rep....

That's really not a bad idea, new members would be at a disadvantage but it would also help make them more aware of the rep system and it's impact. If neg rep impacted on your own rep it might keep people from frivolously giving neg rep. Giving out neg rep should be something you give some thought to, making it impact on the giver seems like a good way to do it. of course giving neg rep when you have no pos rep "in the bank" should result in you receiving neg rep in your account as well, kinda like being over drawn.... I have to admit there have been a few threads that would have tempted me to exhaust my account...

There is no evidence that Neanderthals ever lived in North America, absolutely none... or any other large primate. Just because you haven't seen a mountain lion road kill doesn't mean others have not. I've seen a dead bear on the road, a bob cat, foxes, wolves, snakes almost every day in the summer. Everything, even humans end up as road kill. Highways are a major predator on some animals. I've seen very rare animals turn up as road kill, animals that hadn't been seen in decades, highways kill things, even very rare and secretive things... There are no places big enough to maintain a population of bigfeet left in NA, even extremely secretive rare animals like wolverines are monitored, we can spot warm blooded animals from airplane surveys, we do it regularly. Nothing even close to a bigfoot has ever been seen via infrared even though searches have been done... There is more and better evidence for UFOs being alien space craft than bigfoot evidence.

If you mean spontaneous generation as in complex organisms arising from things like rotting straw then the answer is no. Abiogenesis is the formation of primitive life forms, even more primitive than modern bacteria, from organic chemicals and natural energy sources over time. Many of the chemical pathways toward the formation of primitive life forms can occur naturally, this is the reason i give credence to abiogenesis.

Actually the alcohol is used as a carbon source by bacteria that break down nitrates into nitrogen gas under anaerobic conditions. This was originally done usually done in a container full of gravel that the water is very slowly circulated through so anaerobic conditions would result. The free addition of alcohol to the tank is relatively new and I'm not sure how it works. I was involved in developing this method nearly 35 years ago using deep gravel beds in separate containers. I think it's interesting that it can work when the alcohol is freely administered to the tank. I used several carbon sources when i was first experimenting with this method. Methane worked but was difficult to work with, the chemical added to it make it smell so bad had to be removed, methanol worked too but was difficult to obtain in a pure form, at least that i trusted, ethanol was easiest to use and obtain in pure form... everclear

What really worries me is this tendency for people to not only listen to what they want to hear but for "what they want to hear" to trend toward more and more extreme view points. From my point of view the trend seems to be toward something vaguely resembling conservatism as the person gets older... I am getting older, is this something that that occurs naturally to people as they get older? Does it mean that the view points I had when I was younger will slowly tend to trend toward this vaguely conservative point of view or will my younger self's point of view slowly become written in stone and I will only listen to more extreme versions of my younger self's point of view? How do I continue to adapt my point of view as conditions change and avoid the trap of only paying attention to what I want to hear?

If you are drinking in a bar you can always partake of pickled eggs, pigs feet and pretzels, you know, to supplement the beer...

Much respect Peon, you have chosen to walk the road less traveled, i wish i had the motivation to follow you.

I have been both a follower of this thread and a participant and broken accurately describes some theists as well as some non theists. I am going to use A Tripolation as an example of a relatively reasonable theist, Trip is someone I wouldn't mind living close to, I wouldn't expect him to try and convert me, I doubt he is going to break our laws of civilization to please his god. I don't understand why he believes in a god much less a specific god but I don't see him as part of the set of people who think that his version of God is some sort of all powerful being and no one else's God deserves any respect at all. If all theists were like Trip i doubt we would have been able to maintain this discussion for so many pages. I do wonder how such a reasonable person can maintain his faith in something that has no evidentiary support but as i said he doesn't seem to be one of the my way or die and burn in hell types much less be one of those willing to help anyone who doesn't believe like he does to make that journey to hell... What i am trying to say is that i respect Trip as a person even if i don't respect his beliefs. I could not label Trip as broken or delusional. However there is a set of theists who are broken in a significant way, mostly i attribute this to YECs but even those who who don't worship a book can fall into this category. I divide them in this manner, there is a group of theists who really don't understand why there is even a debate. They have been raised in a virtual vacuum and no real challenge of theism has ever been part of their lives. They simply believe what their religious leaders tell them and seldom if ever attempt to check out the details to see if they line up. I can't call these people broken either, they are simply ignorant and see no reason to even consider gaining knowledge about their ideas about god. I think this group is steadily becoming smaller but at one time they were the largest group. Then there are people who believe despite any problems of reality vs dogma, they seem to think that this is due to our lack of ability to understand and see no reason to pursue knowledge that is not a part of their belief system. They cannot see the connection between science and reality vs dogma and usually think the problem is due to humans lack of enough intelligence to understand the dogma. Then there are people who think that science is flawed and is missing a supernatural reality that cannot be seen and touched, measured or experienced outside of religion. Often these people are quite out spoken but still mostly harmless and other wise reasonable people. Then you have people who genuinely think science is misleading everyone and being used by Satan or some other power to mislead people purposely in an effort to actively oppose god. These people can be dangerous and often they try to impose their beliefs on others. Then you have the people who think that actively lying in support of their dogma is not just ok but demanded by their dogma. They often mislead and misdirect people thinking that winning the battle against science or the negative power that opposes god is more important than any thing else. Yet another group knows they are lying and they do so to make money and gain power. They will lie, cheat, mislead, and distort reality in any way they can to convert people so they can gain money and power. No matter how many times they are shown they are decimating lies they don't care and will continue to do so. I am sure this list can be fused together and broken up in many ways but i see this as a pretty much fundamental break down of types of theists...

As a star collapses into a black hole would it's spin rate increase as it gets smaller? If so is it possible that this spin is what keeps a black hole from collapsing into a one dimensional Point? Over eons wouldn't the spin of a black hole slow down due to friction of it's magnetic field? If so could there be a point in time when the black holes spin can no longer keep it from collapsing further and the black hole would completely vanish from our universe, even gravitationally? My thinking is that at various stages different forces keep a star from collapsing further but as each of these forces is overwhelmed by gravity the mass becomes ever more concentrated, would spin be the last force keeping the black hole from collapsing completely out of our universe? I hope this made some sense, it seemed to be more reasonable until i typed it out...

Great solution to a difficult problem in marine aquarium husbandry... http://saltaquarium.about.com/od/nitratecontrol/a/Reducing-Nitrates-In-Your-Marine-Aquarium-With-The-Vodka-Method.htm

Not sure how to take this one but it looks like human females have been cheating... http://news.yahoo.com/bigfoot-part-human-dna-study-claims-142909433.html

Is it possible to... I want to say imagine... but maybe model is the right word, but can we model a universe with constants different than ours? In a way that can be understood or better yet illustrated?

Would anyone like to discuss the TV show Primeval? I just finished watching the entire series again and i liked it quite a bit. The first time i watched it i completely turned off my disbelief and just watched it as if I believed it all. The second time i watched it with a more critical eye. I found it to be fairly internally consistent and the obvious cultural differences between British and American styles of TV shows was also interesting. Anyone up for a episode by episode discussion of the show?

Probably not... but I tried to scrub it up and it was still there. I haven't bothered to look at it since that night.

I honestly do not understand why a god being would want to be worshiped. It sounds more like what a human would require if they were god. The idea that an all powerful being would need to have his ego stroked like a insecure little boy is difficult to understand

Miser I have tried to take your thread seriously, yes i made fun of you at the beginning due to the fact that your assertions were based on old wives tales and urban legends. You are correct in that studies of the effects of ejaculation seem to be few but after i saw you were serious i provided links that gave real information about the content of semen, These links, had you bothered to read them, would have shown you that semen is a trivial drain on the body. As far as mental effects go doing with out sex causes, me at least, to spend more and more time thinking about sex. My best writings have come to me after a couple of hours engaged in sex. your entire premise is based on urban legends, myths, and old wives tales. Our society is immersed in religion that takes a dim view of any sexual activity that doesn't result in a baby. Yes i understand that not all religious sects have this specific problem but our culture as a whole makes fun of any one who masturbates or admits to it. My grandfather told me that when it comes to masturbation there are two groups of people those who masturbate and those who lie about it. So far you have not provided any credible evidence that masturbation is a bad thing, your assertion that is takes up valuable time that could be spent doing something important is simply a gross exaggeration. Masturbation relieves sexual tension, this is true in both men and women, how often you do it is something you are in control of, your hand never has anything better to do and it doesn't get headaches. masturbation has many good side effects, you can use it to control your own sexual urges and teach your self how to control your orgasms which can make you a better lover. So far you have provided nothing to make me think that masturbation is bad for you, so far all you have are rumors and myths against masturbation based on ancient tales that glorify a mans semen. If you want to go about this scientifically I suggest you stop looking to show masturbation is bad and simply research the effects of masturbation. Go into it with a neutral view point, setting out to prove something you want to be true is not science. In just a cursory search i found lots of info on semen, it's content, how it's made, and many other details about semen. If you had bothered to even google this you would have come up with the same info. I personally get the idea that you are doing nothing but trying to support your own phobia against masturbation, possibly ingrained in you from a religious up bringing or shame and guilt from some other outside source. I know it' seems like something I would say because i am atheist, but it leans more toward my views on personal responsibility. As long as you are not hurting someone else then I see no reason why you shouldn't do it but do some research, i was unable to find any credible source that indicated that masturbation was bad for you at all. I found a few interesting entries on how semen is good for women to ingest orally and vaginally but those articles were undoubtedly written by men.

Since we know the sky of Venus is not black even though it has a 90 bar atmosphere I doubt that at 10 bar the sky would be black.

Now that was classic...