Moontanman

In my area home schooling usually means "white people" teaching their kids creationism, and keeping their kids away from black kids but far and away it's the religion part than has driven the home school craze. We do have a couple of private schools here who tout they give a good christian education to their students I don't know what a christian education is but when i was in grade school, public school, they actually taught that Noah's ark was real and i was punished for not swallowing the fairy tales of the bible but that was 50 years ago....

Isn't hydrogen and fluorine, when reacted together, the most power reaction for chemical rocket engines?

"double face palm"

Plasma is ionized gas, I'm not sure what you are suggesting by plasma is information in a light ray...

I would like to add one thing, while not a professional I have raised two boys into really good young men (some of that has to reflect on me ) I would like to say, and this echos what some one else said, i think it's getting up in the night when everyone else is asleep that is really the point of her nightly forays. Getting up when everyone else is asleep is quite exciting for a child, gives them a sense of power or possibly even scares them a little bit but they know such fear is harmless since mom and dad are really just a shout away. One of my boys would get up in the middle of the night at around that age and play with his toys, very quietly, or sometimes sneak a snack or turn on the TV but we lived in a small house and i am a light sleeper so i knew about his wanderings most of the time and I would always get up and take him back to bed although a few times he would get up and come into our room and he would wake me up to come and see something he had built with legos. It seemed to be mostly be waking up and being bored with laying in bed that motivated him. Of course as teen he tried to sneak out of the house a few times and he found dad was difficult to sneak past but that was a short lived phenomena as well.

Ummm, did we forget a link to what ever you are talking about?

Is that a fact? I suggest you open another thead and we'll discuss the idea "it can't be answered"....

mississippichem, I'm betting he does or will at some point.... In the USA the main problem is that some people want to out law abortion and keep the knowledge of birth control from the very people who are having unwanted pregnancies, it's a catch 22 with profound repercussions, if you want to end the need for abortions then you need to teach something other than don't do "it" because believe it or not sex is fun and even if it weren't fun we are still programmed genetically to have sex, once past puberty our hormones scream SEX SEX SEX but society says NO NO NO, this is not helping anyone....

Uh oh, I am getting a "reveled truth" here yes... it's coming in clear now... truth be told is in reality.... drum roll please... naw too easy.....

There are some hypothesis's that go in that direction, personally if I had to predict i would say the beginning of life was a synergy of more than one process, quite possibly several, lots of good videos on you tube that cover possible avenues of abiogenics. here is a good one... http://www.youtube.com/user/potholer54#p/c/DB23537556D7AADB/3/v8nYTJf62sE

The big rip as you call it does not have anything to do with your bible verse as i pointed out the first time you posted it nor is it mainstream science nor does it qualify as theory, your misrepresentation of both science and religion is weak and fails....

Growing old is not a bad thing, it certainly beats the hell out of the alternative! Yes your physical health and well being does slowly degrade but being active prevents much of that, the most important thing is knowledge and experience. It's really important to point out that your real age is how you feel inside and inside I am still 17, outside I am 56, most of my problems come from being severely injured a few times not old age. Keep your mind young, body active, and hang out with people of all ages to keep your perspective new and getting old is a wonderful trip into the unknown.... Seventeen To be seventeen again was once my fondest wish To know what I know now and be so young but not so foolish To feel the fire in my veins and no fear in my chest To ride my motorcycle like I was destined to the be the best To be able to watch the young girls through eyes not filtered by guilt Majorettes marching at a half time show and not feel I should not notice how they are built To walk the halls of my old high school and know how important the classes To know how going to college would have changed my life, my choices, forever To have the nerve to ask the prettiest girl to the prom, knowing what to say at every turn. To be serious when it was necessary and to have fun when I could and not try to act so stern To savor every moment as if it were the last because as I know now each moment was To know that cool was just being who you were and not doing what everyone else does But now at fifty six, I look back and I would settle for reliving those days as ignorant as I was then To live wild and free and be not be burdonded by what was to be in the future when Maybe just a touch of self confidence would be nice, less introverted, less afraid I could ride my motorcycle and not worry about what was yet to be, or the life I had made Yet in my heart I can relive all the joys and sorrows of that time, even as they fade from my mind All I have to do is think of the special things and it all becomes clear, the memories easy to find At fifty on the outside in my heart I am still seventeen, still wanting to party with songs unsung But my outside marks me as old, not to be trusted; I was guilty of the same when I was young Michael

Arete, normally i try to shy away from "me too" posts but in this case your answer was so good i have to say ME TOO..... Why do you feel the need to do such a rude thing? If your religion is so wonderful it should be readily apparent and all the proselytizing would be unnecessary, people would seek you out, the very need to convert seems to indicate, to me at least, a flawed world view... I know several people who are neo-pagans, they have large celebrations at certain times of the year and get together regularly to pay homage to their goddess but even though there are an amazing number of them to find them you have to seek them out. They do not proselytize, see no reason to convert anyone, if you cannot see their world view then they would rather you just went on. Now this doesn't make them or their world any more correct than yours but at least they are not rudely pushing their world view from ever street corner and beating down my door to convince me that Adriana wants me to worship her every full moon.... I don't know what to say to that, how many enjoy such a rude intrusion into their lives? .001%? This behavior seeks to take advantage of troubled people and only offer a more troubling world view as an answer.... And you have a right to believe those "truths" but asserting to others they are true without evidence is disingenuous at the very least. The reality behind looking hard enough means you fool your self into believing something that has no evidence so you fit in with everyone else who is involved in that belief system. I would be the first to say that things other than religion have caused men to do terrible things but I disagree that nothing is done about it, in fact a religious society tends to over look bad things done by others of their belief system and to jump on those who do not share their beliefs so i would say that religion is less likely to do something about terrible things.... The will to live is quite strong in most living things but if the after life of your belief system is so great why do you do everything in your power to stay "alive" why not hasten your departure from this world to the next, why get medical care? Doing dangerous things must be no problem for people who really believe they are going to heaven.... Ok, here is a real disconnect, you are not experiencing true Christianity, what you see as Christianity is in reality a gelded version of Christianity, gelded by secular law, without those controls in place It is difficult to see much difference between Christianity and Islam. Then I have misjudged you.... So all the rape, murder, pillage, genocide, and slavery doesn't bother you in the least? That's quaint, but you are still part of a huge over all system of obtaining money, George Carlin put it best when he said god can't handle money, he always needs Money, if god is real why does he need money? Gold should appear inside his church when his people need it. But more to the point being a member of a small church is no better or worse than being a member of a huge evangelical circus called a mega church.... Interesting in what way?

What I wouldn't give to be 20 again! I feel like my prime was around 25 or so.... which is about 30 years ago

I can say i had eerily similar problems and they got so bad i passed out in my yard while mowing grass. It turned out i had very high blood pressure, please see your doctor, it is not difficult to correct but death is permanent, please see a doctor about this....

This relationship could have undoubtedly started many ways, one way that comes to mind is that some insect at some point was eating pollen from plants, the insects would inadvertently occasionally transfer pollen to another plant. the plants benefited from this and the plants that best attracted the insects benefited more so. this is a positive feed back loop, probably happened relatively fast.... thousands of generations might have resulted in a perceptively better relationship, millions of generations could account for what we see now... btw lots of insects pollinate plants and take advantage of this relationship, i doubt it evolved first in bees but bees could have exploited already present plant blossoms.

Panspermia still implies a beginning, if it happened once near the beginning of the universe why does that have to be the only time? Again, if it happened once why not twice or billions of times? This is just absolute speculation, no better than the spaghetti monster did it.... Who says humans are necessarily the sole result of evolution? I would be willing to assert that many intelligent life forms have arisen through the process of evolution...

Brainteaserfan, you do not strike me as a fundamentalist, I would even go as far as to suggest you are more of a live and let live type person, by many peoples definition a "reasonable man" I never fear a reasonable man, you can disagree with a reasonable man and the worst that can happen (if you are both reasonable men) is that you have to agree to disagree. Sadly religion seems geared to produce unreasonable men when it is allowed too much power, religion, the main Abramhamic ones at least, are told to convert everyone, they don't just feel an obligation to convert you, they think it's their right to do so.... Think of it from my point of view, everywhere I turn religion is shoved in my face, billboards, print ads, tv, radio, street corner preachers, aggressive asshole street corner preachers, and FAMILY but my personal favorite is door to door preachers... Oh yes, Saturday morning after Church the emerge, knocking on my door, confronting me in my yard, wanting to know if I've heard the good news... The other day, the thought flashed through my mind that the "real good news" (for them) is that I am prohibited by law from shooting trespassers on sight.. That really bothered me, normally I am a no confrontation sort of person, i do my best to avoid confrontation as much as possible and violence rarely solves anything, generally it just shuffles the problem to the future. But that thought did make me smile, not because I wanted to do it but because in our country (in this day and time) knocking on my door is the worst they can do. Sadly as we know religion can inspire people to do much worse to anyone who refuses to convert. "No real Christian" would ever harm you for not converting? No real Scotsman? Religion breeds intolerance, bigotry, and arrogance. Aristarchus in Exile was a good example of this, his arrogance in his assumptions that the only reason I or we hadn't converted yet was because we weren't looking hard enough or we hadn't been looking long enough. This is yet another idea brought about by someone at least well known around the 16th or 17th century, i just can't remember the name, but in essence what he said was if you don't believe you need to pretend you do and eventually the belief will come. To me that idea is just intolerable.. Then you get to the actual creationists, they actually ascribe to the belief that no matter how obvious the disconnect between reality and religion is, religion always trumps reality (and it's ok to lie to support your religion). While this is disturbing I honestly feel they do indeed have the right to believe what ever they want but that's not enough for them, they want their religious belief and it's written word to be taught as science, not just to their children (which is a problem) but to everyone else's, this is unacceptable, but more disturbing is the lengths they will go to support their religion, half truths, misrepresentation, out right fabrications, anything to further their world view and to make sure it is the only world view. They believe their holy book must be 100% literally true, ever read it? If actually reading the bible doesn't give you pause to assume it is literally 100% true then you are probably part of the problem. So is their a war? Yes, no doubt and the final shots are far from being fired, if everyone was reasonable and your beliefs were yours and you felt no need to convert by any means anyone who disagreed with you then there would not a be culture war, maybe not even a concept of such a thing. I am not just picking on Christians other religions have their fundamentalists who deny reality, Islam is a hot bed of creationism, Hindus, Seiks, Zoastrianism (sp) and I think the Jews have their own version as well. Some of these creation myths are similar others are totally different and involve totally different gods. Religion always involves coercion, you have to believe or suffer some sort of punishment... This is blackmail in it's most basic form, believe what I do or suffer eternal torment, science only offers evidence for reality... and requires no worship, no money to build more and grander churches so that more people can be converted. Religion uses it's money to help people you say? Yes, after the expenses of the Church is met, after multi-million dollar mega churches are built, after the evangelical preachers get their grand estates and yachts, incredibly expensive cars, yes some of the money get to the poor and needy but no one knows how much.... Rationalists must win this war, not because they are right but because they allow others to be wrong.....

So if we are both traveling at the same speed we can communicate faster than light?

Doesn't this set a rather low bar for defining a miracle?

Which god? Is a human god to the bacteria living inside him? Please elaborate....

I think it should be noted here that birds, flying birds, are indeed puffed up and much lighter than they appear. Besides having hollow bones their feathers make them look big and do cause the over all bird to be much less dense than it would be if the whole bird was as dense as it would be if it was "that" size and not covered with feathers. Feathers are a lot like being puffed up by air, the surface of the feathers makes the entire bird a lifting body almost as though it was full of air. I wouldn't be surprised if a birds feathered surface area was more than twice it's surface area without feathers but only at a cost of a small percentage of weight.

Can you elaborate? Considering the idea that there is no universal reference frame or are you saying there is a universal reference frame?

No, ID is not within the realms of conventional physics, if you disagree I would love to hear how it can be... I can understand being skeptical but where does assistance come from if not the supernatural? Not at all, neither is impossible, one is naturalistic the other is supernatural, supernatural is not impossible it just has no basis in reality...