Thread: middle east again...

  1. #136
    Registered User seditee's Avatar
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    if we could send a telescope millions of light years away from us...in a short amount of time...rather than millions of years...we would be able to see what happened last month...you think? if it was stationed at the proper distance...& the images could be sent back to us at the proper speed...much faster than the speed of light...a thousands times faster.
    lebios

  2. #137
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "Cylde your complete thought that since god knows what you are going to do you don't have free will has a slight problem. Someone that is all knowing would now all the paths. In your example of picking fruit from a tree they would know the result of picking the fruit and not picking fruit"

    Oh indeed God can know all the paths, but he CANNOT know which one you will choose.

  3. #138
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "For your information, Clyde, the quoted excerpt is from a scientist named Steven Jay Gould. A fairly eminent one, I believe "

    You think that Gould does not think the fossil record shows evidence for evolution!!!!?

    Err.. i think he would have a little something to say about that.

    "If it aint broke dont fix it? What is "broke" supposed to mean? Are you telling me that, for example, Drosophila has reached an endpoint in its evolutionary process? Organisms can always improve. "

    There is no such thing as "improve" organisms can adapt to their environment, if their environment has remained constant for thousands of years and other-factors do not get involved (some environments never result in zero selective pressure even if the environment is constant, like a classical predictor-prey relationship), then the result can be zero selective pressure.

    "What perhaps you dont realize (unless you left it out) is that the original flap of skin, the result of a random mutation, does not confer any advantage whatsoever on its bearer."

    WRONG, it does confer an advantage, it confers greater air resitance, meaning you can fall further without injury, ever seen "flying" squirils?

    "To be functional, a wing has to relatively fully developed"

    Wrong: See flying squirils.

    "Take a good look at the last sentence. Basically, the experiment is set up so that harmful mutations cannot occur, but it is well known that most mutations are deleterious! "

    I suggest you read my explanation of evolution; harmfull mutations DO occur but they get REMOVED from the gene pool, because they are selected against. Hence the results of the program are NOT altered by the fact they ignore negative mutaitons, negative mutations do not get passed on.

    Want to know why cystic fibrosis exists? Because it is an advantage in certain environments: It confers resistance to Cholera, want to know why cycle-cell anemia exists? Because its an advantage in certain environments: It confers resistance to Malaria. In environments without cholera and malaria both these mutations are selected against, meaning that IF 1) The gene pool were closed off, ie. people in Malarial/Cholera environments were unable to mate with people not in malarial/Cholera environments then gradually the gene would gradually fall out of the non-cholera/malerial gene pool (though modern medicine slows this kind of process down a lot- and no that can not in any-way be constrewed as an argument for letting people die, as some nut-cases like to think)
    Last edited by Clyde; 05-04-2002 at 12:23 PM.

  4. #139
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "Where did the space for the universe come from?"

    Big bang

    "Where did matter come from?"

    See question 1

    "Where did the laws of the universe come from (gravity, inertia, etc.)? "

    See question 1

    "How did matter get so perfectly organized?"

    What? The laws physics ie. see question 2

    "Where did the energy come from to do all the organizing?"

    What? An nonsense statement, the "organising" as you call it, is just a result of the laws of physics. The energy in the universe, orgininated like everything else with the big-bang

    Incidently I know what's coming, your going to ask what/who made the big bang, which is an invalid question, TIME began with the big bang, hence there was no before, hence there cannot have been a "cause". Further more the question is doubly invalid, since our rules of causality are infact reflections of the laws of physics, hence applying them to the big-bang which created those laws is invalid.

    It might not "seem" right (and incidently there is no solution that can ever "seem" right, because you will always have a point that is irreducible), but that's because our brains are ........-poor at dealing with anything outside our immediate experience, that is why Quantum mechanics also "seems" wrong, (and no, it blatantly is not wrong).

    Not only that but substituting God into the equation; saying God made the big-bang solves NOTHING since you still have an irreduceable point: God.

    Effectively you introduce a theory (God made the Big-bang) with no evidence that explains nothing. (ooh, sounds like a Creationist theory to me!)

    "When, where, why, and how did life come from dead matter?"

    Not sure, when.... 1-2 billion years ago? Why? ...... laws of physics again. How? There was a huge chemical soup of organic materials on the Earth millions and millions of chemical reactions were occuring, one such reaction created a molecule that could self-replicate; the precursor to DNA.

    "With what did the first cell capable of sexual reproduction reproduce? "

    It did with all the other cells that were "nearly" reproducing sexually, as with everything in evolution, reproduction did not jump from binary fission to sexual reproduction it does so in steps. I can give you an EXTREMELY simplified version of events: First you got two haploid cells biding together so each could perform a specialised function that benefited itself and its neighbour, then you got integration of the pair, removal of the parting membrane, voila diploid cell, but of course the cell still divides as if it were two haploid cells; meiosis(ish), so what happens is that the cell divides into two, and then each new sub-cell pairs up with the first free sub-cell it finds forming a new diploid cell, then comes the mixing of the two haploid genetic material. And voila sexual reproduction.

    "These are only a few of the questions that I have come up with that evolution cannot explain."

    All your above questions except for sexual reproduction have nothing whatsoever to do with evolution, and can be "explained" anyway.

    <1) The wing, starts of as a flap of skin which grows, gains muscle, and bone, and voila a wing. >

    This has never been documated, nor has it ever been found in geological digs, no proof of this theory exsists"

    Really? Funny the paelentologists, and biologists seem to disagree.
    Last edited by Clyde; 05-04-2002 at 12:12 PM.

  5. #140
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "NONliving matter is dead matter. When something isn't living, it is dead. "

    WRONG, dead things were once alive, non-living things were never alive.

    "1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. "

    The evidence supporting this is...?

    "2 The same was in the beginning with God."

    See statement 1

    "3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. "

    See statement 1

    "4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men."

    See statement 1

    "5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. "

    See statement 1

    "6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John."

    See statement 1

    "7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe."

    See statement 1

    "8 He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light."

    See statement 1

    "9 That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."

    See statement 1

    "10 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. "

    See statement 1


    "God was in the beggining, he always was, is, and always will be. "

    See statement 1

  6. #141
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "if we could send a telescope millions of light years away from us...in a short amount of time...rather than millions of years...we would be able to see what happened last month...you think? if it was stationed at the proper distance...& the images could be sent back to us at the proper speed...much faster than the speed of light...a thousands times faster"

    Theoretically, yes.

  7. #142
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    Because creationism hasn't got a scrap of evidence in its favour, neither does it have any derived theory nor testable hypothesis whatsoever, there is very little you can question about it

    (you cannot question a nonexistant theory: Mad person says: I believe there is an invisable, untouchable goat standing next to me...... atheists says: Uhhhh why? Mad person says: Because its there!.... atheists says: Ok then, back to the institute for you):

    But there are a few points (they are wholely unnesessary considering the trully gargantuan amount of evidence supporting evolution anyway):

    If evolution did not occur, then why exactly are the genetic throwbacks? Men have nipples, there are fish at the bottom of the ocean with eyes that do not work, there are huge sections of "junk" DNA.

    Evolution not only explains them but actually predicts their presence.

    And why the hell are their extinct species anyway? Millions of species were made extinct well before man turned up, guess they were God's first attempts that went wrong eh?
    Last edited by Clyde; 05-04-2002 at 12:07 PM.

  8. #143
    What is this concept of "need"? Organisms do not "need" to improve. And there are no circumstances where organisms do the equivalent of telling their genes "Alright, boys. You can stop mutating now. I'm adapted to my environment!" Are you trying to tell me that the common fruit fly is perfectly adapted? That there have been no possible positive mutations in the last 200 or so million years?
    Doh... The "need" I was refering too is what Clyde has already described (in great detail) to you as "selective pressure". Nothing is 'telling' their genes anything. They dont ever stop mutating per se, either. And for the nth time: Organisms are not reaching for perfection! *swears under breath* The mutations are only going to become common if the effect of the mutation has a posative effect on the organisms ability to survive. Mutations with a negative effect on the organisms survival are wont to disapear. Random mutations with no specific benefit/loss are also likely to disapear.

    Simply put: If creature 'x' has adapted to run faster than its main predator 'y' then any further mutation on the part of 'x' that caused it to run even faster or any other mutation relating to escaping predator 'y', then said mutation is not likely to spread as its benefit has no effect on the survival of creature 'x'.
    "There's always another way"
    -lightatdawn (lightatdawn.cprogramming.com)

  9. #144
    "if we could send a telescope millions of light years away from us...in a short amount of time...rather than millions of years...we would be able to see what happened last month...you think? if it was stationed at the proper distance...& the images could be sent back to us at the proper speed...much faster than the speed of light...a thousands times faster"
    Not theory; fact. If the images could be relayed back to us instantly, and the image was taken at the afformentioned 'million light years away' then the time would be looking at would not be 'a month' it would be exactly 1 million years ago. Hence the name 'light year'. The distance light travels in 1 year. This is a very important tool used to increase our understanding of the universe as we can look at stars 100 million light years away and thus are able to see the universe as it was 100 million years ago. The farther away we look, the farther back in time we can see.
    "There's always another way"
    -lightatdawn (lightatdawn.cprogramming.com)

  10. #145
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "Not theory; fact. "

    =), i only said theoretically, because the light at that distance would be so diffuse, that in practice to actually see stuff happening on Earth you would need a telescope billions upon billions upon billions times more accurate than anything we have at the moment (and I have a sneaking suspicion that a telescope that powerfull is theoretically impossible - could be wrong on that though)

  11. #146
    Registered User seditee's Avatar
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    Thumbs down

    tarazi - plo legal advisor? ahahahaha...sick. he wants the US to send troops to conquer our ally....israel. we'll never put troops in that region for any reason...it's a set up. the israelis can handle that little corner of the world.

    & about the super telescope: nothing is impossible...


    Last edited by seditee; 05-04-2002 at 12:21 PM.
    lebios

  12. #147
    >>sneaking suspicion that a telescope that powerfull is theoretically impossible

    But if it were in space then it could be as large as needed. Of course to get the kind of magnitude required would be the impossible part.

    "The 18,000'th mile of the scope was built today. Supplies are running a little low..."
    "There's always another way"
    -lightatdawn (lightatdawn.cprogramming.com)

  13. #148
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "But if it were in space then it could be as large as needed. Of course to get the kind of magnitude required would be the impossible part"

    Maybe, I was thinking more on the lines of the intesity being so low that cosmic fluctuations ("empty" space does funky things) would make the errors involved too large to be usefull.

    Though, it would be quite cool to have a moon-size telescope orbiting the Earth =)

  14. #149
    The Earth is not flat. Clyde's Avatar
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    "& about the super telescope: nothing is impossible... "

    Plenty of things are impossible, human beings do not have magic powers, we are constrained by the laws of physics.

    It is impossible for example for me to flap my arms so fast that i take off.
    Last edited by Clyde; 05-04-2002 at 12:43 PM.

  15. #150
    >>It is impossible for example for me to flap my arms so fast that i take off.

    Come on, Clyde. Think happy thoughts!


    >>"empty" space does funky things

    True. That would be due to the fact that (as your quotes imply), space isnt really all that empty.

    >>Though, it would be quite cool to have a moon-size telescope orbiting the Earth =)

    Heck, yes. Think of what could be done with that.... nice.


    >>we are constrained by the laws of physics

    And sadly, it seems only a few of us understand this.
    "There's always another way"
    -lightatdawn (lightatdawn.cprogramming.com)

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