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Argent

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Everything posted by Argent

  1. "I want to work for you. I am happy to do so as an employee or in a freelance role." That said, I would prefer to use consultant or contractor.
  2. The aim is not to convince the professor, but to cast doubt in the minds of those inclined to believe him. There is also the rather important matter of integrity. If we stand to one side and allow the spread of nonsense, some of it dangerous, we are as guilty as the perpetrators. Edit: I listened to about forty five seconds of the recording and had to pause in order to resist vomiting. Rescue341, you have my sincere sympathy. Dealing with chronic stupidity is an arduous and often unrewarded task. When I can get a better audio running I'll seek to offer you some suggestions for more powerful or ordered arguments.
  3. I haven't always been able to foretell the future. It first occurred next Friday.
  4. I get your point. With only minor thought I can figure it out. It is obvious to me that you don't know what you are talking about.
  5. I would not rule out panspermia. In its favour is the comparatively short time between the formation of the Earth and the appearance of the first life. However that could also be considered evidence for the ease with which life begins if the conditions are right. We do not, in my opinion, have sufficient data to distinguish between the two possibilities. That said, regardless of where life began, we have several plausible mechanisms for all, or part of the process. If the next half century produces the same scale of advances in analytical techniques, field data and software simulation as the last half century I would be surprised if we had not got a fairly secure answer. I think it unwise to use the present gaps in out knowledge for definitive speculation. By that I mean your proposal of deliberate seeding of the Earth with primitive cells by some sentient beings is plausible as a speculation, but sufficiently unsupported to be viewed as the most likely speculation.
  6. The key point is surely the one made by imatfaal. Black holes do not need to be incredibly dense. Or am I being incredibly dense.
  7. Surely what you are describing is simply accurate analysis of data to predict the future? Precognition is an awareness of the future ahead of its arrival in the "now". Those are very different things.
  8. I don't rule out the possibility of precognition, but your description of your experiences thus far do not seem to be sound evidence in favour of it. Bender and Strange have pointed out some of the weaknesses. Consequently I am unwilling to speculate on the philosophical implications of something that is almost certainly not happening. However, I will make this prediction: the comments in this thread that doubt that you do experience precognition will not change your mind. If I am correct that won't be precognition, but experience.
  9. And, as far as I can tell from the photos, a metamorphic rock, probably a gneiss. I cannot see any skull like features any where on it William. What you are probably experiencing is the same pattern recognition skill that causes us to see faces in clouds and canals on Mars.
  10. Perhaps this is so. Do you have any evidence for it? And what exactly is a mathematical timeline? How does it differ from a normal timeline? What is it that makes this one well-defined?
  11. Everyone else was doing a fine job of pointing out the OP's deficiencies. I criticised a portion of someone's post for a potential weakness in their style of criticism. Eise was perfectly free to accept or reject that criticism. It was offered in good faith. Ironically, I notice that rather than continue criticising the OP you would rather take potshots at my minor intervention. Note: I have broached my previous statement that I would not comment further on this in this thread, since your forum settings prohibit me from communicating with you by pm.
  12. If I start discussing growing rhododendrons would that represent a thread hijack?
  13. Unfortunately I cannot provide any of the references you are hoping for. I just thought your speculation is a very interesting one and certainly seems plausible. I shall watch this thread with interest to see if anyone has material that would either support or refute it. Epigenetics is a fascinating field, but we probably need to be cautious that we don't overrate its power. (Hence your search for relevant research.)
  14. Apparently my own post lacked precision. I am contrasting your example (the black hole at the centre of the galaxy) where the implicit meaning would typically be evident, with this instance (Eise's response) where the implicit meaning may be ignored by the OP. I've restated my point with slight expansion. The OP has offered a rather garbled and seemingly unsubstantiated speculation. Experience suggests that the authors of such speculation may focus on apparent ambiguities or inconsistencies in any critiques that are offered in order to counter such criticisms. In these cases I believe it is worth taking a little more care and offering a little more precision when making the criticism in order to avoid such a counter attack. At the risk of being censured by the moderator team for an ad hominem here is my point in more robust language. The OP is talking nonsense in the medium of word salad. We shouldn't descend anywhere near this level and therefore should take extra care in how we phrase our criticism. Avoiding absolutes is a good way to start. It was a small aside. I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition. If you, Eise or anyone else wish to continue discussion about it I shall be happy to engage in a dialogue by pm, or in a thread set up for that purpose. I shall not reply further in this thread since the extended discussion is off-topic.
  15. Superficially this appears to be a sound point. I suggest, however, that there is an important distinction between the instance I drew attention to here and the example you have given. In your example, if the statement is in the context of a discussion of galactic structure, or perhaps galactic evolution, then it is wholly reasonable to assume the implied caveat. However, in this instance we are discussing a speculation that, to be charitable, does not easily fit into consensus science. Experience suggests that the authors of such speculation may focus on apparent ambiguities or inconsistencies in any critiques that are offered. In these cases I believe it is worth taking a little more care and offering a little more precision. Perhaps we should now return to the topic of the thread and my apologies to Abnormally Honest for the deviation.
  16. I think precision in language is important. I regret you took offense at the way I made that point. Your proposed solution is flawed, but I don't think either of us should lose any sleep over it.
  17. Acceleration is a rate of increase. So many metres per second increase in velocity for every second that passes. 9.81 metres per second per second. 9.81 m/s2
  18. Get consistently good teachers. Doesn't that assume that the only place you get educated is in school? Do you believe that is the case? What are you testing for? The ability to pass tests? Why stop at 6th grade? Some people are late developers. You want to allow a ten year old to decide their future? You are assuming a strong correlation between psychological maturity and test passing ability. That will do wonders for their self esteem.
  19. Would it not be more accurate to say "All the empirical evidence I am aware of ............"?. The distinction is surely important else you risk being guilty of the logical fallacy, Argument from Ignorance.
  20. Thank you for the reply. I have several additional points and questions. I hope these will help you refine your hypothesis. Mantle Penetration If you argue that the impactor penetrated the mantle you have to be able to demonstrate that. Here is a comment from an early study on the impact event. This study used a range of impactor densities, compositions and velocities. "As we pointed out earlier [Kring, 1995], there is no chemical or isotopic evidence of a mantle component involved in the impact melts produced by the Chicxulub impact event, consistent with the results here that indicate it is unlikely that the mantle was involved." E.Pierazzo et al 'Hydrocode simulation of the Chicxulub impact event and the production of climatically active gases' http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/98JE02496/epdf The authors are not just arguing that the impactor failed to penetrate the mantle, but that "the intensity of the shock decays as it moves away from the impact point, and at the Earth's mantle the maximum shock pressure is not high enough to induce melting in any of the runs, with the exception of the largest impacts, in particular, for the comet ones." What evidence (simulation, field data, logical argument, etc.) can you bring to the table to support your assertion that the impactor penetrated the mantle? I think it would be important that such a demonstration showed that the penetration was quantitatively significant. To anticipate a perfectly reasonable objection you might make - have I cherry picked my research to support a counter argument? No. I selected the first paper I came across that suggested the mantle had not been penetrated. You have obviously already done some extensive reading on the subject. (My own reading on the event is restricted to the book by Alvarez and half a dozen papers.) There may be several research items out there that contradict a twenty year old paper. But if you cannot bring to the table such papers or present other evidence in support of your hypothesis then I fear it will be seen as an interesting idea that failed because of inadequate evidence. Deccan Traps Eruptions You state that when the antipodal " shock waves meet they push magma up through convergent pressure". This was not my understanding of the mechanism proposed for the Deccan Trap eruptions. The Deccan trap eruption began before the impact event and continued after it. There was no "pushing up of magma" but , as phrased in this excellent paper, "a change to the plumbing of the magma chambers". You therefore need to do one of three things. Produce evidence to support your "magma push" mechanism. Accept the current explanations, in which case, while they do not contradict your hypothesis, do not exclude the conventional theory. Propose and demonstrate a mechanism for changing the character of the Deccan Trap eruptions that could only occur as a result of mantle penetration by the impactor. Stylistic Considerations You have put a lot of work into this. I am sure you want to be taken seriously. If you are addressing this hypothesis to a bunch of adolescents who get their science from Discovery Channel documentaries then comparing the Deccan Traps to a zit and talking about assassination are perfect. However, if you wish this to be considered as a genuine contribution to an understanding of events at and around the KT boundary, then you need to lose the graphic candy floss. You say "God help me if this is seized upon by conspiracy theorists. Not sure what I could do to stop that happening tho." Easy - don't give them ammunition to assassinate your idea, exploding it like a giant, thermonuclear zit. Thanks I love planets. Thank you for giving me an opportunity to talk about one. In preparing this reply I've already learned much I didn't know yesterday.
  21. There is quite a lot of detail here. Much of the material, as you note, is a restatement of preexisting ideas. To advance the discussion could you answer two questions: What specific claims are different in your proposal from previous studies? Why have you chosen the anthropomorphic term "assassination"? Assassinations are conscious acts. Use of the word is liable to cause some readers to dismiss your thesis from the outset and disappoint those attracted by the word who hoped for speculation about aliens who play bolide billiards. .
  22. This is a similar concept to the one you have presented. It has been around for a few years.
  23. This is outside my field of expertise (not that I really have one anyway), however this is my reading of it. P.aurelia occupies a niche that overlaps that of the comparison organism. The overlap is small, but it is enough to constrict resources sufficiently that when it comes up against the comparison organism its maximum population level is held to a lower level than when it can access all the resources. In contrast P. caudatum occupies the same niche as the comparison organism. That organism is much more efficient at utilising the resources and so drives P. caudatum towards elimination. As the note on the page says "Identical niches cannot coexist."
  24. Now you have confused me. I understood that the "they" in your question referred to possible magma pools within Mars. If that was what you meant then it is far more than opinion that they were liquid (molten). It is the only explanation for the observation of vast quantities of lava on Mars. Now, you say "they" have an ellipsoid shape. That makes no sense to me. Do you mean the Earth and Mars have ellipsoid shapes? And what is it you are testing with a solid? And what is it you expect to happen?
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