YaDinghus

2 hours ago, iNow said:

Right now, in July 2018, when you google the word “IDIOT,” Donald Trump is the first result. Try it also on google images.

I’m not kidding. Try it. 

Confirmed. Though it says now that Trump said Einstein was an idiot...

5 minutes ago, SamCogar said:

2 hours ago, YaDinghus said:

Have you been to college?

Yes I have.

I was awarded an AB Degree with a Major in the Biological Sciences and a Minor in the Physical Sciences, ….. @ GSC in 63'.

2 hours ago, YaDinghus said:

He properly cited research papers from established anthropology articles and books

2 hours ago, SamCogar said:

And you accepted that as a literal fact without questioning your instructor's wild accusations that he/she would have no knowledge whatsoever about the daily life of Neolithic hunter/gathers.   

Still shooting your own leg.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_affluent_society

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At the time of the symposium new research by anthropologists, such as Richard B. Lee's work on the !Kung of southern Africa, was challenging popular notions that hunter-gatherer societies were always near the brink of starvation and continuously engaged in a struggle for survival. Sahlins gathered the data from these studies and used it to support a comprehensive argument that states that hunter-gatherers did not suffer from deprivation, but instead lived in a society in which "all the people's wants are easily satisfied."

I ain't got the time or the inclination to look for all the relevant sources my professor used back in the day, but the wikipedia article should give you an idea of the concept

31 minutes ago, mistermack said:

No, we've jumped from fire use to inventions to leisure time. 

Going back to fire, though, I think it's very relevant to cave dwelling. I am personally convinced that the big attraction of a cave was the ease of keeping a fire going for long periods, which was surely a lifesaver to Neanderthals. If you picture the problems that they faced, in the absence of a cave, in keeping a fire going 24/7 in the very worst winter weather, you can get an idea of what difference a cave would make.

It's so easy for us to throw wood in a shed, it's hard to imagine what it would be like for them. Your fuel could be soaking wet for weeks on end, and there can be torrential storms that would blow your fire away, and douse it. A cave makes it all so much easier. No high winds, no downpours, and your stored firewood dries out fairly rapidly.

If they had the technology to light fires at will, then caves wouldn't be so vital. But it seems to be highly unlikely that they did. It's more likely that, if they lost their fire, they would have some technique of carrying smouldering embers, so they could maybe send someone to the next settlement, to get fire, and carry it back long distances as a smokey bundle, eventually getting fire restarted at home.

Well, I rather meant what exactly irish people/people of irish descent specifically do in their leisure time is beside the point of this thread since destilling alcohol to high concentrations wasn't a widespread technology 175000 years ago ;-)

It is quite likely that H. Heidelbergensis who are the likely antecedents of H. Neanderthal and possibly H. Sapien's and H. Neandertal's latest common ancestor, already knew how to construct shelters of organic materials, which could keep a fire safe, since caves were notoriously dangerous because of Cave Bears. That doesn't mean early humans wouldn't have ever used caves for their convenience, and even long term habitation once they were sure that no dangerous predators lurked within. So technically I'm not contradicting you, just opening up more avenues for the debate

5 minutes ago, mistermack said:

And that was in the summer. The winters are long with short days, and the enforced leisure time can last weeks on end. Not that they sat around all the time, they would find things to do, as most people do.

I have Irish ancestry, so I have a pretty good idea of what they might have done during their forced leisure time ;-) . This is, however, somewhat beside the point of this thread

31 minutes ago, SamCogar said:

And you accepted that as a literal fact without questioning your instructor's wild accusations that he/she would have no knowledge whatsoever about the daily life of Neolithic hunter/gathers.  

Have you been to college? The first thing we learned was to TAKE NOTHING AT FACE VALUE. He properly cited research papers from established anthropology articles and books. Alas, it's more than 10 years ago, so no, I can't recall the sources my professor referenced.

But you trying to discredit my very renowned college professor is a pathetic tactic. I mean, seriously...

14 hours ago, mistermack said:

I don't think it's a lack of free time that stifles invention. It's resistance to change, which seems to be an inherited part of the human character. 

When I was a kid, I used to go to my Uncle's farm in Ireland in the school holidays. I was amazed at how some things were done, and would make suggestions that I knew would be better, but there was no chance of getting my uncle or grandfather to change. They were absolutely determined that that is how we've always done it, and we're not going to change now. That was more than fifty years ago, times have changed now. We're swamped with new inventions, and people see the value in them every day so it's almost a different world now.

You might also have the influence of religion and spirits in ancient times. There might be ritual involved in flint knapping, or fire making, and mystic communication with the ancestors. To change it might be the equivalent of religious heresy.

I'd say resistance to change is pretty much a universal principle (compare to inertia - the resistance to change direction and velocity of movement).

From an economic point of view, it makes sense to keep practises that have worked well so far and implement changes carefully (it doesn't make sense however to keep the old ways when the new ways are established as producing better results).

Also I am not aware of any ritualistic practises in prehistoric toolmaking. I wouldn't outright reject the idea, though. Ritualisation is a powerful tool for conveying ideas across generations, and aspects of this can be identified in many traditional crafts and trades. 

8 minutes ago, SamCogar said:

Like the people of yesteryears, the people of today who are forced to spend most of their awake hours just trying to stay alive, ….. really don’t have any idle time to be thinking about inventing something.

I'd like to see your source on that.

Back in the day in anthropology classes, especially in prehistoric economy, we learned that hunter/gatherers only need(ed) to spend 2-4 hours a day on average to get the food they needed to do more than survive. The hardest part about surviving was knowing how to treat severe injuries and avoid food poisoning...

On 7/16/2018 at 5:05 PM, Moontanman said:

Ummm Mormyrids? 

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the cerebellum (part of the brain) is greatly enlarged, giving them a brain to body size ratio similar to that of humans (though other sources give the brain/body proportion as 'similar to that of birds and marsupials'

from the Wikipedia article on Mormyrids.

It's quite impossible to say how intelligent Neanderthals really were. Tissue conservation techniques weren't exactly advanced around 40ka ago, so we can't examine the brain of a "true" Neanderthal for differences in the internal arhitecture between Neaderthals and Sapiens. Also we couldn't really examine how an ancient Sapien would do on a modern IQ test, because you can't see cultural evolution in a brain, either. 

Edit: Wow I totally missed the 2nd page...

Iron Maiden - Speed of Light

On 6/8/2015 at 11:53 AM, Sorcerer said:

That was pointed out the theory only describes the universe from a time of 10^-49 seconds onwards (according to what Mordred posted before). But the reasoning that lead to the creation of the idea, inevitably leads to the crossing of spacetime at the origin, where it has no volume and is infinitely dense.

 

This logical consequence was abandoned because we lack the tools to describe it with our current knowledge. But that doesn't necessarily mean it isn't what happened before that. It doen't necessarily mean it is either, however that would be the conclusion from the reasoning which first created the theory.

 

The fact that you need to give a time of 10^-49 seconds, implies that time before it.

I wouldn't get hung up on the fact that it's 10^-49 seconds that defy our current understanding of physics. Also, Big Bang is an historic misnomer

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He coined the term "Big Bang" on BBC radio's Third Programmebroadcast on 28 March 1949. It was popularly reported by George Gamov and his opponents that Hoyle intended to be pejorative

From Wikipedia - Fred Hoyle.

But this term has lead many people to imagine the beginnig of the universe as an explosion from a single point.

But now just imagine that you could appoint an infinitely large amount of numbers to every real number. Every real number here is a single point, on a scale consisting of an infinite amount of points. Our observable universe might have sprung from a single point, but it needn't have been the only point that was there at the "beginning", so even though this point would be special to our observeable universe, it would be utterly insignificant among a lot of insignificant points, and the cosmological principle would continue to hold

I thought it was something everyone can do. Now I feel weird(er)...

On 9/22/2017 at 5:12 PM, Sensei said:

I am great fan of solar panels. I would use them everywhere, if I could, and only after exhausting accumulators use regular power supply.

Bill Nye saves the world, S1E1: one of the panelists, an engineer, claims the entire world energy consumption could be covered completely with regenerative energy. We have the technology and the resources. And it would only cost a few hundred billion dollars. The Gross World Product is in the vicinity of 100 trillion dollars. If we consider that it will take 10-20 years to realize this if we commit to this, it would be a negligible fraction of our global economic power.

Since I'm in charge of music today at work, I put on the AC/DC collection

On 10/3/2013 at 11:05 PM, s1eep said:

You can't imagine a square circle, that's illogical. The only things you can imagine are life alike things, since that is where your pool of knowledge comes from. If you can imagine it, it is possible, because the universe(s) is without limit. It is infinite, if you can build a mental picture of something, it is likely it is already in the universe, since the universe is much greater than you and probably had a similar thought. You may even create it, the universe(s) are so massive that they have infinite dimensions- each move you make is but a ripple in space-time, creating possibilities for future events. Your imagination, with the correct powers, could create life. It is in that much harmony with the universe; if you try to imagine a square circle you cannot but if you try to imagine a dragon you can; that's because it is more life alike. That was a illogical example.

I just imagined a 'square circle', but it's kind of a stretch of the term 'square'. Bear with me: squares and circles are two-dimensional geometric forms, naturally. A circle is a cornerless object with all points being the same distance from the centet. Cornerlessness means there is no continuity break in the direction of the line drawn, a circle graph has a continuous derivative, while a square, having corners, doesn't. This is a very big problem in making a square circle. In euclidian geometry.

Even in non-euclidian space, the definitions of square and circle must hold. A circle remains a continuous loop with all points equidistant from the center, only the circumference-diameter ratio changes. A square remains four enclosing sides (straight lines) of equal length touching at their ends under the same angle. What changes in non-euclidian geometry is the angle under which the ends of these lines touch. To make the square a circle, we need to create a warped plane on which the sides of the square meet so they form a continuous loop instead of corners.

One example of making a square a circle under these conditions is the equator of a sphere