Peterkin

Thank you!!! I would so like to believe that!

Back off, everybody! Sloooowly... He used The Big Bad Name. And now you must all stop eating ham, because it was oer of Hitler's favourite foods.

Only if you learn facts and the methods of scientific investigation at school. If you discover the scientific method all by yourself, I guess you're not indoctrinated by the village, but the down-side is, you have to start with the knowledge-base of 6000 BCE.

Better than what? In biology, which you consider irrelevant to biological taxonomy, you appear appallingly ignorant. Of paleontology, you seem entirely ignorant. As regards evolutionary theory, you appear misguided. Your knowledge of science appears to be spotty wikipedia readings. Your perception of atheism is skewed in ways I can't even fathom. *sigh!* another one of those

One little oddity about that rape and murder business and the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faiths: the holy book is full of god-recommended rapes and murders. Someone might be tempted to criticize that. Someone might be tempted to criticize the long bloody history of past ones, of Christians and Muslims imposing their own punitive, screwed-up morality on populations that had their own well-functioning social organization, and their campaigns to do so again with modern populations. Someone might be tempted to point out the immense wealth of the churches. Lilies of the field, they are not.

Not to biological taxonomy, it isn't! There are lots of other classifications and categories that work very well when discussing those other subjects. But if you attempt to transpose the terminology of one discipline into another discipline, you're speaking gibberish. As illustrated here. You can always take refuge in either the biblical version or the extraterrestrial school of thought. Just don't try to discuss it with scientists. Yes, and then....? What? god filled in the gaps with his magic crayon? It begs nothing: it merely demonstrates an equally willful ignorance of automobiles, a sub-group of motorized wheeled vehicles, a subgroup of wheeled vehicles, a subgroup of transport. You can create a system of categorizing everything in the world according to horsepower, but it would be meaningless without reference to how the horsepower is being used.

You can choose to call humans whatever you wanted, it wouldn't change the biology. You can classify any way you want, but will make no scientific sense. You can give any designation to like to any group and agree on that designation among your friends, but it won't help you communicate with anyone outside of that circle.

It is taught in schools, not as a single statement, but a body of knowledge: evidence painstakingly collected, assessed and compared over two hundred plus years of scientific endeavour. Outside of classrooms, there is also a considerable scholarly and popular literature on the subject, as well as accessible video presentations. That's not 'indoctrination'; that's education. He and many other scientists, with the aid of their well documented observations and sample collections, made a comprehensive theory out of disparate observations that had previously amounted to nothing more than opinion. That the simple observation of similarities supports the same conclusion further reinforces the soundness of the theory. That would be Genesis. Certainly, that book has been translated many times, but it has also been closely monitored by biblical scholars. But what has this to do with evolution? Only attackers of evolutionary theory say that. To those who understand it, there is nothing random about natural selection. Competition in nature is a fact; it doesn't require advocacy. Do you have the remotest idea what you're talking about? Classification is not arbitrary; it's systematic and logical. And your objection to atheists using taxonomy to count humans among the great apes who share 94-96% of our DNA, is.... what exactly? I very much doubt any atheist would hire a bonobo for an administrative position or engage in a philosophical debate with a gorilla - we're pretty much aware of the differences.

That's a personal view of art, yes. The similarities between the model and the porn actor seem to end at how they are judged, and do not encompass how they are treated or what they are required to do for a living. Still, I do not dispute that it's a version of reality that some people enjoy.

yea: Therefore, I didn't condemn art and sex education books, nude beaches or love scenes in a romantic film. My remarks were directed exclusively at pornography. Since it was in the title, I assumed it was eligible for discussion. As regards art, educational and literary merit, I have no opinion until I've seen the material in question.

To a large extent, yes, but we also bring our own experience and sensibility to an informed adult opinion. I came up in the sixties, embracing free love and appreciation of the sensual pleasures - and quite a lot of self-indulgence and irresponsibility that as part of that culture. But then came the grown-up struggles for human rights, reproductive rights, the protection of women from domestic and workplace abuse, of physically and mentally challenged people from discrimination, etc. One develops a certain regard for the privacy and dignity of individuals. Yes. Did she have a penis stuck in her anus and then her mouth? That's also work is work. I didn't bring up Hollywood movies. I'm sure actors and directors are embarrassed about the failures, but those don't make any money. How does that make pornography more respectable? Neither are hard porn and 'sexually suggestive content'. A lot of material is conflated in this topic, a wide range of imagery and activity. We may not all be thinking of the same material when we form an opinion of the ethics involved.

No, it's quite different. Art is personal to the artist; he's expressing himself freely and without pretense. The model is uninvolved: his or her body is depicted, but not touched or invaded; they don't need to pretend they're bringing their private feelings and desires into the studio. How the buyer feels, why they pay for one painting rather than another, is neither in play nor on display. If a man buys a picture of a naked man or woman, it's not necessarily because he's missing something in his own sex life. Ask the actors and directors of an Oscar winner whether they consider themselves invested in and engaged by the movie they're creating. Then ask the cast and crew of a skin flick. You might also delve into the ways in which many of the performers are recruited and then treated. Not all; for some it's a chosen career; for some, an easy side-hustle - just as it is with prostitution. But there, too, is a dark side. Making it illegal doesn't stop the purveyors, any more that it stops organ-leggers, drug traffickers and gunrunners; it just drives them deeper into the shadows, renders them less accessible to regulation and taxation. The only thing that could stop the abuse is making it unprofitable. I won't watch or approve of those, either. I accept that others enjoy it; I sometimes understand why they enjoy it. I accept that some people enjoy a great many things I consider bad for them and for society. That doesn't change my opinion of the thing itself.

I personally have never had occasion to partake, except for one video we brought home out of curiosity. It was hilarious for about five minutes, and then just distasteful. I've had friends who liked looking at naked women in photographs, films and live shows, and a son-in-law who kept a stash of dirty movies in his garage. Daughter, at first upset, eventually capitulated and joined in. Presumably in the 'soft' range of the hetero spectrum. My own take: Yech! Pornography demeans every participant: the performers, the producers, the distributors and the consumers - as well as the subject matter. It reduces human beings to mindless puppets going through meaningless motions of someone else's fantasy; the purveyors to pandering and predation, the customers to their basest impulses. And that's ordinary graphic sexual content, which then branches off into far darker variants, featuring animals, children, violence and sadism. I don't think society benefits from promoting that aspect of the human psyche. I don't think the $ 15+ Billion annual revenue is used for the improvement of the nation's health. I'm all for public nudity, early and frank sex education, freedom of artistic expression, association and affiliation within the limits of informed adult consent, sexual and reproductive autonomy. I'm against the exploitation and corruption of the erotic imperative. If that makes me a prig, I don't mind.

Green eyes are uncommon. I have personally only encountered two people with true green (rather than hazel or teal) eyes; one Irish (with fair skin, freckles and red frizzy hair) one Polish, with dark brown hair, light tan skin (and very attractive dimples, but that's another issue). Europe has had so much migration and warfare over the centuries that no ethnicity is genetically 'pure'. In a few isolated hard-to-reach place, there may still be communities that have shared a small gene pool over many generations. (presumably, the most harmful recessives have been bred out) But generally, given the wide spread and dominance of dark hair and eyes, and given the scope of Roman and Muslim conquests, black hair and brown or hazel eyes shouldn't be unusual anywhere. And so many genes contribute to eye, hair and skin pigmentation, that almost any combination can turn up in any predominantly Caucasian population. Red hair is also in a small minority, but it seems rumours of its extinction are premature.

This was not a secret. https://www.stnicholascenter.org/who-is-st-nicholas Right. We see a lot of ghosts and spirits getting shot through with arrows, carrying babies across rivers, and repeating all the actions of saint all the time, though they don't all bite into people's snacks, which is just well. And, of course you have satellite shots of the elf settlement, living quarters, the workshops where they remove the department store packaging, reindeer stables, all around the north pole. At least Santa Claus-without-an-e doesn't require an outsized house; he just hovers the whole time, supervising. Those poor cold elves!

Not very nutritious, but better for him than ice cream on a summer's day. One of my long-ago neighbours would buy himself and his Samoyed a burger and soft serve cone each, pretty much every day in summer. The two of them would while away all afternoon on the front porch. They were both unhealthily overweight, but seemed content.

You can look up wholesome, vet-approved recipes. There are lots on the internet - most seem to feature peanut butter, which mkes sense; it's a popular taste. For giving medicine to a dog, the best thing my mother invented was a catfood sandwich. Cats are more discriminating eaters, so their food tastes and smells better. You spread it on soft bread slices and tuck the pill into one corner. I used an extra diversionary tactic for an extra pill-phobic dog: I would share the sandwich, one bite at a time, among all three of them, reserving that last piece with a thumb on it, for the sick one.

Some dogs also think a stick of raw celery or a carrot are treats. A neighbour's dog used to bring mine apples as a gift, because he liked apple. She didn't eat them, but she'd play with them, so the besotted pup was happy.

I don't even have a dog. Not for many years now. I recall the bisquits were mainly oatmeal and shredded carrot, some kind of fat - ?chicken - nutritional yeast and flax seed. Nothing very complicated. In that discussion, they were talking about making your own dogfood. I don't see how it could be any more harmful than table scraps, which is what all dogs used to eat in the several thousand years before we had everything manufactured. I did cook for our dog at one time, because she had health issues and the specially formulated commercial stuff was wildly expensive.

Any mild acid should do the trick. Vinegar, lemon juice or ketchup.

How, exactly, does this equation work? I'm no mathematician, but .... I suspect he actually believes that those key factors determine the outcome of elections. Based on a set of assumptions about US politics that have prevailed in the 20th century, they would be strongly indicative of the outcome. But he didn't add in unprecedented factors - probably because they're extremely difficult to quantify and any attempt would have complicated the model too much.

Then we must disagree, but only one of us free to change his method according to prevailing trend and still claim its efficacy.

'Ordinary' people accept the technology and pace of their times. They use whatever form of transport is available to arrive where and when they're obliged to or desire to be. Zeppelins went out of popular favour because of the perceived danger, the price of building and upkeep and the disproportion of airship to payload: they're just not cost-effective. Ships are fine for leisurely trips, but only on water, which means delay and inconvenience in transferring to one or more land vehicles, while airplanes can go directly from one city to another anywhere on the planet. The more thoughtful among us may reject air travel for various reasons, may reject motorized travel and may even question the need to travel.

The model is simply not applicable to the volatile political landscape of today.

Okay. So can you see how this leads inevitably to : always assuming this is the case....