iNow

Why did you just bump a three year old thread? Also, to answer your question, the same way you prove a positive. Assertion: The earth is not flat. Proof: Earth is spherical. Finally, Intelligent Design has been proven false. Hence, it is discarded into the waste pile with all of the other stupid ideas.

Point taken. Maybe the Psychiatry and Psychology forum would be better. It could be a case study.

So, you seem to think that an accrurate description of the desires of the people who serve on those boards and in those libararies is to ban books and eliminate them from public availability. Fascinating.

While I can appreciate the entertainment of leaving this thread open, why hasn't it been moved to P&S?

No. Also, I am struggling a bit deciding whether I want some of what you're on, or if I truly would be better off just to avoid it altogether. I must think about this...

I can prove it's not an invisible man since a hominid has qualities which are testable and not limited to the electromagnetic spectrum. However, I concede that I'm only 99% sure instead of 100% sure that it's an imaginary being... a three letter word with an ambiguous definition.

There are many sources of the confusion in these people, none moreso than their pastors, but in terms of text there are a number of places where Jesus and exclusion went hand in hand. http://www.beliefnet.com/story/197/story_19741_1.html Jesus opens his ministry as a rather exacting rabbi. He suddenly appears before two groups of fishermen and starkly commands them, “Follow me!” (Mark 1:16-20). He tells a deranged man to shut up and then causes him to writhe in pain (Mark 1:25-26). After Jesus heals a helpless leper, Mark says, “sternly warning him, [Jesus] sent him away at once” (Mark 1:43). Jesus throws people out of a room (ekballo again) so he can heal a child, and then he “strictly ordered” witnesses of the miracle to keep quiet (Mark 5:40, 43). He and Peter get into a row, each rebuking the other (Mark 8:32-33). Jesus becomes exasperated with a crowd and his disciples: “You faithless generation, how much longer must I be among you? How much longer must I put up with you?” (Mark 9:19). He curses a fig tree (Mark 11:13-14). He drives people out of the temple area (with a whip, according to John 2:15), overturning tables, and physically intimidating people to prevent their passing through (Mark 11:15-17). Jesus' attitude toward authorities is hardly respectful. He calls Herod a fox (Luke 13:32), and he castigates the scribes and Pharisees at length, mocking them as “blind guides” and “hypocrites” (Matt. 23:24-25), and practically curses them, saying, “You are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth” (Matt. 23:27). http://www.nimblespirit.com/html/is_jesus_mean_.html But Jesus’ harsh criticisms also reach into places I do not expect. After one parable, Jesus’ friend Peter asks for an explanation. “Are you still so dull?” Jesus snaps. Worse, Jesus appears to dishonor His own family. Once when someone tells Jesus that His mother and brothers are standing outside and waiting to see Him, Jesus replies, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” He suggests that His true family is “whoever does the will of my Father in heaven” (Matthew 12:46–50). I see His point, but does He have to ignore His mom? And how does this fit with my understanding of a God who wants everyone to be a part of a loving family, a God who focuses on the family and wants us to do the same? Turning more crinkly pages, I read — as if for the first time — the story of Jesus calling a Canaanite woman a dog. She cries out to Him to deliver her daughter of demonic possession. “Jesus did not answer a word,” says Matthew (15:23). The Great lover ignores her cries. The woman doesn’t let up, and finally, Jesus’ disciples beg Him to do something to shut her up. “Send her away,” they plead. “She keeps crying after us.” Jesus will have none of it. Why? Because the woman isn’t a Jew. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” Even when the woman forces her way to Jesus, kneels at His feet, and cries, “Lord, help me!” Jesus is unmoved. “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to their dogs,” He says. No, not says. He mutters. He snipes. He sneers. I try to imagine the way He must have spoken to her. http://www.crosswalk.com/spirituallife/11539259/ In a withering excoriation of religious hypocrisy in Matthew 23, he compared the scribes and Pharisees to whitewashed tombs, which is a worse insult than it sounds because the religious leaders prided themselves on their outward righteousness. He could be tough on his own followers also. In Mark 8:14-21 he tells his disciples that they are spiritual blind and have hard hearts. When he appeared to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, he calls them "foolish ones" and "slow of heart to believe" (Luke 24:25). He told certain Jewish leaders in John 8:44, "You are of your father the devil." The notion that our Lord was always "gentle Jesus, meek and mild," as if he spent his days saying nice things to make people feel better is only possible if you never read the gospels. Naturally, the people who are the most fundamental are the ones who are actually interpretting the texts correctly, despite the fact that those texts go against the laws of equal rights. It's those who are moderate and selectively choose which passages to follow and which to ignore that are the most problematic to solving these in between issues of withholding medical care.

I think the answer might be yes, but then again, we bottle it, then drink it, then release it from our bladder back into the system. So, while we are certainly redistributing water, it's still conserved. This is just my own speculation, so let me apologize ahead of time if I'm wrong and created any confusion. Btw... welcome to SFN.

I didn't bother wasting my time replying to waitforufo here because I'd already done so over in this other thread... twice... and he brought it up yet again anyway. http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?p=432519#post432519 http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?p=432730#post432730 Oh, and it's not an "invisible man," it's an imaginary being.

While I cannot speak to the issue of the chemistry differences, I can tell you with a high degree of confidence that you very likely used pennies minted after '82 since banks take old money out of circulation every so often.

That's a very interesting point, ParanoiA. What is the role of a library in today's internet age? Hmmm... Different topic perhaps. I also apologize to all of my scientific friends out here who see this poll as poorly constructed. I agree completely with that assessmnet, however, Big314mp hit the nail on the head. I wasn't looking for significant results and standard deviations. It was a conversation starter so we could explore the subtleties of the issue together.

The mental contortions that must go on in these people's heads to avoid this. They go into medicine, which at its root is to help people, yet they refuse to help a particluar group (aka discriminate against) because of their religious teachings. If you cannot help everyone equally, then you cannot be a doctor. Simple. I couldn't care less what your religion is. If you're going to med school, you have to learn medicine and treat people without Iron Age fairy tales impacting your actions and curriculum. It's just so infuriating, as this seems so simple to understand and such common sense. If waving my body around in front of women is against my beliefs, I'm not going to get a job as a stripper. If alcohol is against my beliefs, I'm not going to be a bartender. If you can't treat all patients the same, then you can't be a general practitioner. If you can't give out all medicines available, then you can't be a pharmacist. Come on... Why is this so hard to grasp?!? </exasperated venting>

I've already responded to this point above, but will say it again. Just because people out there misinterpreted his work, and used it to promulgate negative dogmas does not mean that Darwin's idea intended these things, nor does it mean that those things are a direct result of his idea. It's the same argument people use when attacking atheism and saying Hitler used atheist ideas and evolution to further his cause of murdering Jews. Bullshit. He was NOT an atheist, and he was not performing natural selection (he was doing artificial selection and discrimination and using nationalistic fervor to accomplish it, and he very much used Jesus in his speeches to justify his ends). The fact that you bring up eugenics and social darwinism proves to all of us that you are trying argue a guilt based on association. In case you missed it, NONE of those things are from Darwin. They are from others who have misapplied for their own ends Darwins described process for evolutionary change in nature via selection pressures. All "fitness" means in this context is the ability to pass on your genes to the next generation. I find this statement appalling. It appears that you would rather live in a world of lies and fairy tales instead of one where we know the truth of nature, simply because some tiny fraction of a percentage of people use those truths in ways they were not intended. Also, better for whom? Folks who can't stand challenges to their worldview and would rather bury their heads in the sand and pretend the earth is flat? Finally, the tooth paste is already out of the tube, and you're not going to be able to force it back in. So get used to having this knowledge. It's been around for 150 years already, it's proven to be one of the strongest scientific theories ever put forth in the history of humans, and if it conflicts with your religious beliefs you should probably let go of the one that is probablistically more likely to be a false and inaccurate description of the universe. http://www.pandasthumb.org/pt-archives/000426.html Social Darwinism is the philosophy that the individuals or classes in a society are subject to natural selection, much as organisms in nature are subject to natural selection. Thus, it is seen as fitting for the weak to grow weaker and the strong to grow stronger; the population is thus improved overall. Social Darwinism was popular in the early 20th century, and I have no doubt that it influenced Nazism and a lot of other aberrations. That fact has absolutely nothing to do with “Darwinism,” as the Discovery Institute people call the theory of evolution. Darwin never made the mistake of assuming that the theory of evolution could be extended to social systems, and theories regarding different races (a term that subsumes what today we call ethnic or religious groups) predate Darwin by centuries. Social Darwinism is thus a misnomer; it has nothing to do with Darwin. It was, however, used to provide intellectual support for laissez-faire capitalism. Economic stratification was considered “natural.” Thus, the state was prohibited from intervening and supporting the lower economic classes. Survival of the fittest, a term coined by Spencer, not Darwin, was ensured as the “unfit” poor received no quarter. Social Darwinism was also used to justify imperialism and racism. It was a self-serving theory that could easily be adopted by rich individuals and imperialist nations. It “justified” the inequality of the social system and, indeed, the position of the rich in society. It is obscene for the social Darwinists at the Discovery Institute to argue against “Darwinism” on the grounds that it leads to social Darwinism. And read tihs link, too, while you're at it: http://www.texscience.org/reviews/darwinism-racism.htm The persistent misidentification of evolution with economic exploitation, racism, euthanasia, eugenics, infanticide, and genocide all depend on someone's persistent confusion about the vital difference between social and scientific Darwinism, that is, between social biological determinism--not a science but a discreditable doctrine--and biological evolution--an accurate and highly reliable science. By mendaciously ignoring this vital distinction, anti-evolutionists try to discredit evolution by illogically associating it with historically disreputable ideologies. Anti-evolutionists believe that if people come to believe evolution, under the misnomers of "survival of the fittest" and "social Darwinism," is equivalent to evil ideologies, they will then doubt the veracity and necessity of evolutionary science. Guilt by association is the anti-evolutionist's goal for scientific evolution, and their fondest wish is to promote this distortion. Even the fact that economic exploitation, racism, euthanasia, eugenics (in the sense of favorable breeding), infanticide, and genocide were all common in human history long before either evolution or Darwin does not dissuade the true believers. How can "Darwinism" be responsible for things that historically predate it? The obvious answer is that it can't.

Errmmm... Never mind. I don't even know where to begin with all of that. Let's just say that I (and I'm sure countless others) disagree strongly with your position. "Evolution is Christianity in disguise." That takes a special level of delusion.

I agree that it's an interesting point, but it's not a valid comparison. On the national level, there will be a collection of experts in the field alongside seasoned educators together deciding which books should be part of the primary lists, and they are doing so as a group. It is only after they ultimately reach some sort of consensus that they write their guidelines and suggestions, and once the group is aligned they distribute those to the libraries. (As an aside, it would be interesting also to see of they ever attempt to enforce the removal of books from libraries, or if they simply set the "default position" of book lists up front.). At the level of Sarah Palin, however, that was an instance where a book (or multiple books) already were in place, and she explored the possibility of using her power to remove them because they conflicted with her religious beliefs. She was not working with a group of experts on setting a curriculum, or trying to maximize the education of the children. No. She was seeking a way to unilaterally remove books which were being discussed among the members of her church and deemed inappropriate. She exercised her power and terminated the librarian when she was refused, only revoking the termination after public outcry. Again, a discussion of how standards are set at the national level, while interesting, is not a valid comparison to the discussion we're having here about Palins character, integrity, and academic approach to the world. Indeed. What it reminds me of is Fahrenheit 451 by Bradbury.

Maybe this is a simple miscommunication. I have absolutely zero idea what you mean when you say "Christian thought pattern." I think of very negative things about that term, and based on your posts, I'm confident you do not intend it in a negative way. So, what does it mean?

When exactly did Obama back peddle and try to spin the fact that he did that?

Slight difference. McCain being old, and more statistically likely to die, is a fact. The stuff that Republicans have been spreading? Not facts. Of course, how that fact is stated is important to perceptions, but he is old no matter how much you disagree with the tone and presentation of that statement.

The only thing which I can think to say is... our country is so full of uneducated, stupid, and backward religiots who get lied to every Sunday morning and keep going back for more... that it might just work.

What benefit does it bring? You are really attempting some strange biological form of numerology here. Are you also going to detail every parallel between Islam and Evolution? Are you also going to detail every parallel between Hinduism and Evolution? Are you also going to detail every parallel between Buddhism and Evolution? Are you also going to detail every parallel between the countless thousands of religions which were in practice during Darwins time and Evolution? How does such an endeavor, one that is minimally accurate, broadly speculative, and deeply motivated by wish thinking help us to understand any better the reality which is nature around us, or the briilliant idea of Darwin which helps us to explain that reality? Yes. I'm aware. There's a similar phenomenon known as Gestalt formation in human cognition. http://www.brookes.ac.uk/services/ocsd/2_learntch/theories.html See, now here's where you lose me. We were good when you were simply stating that there is this phenomenon out there called a "closure principle." You then go on to assert this non-sequitur which is not only unsupported, but also counter the evidence which we do have available, and you leave it at that. As for your cup analogy, it fails. Darwin was not describing a material object like a cup, a finch, or a tree. He was describing an abstract process regarding how those things came to be, and how slight differences in environment could result in huge differences is morphology. Ergo, since a concept doesn't have an existence in "real time and space" there is no meaningful difference between the actual process and the description of it or its interpretation in the mind. Now, had Darwin instead been describing a physical entity like a cup, a finch, a tree, or whatever, then you'd be quite right. However, that's not what he did, so it's moot. Again, you assert that there is this phenomenon out there where we tend to fill in gaps of our knowledge, and that is fine. However, you then go on to again assert another non-sequitur which is itself also unsupported and counter the evidence we have. That's not how it works, mate. It's like you're saying "because today is Saturday, bananas are yellow."

The closest thing I can see to this scenario is when Obama went on O'Reilly last week, and I personally think he did quite well, and was very stateman-esque. I'm not sure if you caught that, but can probably find it on YouTube (it was split into four parts). EDIT: I actually think that interview showed his diplomatic abilities much much more than just statesmanship. He managed to keep the conversation positive and made progress where many who came before him have failed. This isn't the highest quality, but considering your comments above I get the feeling that you might just enjoy this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnrWJJ97sF4

I feel sorry for those poor folks who have to deal with your kind. Wait a minute, we're dealing with you, too!

I don't have to be able to tell you where every single raindrop is going to fall in order to accurately tell you that my entire driveway is going to get wet during the next storm. You've proven that you're not even willing to look at the data and reconsider your position, as your mind is already made up and you've been digging your heels in. That's unfortunate, but is your perogative.

The only thing you mentioned in reference to darwin was in the last sentence where you assert, "In Darwin's thought it is the changed member that leads the way to survival." First, I'd like you to point out for everyone how exactly you came to the conclusion that this is an accurate representation of "darwins thought." Second, I'd like to point out TO you that this is not an accurate representation of darwins idea. His idea was that certain mutations prove beneficial in certain environments, and those most successful out reproduce those who are less successful when viewed across long expanses of time. Third, change in the sense that you mean it (once bad, now good, once evil, now a hero) is personality/character change, and has nothing to do with "change" in allele frequencies through geologic time. I'm not attacking you, Dennis. Know that. I'm attacking your assertions, as they are really close to the truth, but just wrong enough to be misrepresenting it.

It's telling that so many people are trying to distract us about Palins performance by trying to stir up muck about Gibson and get us to focus on that instead. Whatever.