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Early Man: The Cause of Mass Extinction?
xpccx writes: "There's an article over at CNN about the possibility that early man hunted large animals ( like mammoths ) into extinction. "New work by American and Australian researchers is adding weight to the theory, while undercutting the notion that climate change and not human influence was the cause."" Update: 06/14 03:32 PM by H : This is touched on in Guns, Germs and Steel, which I highly recommend. This has been the going theory with many (most?) historians as to why the megafauna in Australia, the Americas all disappeared within a couple thousand years of the appearance of humans. Considering they had survived countless millenia before our arrival, I'm inclined to think that the two events might just kinda be linked.
How come you got pissed off halfway through the first sentence and flipped on the bold?
As was pointed out, natives used to run entire herds of buffalo over the side of cliffs. Is there any reason to think that they wouldn't have herded/dispatched mammoths et al. the same way? Personally, I'd rather let a mammoth kill itself than take one on with a pointy stick.
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In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And Satan said, "It doesn't get any better than this." And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. And God said, "Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit," and God saw that it was good. And Satan said, "There goes the neighborhood." And God said, "Let us make Man in our image, after our likeness, and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." And so God created Man in his own image; male and female created He them. And God looked upon Man and Woman and saw that they were lean and fit. And Satan said, "I know how I can get back into this game." And God populated the earth with broccoli and cauliflower and spinach, green and yellow vegetables of all kinds, so Man and Woman would=live long and health lives. And Satan created McDonald's. And McDonald's brought forth the 99-cent double cheeseburger. And Satan said to Man, "You want fries with that?" And Man said, "Supersize them." And Man gained 5 pounds. And God created the healthful yogurt, that Woman might keep her figure that Man found so fair. And Satan brought forth chocolate. And Woman gained 5 pounds. And God said, "Try my crispy fresh salad." And Satan brought forth Ben & Jerry's. And Woman gained 10 pounds. And God said, "I have sent thee heart-healthy vegetables and olive oil with which to cook them." And Satan brought forth chicken-fried steak so big it needed its own platter. And Man gained 10 pounds and his bad cholesterol went through the roof. And God brought forth running shoes and Man resolved to lose those extra pounds. And Satan brought forth cable TV with remote control so Man would not have to toil to change channels between ESPN and ESPN2. And Man gained another 20 pounds. And God said, "You are running up the score, Satan." And God brought forth the potato, a vegetable naturally low in fat and brimming with nutrition. And Satan peeled off the healthful skin and sliced the starchy center into chips and deep-fried them. And he created sour cream dip also. And Man clutched his remote control and ate the potato chips swaddled in cholesterol. And Satan saw and said, "It is good." And Man went into cardiac arrest. And God sighed and created quadruple bypass surgery. And Satan created HMOs.
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Will all you Conservatives and Liberals hurry up and rip each other apart? The sooner the people are rid of you, the sooner we can restore a mediocum of sanity to our culture and our political system.
-- Guges --
You'd think so but fellatio is hard to resist.
The only humorous sidenote is that this punctures the myth of the American Indian as an environmental superbeing. Obviously, they committed carnivorous genocide on every being their primitive technology allowed,
Where did you get your facts you fucking moron? American Indians were the original practitioners of conservation, a fact that would be obvious to you if you had done anything approximating study of them. Just because they killed things doesn't mean they were out there raping the environment. It is the white man, by killing off all of the upper level predators, that wrecked the biota.
You greens are the most misguided bunch I have even seen. The only time you have spent in the woods is to chain yourself to a tree to stop a logger, or taken a nap in a meadow at some college campus. Try to learn something before you run your mouth about who wrecks what, stop watching so many Disney movies where the animals cooperate with one another. It isn't like that in real life. You think deer aren't supposed to die to feed predators? Do you think that if we just stopped killing them they'll all be just fine? The biota is far more intricate than you will ever understand, more intricate than we will ever be able to model. You think because people hunt they are somehow contributing to the destruction of nature but thats because your are guided by your politics.
You've just demonstrated why so-called "pure logic" is difficult to use as a good basis for making decisions. Both of you have "logical" arguments that come to very different conclusions, opposite conclusions actually. One of you is no more "right" than the other, but you both think the other is wrong.
Just to add my own $0.02, you'd be hard pressed to say that farms are not nature. They're just a small part of nature contained but still subject to the larger overall system that includes sunlight, rain, soil, and many other things that are hard (or impossible) to replicate on a large enough scale to feed everyone.
I, for one, am glad that I don't have to worry about one of those showing up in my back yard.
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Notice when that was posted. Nice try, though.
Thank you. Exactly the example I would've chosen. Someone can post one way or the other what is "right", but in the end it comes down to values and beliefs. And those aren't based on logic.
Your flaw is in thinking that your definition of what is human is logical.
Some Christians say that the fetus/embryo is human the moment conception occurs. Because that's when God puts the soul in. If their religious beliefs are correct, then that is the logical answer.
OTOH, I personally disagree with your criteria. I think a human is a very hard thing to define, and I won't really try, but I'll give you some examples of things I think are human, or at least as deserving of human rights, as normal human beings:
1) beings that cannot survive by themselves, but could with help. examples: patient with failed kidneys on a dialysis machine. patient with failed heart with an artificial heart. patient with failed lungs with an iron lung or something of the sort.
2) some sort of freak chimp that is as smart/sentient/conscious as a human(I won't even get into normal chimps, which are probably on the level of small children, and which I have huge reservations about using in medical research)
3) a computer with human-level intelligence
4) some being from another planet with human-level intelligence
5) related to #1, a human fetus that, even if it cannnot sustain itself outside the womb, has human-like brainwaves, and can survive inside the womb
some other people might add exceptions to the list that I don't agree with, or say some of mine are invalid. I don't think I or anyone else can give a completely logical reason for saying: this one is human, this one is not.
BTW, going back to chimps: the whole idea that there are mentally retarded people who are given the same rights as all of us, while chimps who are far more intelligent/capable of human-like feeling and thoughts are kept in cages and killed in painful ways for research is frankly something that makes me uncomfortable to think about.
I don't there is any black and white in this issue
I derived it for you right there. Point out my mistake.
Your definition for a human being is arbitrary. There are exceptions that are pretty clearly humans yet under your definition are not. You say you need certain organs to be considered human. So does that mean that a person, born to two human parents, whose kidneys were destroyed by disease, and who is living on a dialysis machine, and with whom you could carry out a normal intelligent conversation, is not human? Does that sound logical to you?
I'm sorry, but one of the criteria is that human cells are not human beings. An embryo is a single cell, therefore it does not qualify.
That's one of your criteria, and it's based on your beliefs of what makes a human human. If what makes a human human is having a brain, then you are correct. If it is having a soul that is put there by god at conception, then you are wrong. If it is neither of those, then who knows?
They had these vital organs to start with, but they failed during the course of their life. I think this could easily fit with the def'n I gave for a human.
"c) must have the basic anatomical features(organs) of a human being necessary for sustaining its life"
I don't see how a person without kidneys "easily" fits into a definition which requires that you have the basic organs(and you listed kidneys as one of them). are you going to change your definition to say that if you are born with them but later lose them you're still human? if so, what would be the logical reason for saying that a fetus with a brain capable of thought but no kidneys isn't human, but an adult with a brain capable of thought but no kidneys is???
I started with the challenges' criteria and I came to a logical conclusion.
What criteria? There was none listed. The poster simply said: here are two different possible views, now you try to logically say why one is right and the other isn't. It would appear that you drew criteria out of thin(i.e. illogical) air.
On the other hand, if you started from scratch and logically defined all of your morals from a logical foundation there would be none of this confusion and it would be quite clear what a human being is, what would be a proper course of action etc.
Wow, congrats. I don't think anyone in human history has been able to give a logical from the ground up definition of morality. Wonderful that you were able to...
Once you are human, you can logically extend the law to say that you are human for the rest of your life.
And why is that exactly? What is life? Is someone who essentially has his entire brain destroyed in an accident still deserving of human rights? What part of you makes you human? With enough technology, it would be possible to replace pretty much every organ in your body with something artificial(even just some simply artificial brain to tell you to keep breathing and what not). Could someone(something?) like that still be said to be human? If not, when and why does the change in status occur? Your definition of what is human is extremely lacking.
Well, read the challenge again. He explicitly stated two possible conclusions. Conclusion 1 was a fetus is a human, Conclusion 2 was a fetus is no more a human being than a human cell. That logically implies that human cells are not human beings.
But I am made up of human cells. Am I not a human being? So what makes me human? You are saying that a fetus with a brain but not kidneys isn't human...why? This does not follow logically from saying cells aren't a human being. You seem to think that because you used a definition which can distinguish a clump of cells from a newborn, you have a definition that can distinguish a human from a non-human.
Oh no, I am by no means the first(as I found out awhile ago). Many people have done the same to lesser or even greater degrees. Ayn Rand is one such person.
ROTFL. OK, I think we're done here.
"My opinions are my own, and I've got *lots* of them!"
Try a little less ideology, and spend a little more time crafting 'a-ha' moments which really give the impression that you know what you're talking about.
The one about the Moon was good, though.
Don Negro
Don Negro
Perl 6 will give you the big knob. -- Larry Wall
"We know about evolution, dinosaurs, the big-bang et al".
Yeah, I know about the Easter Bunny, Santa Clause and Batman, but that doesn't mean they're real, (maybe Batman). I won't argue Dinos, I have no reason to believe they didn't exist, but evolution and the big-bang are only theories; theories that are in a constant state of flux.
I don't personally believe in either. I just can't grasp the idea that we're all happy little coincidences brought on by an exploding grapefruit sized ball of energy.
Misfit
Oh great. Just ruin the ending for everyone, why don't you.
Misfit
I don't know, I'm not in favor of making things extinct but if early man could take down a mammoth with sticks and stones then I'm all in favor of letting early man decide fate of those beasts who clearly did not have the needed skills to survive. Early man was hardcore if he was killing mammoths at will.
Why not if we're going to make shit up and present it as a possible history?
Polonium halos?
1, 2
"Decay" of planetary magnetic fields.
1, 2, 3
Interplanetary dust?
1, 2, 3, 4
And many more, all information that "smug liberals idealogues" have compiled and endlessly link to in their patient responses to rants like yours in the talkorigins.org feedback.
All cross-referenced and detailed in their explanations.
I thought you were surely a troll, which was why you were marked up as "funny" but now I recognise the same empty arguments from the feedback.
-- perl -e'print pack"H*","6e656d6f406d38792e6f7267"'
I take it back.
Elsewhere you are clearly just joking.
My congratulations on doing a very good imitation of YEC arguments.
-- perl -e'print pack"H*","6e656d6f406d38792e6f7267"'
"John Alroy, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California at Santa Barbara, used a complicated computer model to simulate what may have happened when humans first entered North America some 13,400 years ago over an Ice Age land bridge from Asia..."
So this guy has got tenure, and he's making himself famous and getting quoted on CNN by coming up with some off-the-wall theory that makes him stand out from the crowd, by saying that aboriginal native americans caused mass extinctions...
Yeah, right...
Remember that university professors are under absoulutely *no* obligation whatsoever to espouse theories that make any sense.
Just as there is the attitude of "publish or perish" that drives much of what comes out of the university context, so is there the attitude that "I can say any damn thing I want to because of my 'academic freedom'"
It doesn't have to make any sense, it just has to get him noticed.
When I was at CSU at Long Beach in the late sixties, taking a geology minor, there was an extremely influential professor there who based his entire career on the position that plate tectonics was a bunch of crap.
Everyone took him very seriously, and he went on and on, and he was totally wrong.
Wrong.
Period.
And yet everyone pretended to take him seriously because he had tenure and he'd been there a long time.
And wait just one minute:
"Regardless of the variables he plugged in, the presence of human hunters triggered mass extinctions..."
No matter *what* variables he plugged in, he still kept getting the same answer?!?
Are you putting me on?
Either CNN is full of sh*t, (heh.. don't get me started...) or the guy had a result he wanted, and set up his model to get that result no matter what.
Some "scientist"...
t_t_b
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I think not; therefore I ain't®
I'm on PJ's "enemies" list! Are you?
...from my sources in PRE-pre-Columbian American History, that Native Americans only became enlightened Noble Savages AFTER they killed off the mammoths.
Nobody complained about the extinction of the "giant lizards with really big teeth" (as some of the megafauna of the day were known). But, in the famine which followed the death of the last wooly pachyderm, many were heard to lament, "Maybe we shouldn't have killed them all. I wonder if we shouldn't adopt a different philosophy vis-a-vis these bison. Something along the lines of we're-all-the-children-of-the-Great-Spirit or something like that. Besides, Rousseau will respect us more."
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
It's not like ancient man had the tools nessecery to kill off a sufficient quantity of any animal as to drive it to extinction
They sure as heck did, especially in cases of the huge, lumbering wooly-mammoth type animals. In the beginning, such animals were hunted at close-quarters by spear-holding humans. Kills were hard-earned with frequent human casualties until an innovation called the atlatl enabled much smaller bands of hunters to kill much more easily and with far fewer casualties. Various difficulties involving population growth and over-hunting insued, with lasting ramifications for our old wooly pals!
**>>BELCH
Please. Given how easy it would be to bias a computer model, this 'research' is laughable.
Okay, so these nomadic, hunter-gathers would set fires that they have no way of controlling to facilitate 'hunting or travel'. Come on!
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"In the land of the brave and the free, we defend our freedom with the GNU GPL."
"You're gonna need a bigger boat." - Chief Brody
If they had been truly civilized with a proper (large) form of government, they would have had to prepare an environmental impact statement and thus the extinction would never have happened! If anything shows how important big government is, this does!
(That was sarcasm for those of you who didn't get it)
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Since when did we stop being part of natural selection?
Since it seems popular to forget that every "great tale" had some basis in fact most people never bother to check into what could have led to a so-called great flood.
Which is a shame, because when the world, for all intents and purposes, consisted of the cities of Mesopotamia (Ur, Kish, Lagash, Eridu, Nippur...) there was indeed a great flood when both the Tigris and Euphrates spilled over covering some if not all of the major cities of the time. Since this would have covered most of the cities and the only records we have of large city based civilizations of the time come from these cities...
... there was a great flood.
--- I do not moderate.
When animals hunt other animals, it's survival of the fittest, but when humans do it, it's mass extinction?
As has already been said, animals don't hunt down a whole herd of another animal at one time. They weed them out, usually taking down the slowest/weakest of the herd. This is natural selection at work, and is actually very similar to the way early man hunted as well.
All they know is, whenever humans showed up on a continent, mega-fauna seem to die out 1000-2000 years later. Right now all they have are *theories* as to why. Only one is mass-hunting, and I think I agree with the one guy at the bottom of the article who says this is just not feasible for early man. It's more likely something else, such as man bringing disease and wiping them out that way, or perhaps domesticated dogs travelling with man introducing such a disease.
The best research never sets out to prove or dis-prove something, rather, it sets out to find out what happened without any prior opinion.
... the answer of course is both no and yes, no, they are not dispassionate but yes, their methodology and results can be), your characterization of scientific methodology is wrong.
... the (almost religious) belief that capitalism can do no wrong and unfettered trade with no restraint or regulation holds little water when set against the obvious ecological impact such lassaiz-faire approaches have engendered in the past. The notion that even low-tech cavemen were having a negative impact with nothing more than their native intelligence, a mastadonian thigh-bone, fire, and a lack of restraint would serve to threaten those beliefs even more potently. The dubya supporters and their ilk have had another beloved myth torn from their eyes, with predictable results.
While I understand what you're trying to get at (can scientists really be dispassionate if they start out with a preconcieved notion
The most common scientific method (there is more than one scientific method btw) is to pose a falsifiable hypothesis and then go about proving or disproving it through the rigorous gathering of evidence. Inherent in this method is having a prior opinion, and then proving (or disproving) it through rigorous scientific research. Despite the high fluff/low fact ratio of the article in question, it does appear that this group followed exactly that approach: they formed a falsifiable hypothesis, then went about gathering evidence to support it. It appears their methods were sound and that the available evidence thus far supports their hypothesis.
Does this mean their right? Perhaps, perhaps not. Someone else may well come forward with evidence which knocks the legs out from their hypothesis. But for now it appears their hypothesis is standing up to scientific rigor. Of course, others in the scientific community will examine their hypothesis and in turn add supporting or contravening evidence.
It is not really surprising that this makes certain camps of Randian rationalists uncomfortable to the point of frothing at the mouth (no, I do not include the post to which I am replying, but do point to other posts in this thread)
And yes, of course "the greenies" will point to this as further evidence that mankind needs to learn to tread more lightly on this planet. After all, if even cavemen can damage their environment so severely that mass extinctions are a result, what of modern man, where each individual commands more energy to their own ends than the whole of humankind ten thousand years ago? Clearly this is evidence supporting their perspective, so yes, they will come forth. As well they should, right wing frothing at the mouth notwithstanding.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Read Daniel Quinne's Ishmael. He discusses this issue in depth with far more eloquence than I.
Humans aren't just hunting animals, they are waging all out war against (some) animals. Why? Because they compete against us for food. Farmers exterminate wolves and foxes that prey upon their livestock, rabbits that prey upon their produce, etc. etc. We gas insects routinely for the same reason. In this all out war, many species are diven to the brink of extinction and beyond. Others survive, marginalized and with an ever more depleated reserve of genetic diversity, lessoning their capacity for adaptation when natural ecological changes occur. Add to that the very unnatural, man-made ecological changes occurring (global warming, which a mountain of scientific evidence supports despite the nay-saying of a few ostrich-mimicking humans) and you do have mass extinction caused by humankind.
But, and here's the real catch people like you seem to miss, it isn't just about the extinction of other species. It is about our own impending extinction. Contrary to popular myth, propogated by everything from right-wing religious fanatics to left-wing "we can manage the ecosphere" to trekkie/trekker "social and technological change will solve these problems" optomists that we are somehow "above" or "outside" of our ecology, we are an inherent part of the ecological structure and web of food chains we ourselves are ravaging.
If we continue as we are, we will in the not so very distant future bring the entire structure crashing down, along with it that portion of the ecology which supports our own food chain. For example, if the worms die, our soil dies, and with it our crops, and ultimately ourselves. Why should worms die? The reason may not be obvious, but they, as we, are a part of an entire complex web of interdependency, key portions of which are being thoughtlesshack hacked out of existence with unforseen consiquences. Warnings abound: dustbowls, the desertification of once lush areas through absolutist agricultural methods which, in those regions, left the ecosystem in such tatters that, thousands of years later, it still hasn't recovered. Entire civilizations (e.g. the Mayans) are believed to have vanished in no small part as a result of agricultural collaps.
Take a look at it from another perspective. At one time there were a thousand different types of apples, some sweet, some tart, some red, some yellow, some green. Now there are a handfull of types which are mass-farmed. The same holds true for virtually every other food product we consume: where once there was tremendous diversity there are now a scant few surviving types, and many of those (oranges, for example) have been deliberately bred to not be able to reproduce (no seeds). What was once a robust food chain, with enough redundancy to withstand tremendoous changes in the environment (whether such changes be the emergence of a new species of plant, animal or insect, or climatic change) there remains only a fragile few choices, any one of which can be wiped out by a single parisite or disease.
It isn't as obvious as the Irish potato famine, which resulted in no small part because there was only one food crop of significance, and when it failed, everyone starved, but the principle is the same. The more we weaken our supporting ecology, whether it is by reducing the diversity of our own food sources, or that of the life around us (even competing life, such as wolves and the like), the more vulnerable we become to any change, no matter how small.
Down this road lies inevitable extinction, it is really only a question of how soon and how fast.
The solution doesn't require us foregoing technology, as some of the luddite inspired environmentalists would have us believe. It doesn't even necessarilly mean foregoing genetic enhancement of food products (although Monsato's habit of making seeds steril to protect their so-called intellectual property is certainly one way to jump-start a famine). It is only necessary that we stop waging war on the life around us and stop trying to turn every square meter of land into a production device for human food.
Back off, allow some robustness to return to our supporting ecology, and we will not only have less extinctions, we may even manage to prevent our own.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Maybe the mass landscape burning mentioned here is responsible for all the desert land in Australia???
This article is ridiculous
What you said would be all fine and dandy, except for the fact that Tenochtitlan (a.k.a. Mexico City) had a larger population than most European towns at the time.
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Information wants to be beer, or something like that.
First off I would like to mention that even if we do kill off an entire species, it means that natural selection isn't working for that species...we are doing it a favor by extinguishing it's agony...
.45 caliber bullet will pass through the engine block of a car - how is an animal to evolve to the point of being immune, especially in the very limited time frame of just a few years?
Natural selection is implied to be just that, "natural". There's nothing natural about polutants in the air and water, nor is it possible for animals to develop a natural defense against shotguns, rifles, nightscopes, etc... Those just tip the scales way too far against them, and they're certainly not natural. A
If natural selection were working it would be harder to catch, or taste bad, or be poisonous by now...(people have been fishing for millenia- read the bible)
The things people eat are pretty gross, sometimes... Lobster guts, monkey brains, cow balls, mushrooms (fungi found growing on cow shit, basically)... We drive plants to extinction, which in turn drives animals to extinction because they have no habitat or food left. Or the animals that do adapt, say mountain lions, are killed if they have the "audacity" to enter into an area that's been populated by humans. Survival of the fittest? Why do people care if a mountain lion eats a baby, i wonder?
And yes... i eat steak and sushi - all the good stuff, i do realize that those choices (not so much with steak, i don't think, since cattle are raised by us) have a material effect on the world...
When humans started getting alot smarter than their prey they sort of artificially took themselves out of the predator/prey loop. Human's didn't over specialize because they moved around so much. We're arguably omnivores which means we never needed to specialize in hunting any particular sort of prey. When supply dwindled we moved to a new area or chased down animals that were roving. Strict carnivores don't have that ability because they've got too many special straits for hunting particular types of animals. Our specialty was our brains and with that we were able to augment the rest of our abilities. You don't need to run really fast to throw some sort of missle weapon and you don't need sharp claws if you've got oposed thumbs and can grip sharp rocks. Since we could outlive the extinction of our prey we could afford to make it go extinct. I'd assume if you looked at human populations during a prey downturn you'd see their populations didn't shrink too much only moved on or split up.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
...or you might become a heretic. Hmmm... evidence? Can you show me a photograph of the chariots at the bottom of the Red Sea? How about Noah's Ark that has been found so many times, they haven't even bothered to bring back evidence? The fact is, there is no hard evidence of anything supernatural caught on a photograph, video, or audio recording. It's amazing how all of these miracles ceased when humanity gained the ability to prove their experiences beyond a written testimony.
It's a news blurb summary on CNN. How about you try reading the actual paper when it comes out?
Hmm, appeal to authority. ;)
Still, a good page nonetheless, Sagan is certainly missed. I also note Sagan included "Appeal to ignorance (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence)" as one of his common fallacies of logic. Nonetheless, ad hominem attacks on theists seem rampant on /.
This post only slightly tongue in cheek.
I am Jack's writable stack pointer.
I say troll. Clearly, "Jon Erikson" is a very nasty satirist with far too much free time on his hands.
Look. I grew up in a Fundamentalist family. I was Fundamentalist for a long time. I have family and friends who went to BJU. If you look hard enough, you can find people who think little bits and pieces like this. But the whole flamin' deadpan package? Doesn't exist in Real Life(tm). He's trolling, and counting on the general anti-Fundamentalist prejudices of the Slashdot crowd to take these rantings as "typical" of Evangelical/Fundamentalist Christianity, when they are not.
And the "skeptical" "critical" "thinkers" of Slashdot are falling for it hook, line, and sinker ...
Your post was emotional, distorted, incendiary, and silly. I felt like I was reading Atlas Shrugged.
That the left-wing media and so-called "scientific" establishments attack all forms of progress is nothing new. The anti-Human forces have been at it for decades, sickly raging at those who are better than them.
Umm, the article only mentioned a new theory about what caused the extinction of some species. All of this about attacking progress in the name of sickly fascism etc etc is just a figment of your paranoid imagination, and you likely imagine yourself to be the lone crusader against it. Nothing about "anti-humanism" was mentioned in the post; it was just a theory about extinction.
In our present day, the whining, half-human statists wish to use their leverage inside the corrupt, reeking organ of fascism known as the modern nation to bind as they could not bind our ancient forefathers.
I'm glad you're capable of being dispassionate and avoiding loaded terms.
It is the liberals who have passed their point of usefulness. A political Darwinism will sweep the land, raging like holy fire across a peoples weary of the lies, slander, and weakness of the liberal ideals.
You accuse your opponents of fascism?
Try to relax and think for awhile. When you find yourself getting upset, you aren't thinking.
If the universe is not allowed to be created "out of nothing", then where did God come from? Is God allowed to be created "out of nothing"? Oh, he always existed? Then why can't the universe have always existed? There is some thought that the Big Bang was not an isolated event and that the universe expands and contracts cyclically.
cpeterso
Please read Carl Sagan's baloney detection kit:
"Everything in the Bible is literally true [Argument from "authority"] except where it's obviously intended as a parable or metaphor [Observational selection (counting the hits and forgetting the misses)]. In this case, of course God created the world in 7 days - 7 of His days [Special pleading (typically referring to god's will)]. From our point of view, 7 of His days looks like a mighty long time. Don't get hung up on literalism and legalism. They are mere intellectual cudgels used in meaningless verbal battles between self-important idiots [Ad hominem - attacking the arguer and not the argument] furiously engaged in competitive but highly transient mental masturbation."
cpeterso
Any real 'dotter knows the answer is CowboyNeal
'nuff said.
.max
-- It's always darker before it goes pitch black.
not only is the universe stranger than you imagine,
it's stranger than you are capable of imagining
Modern man paving the earth and killing animals can still lead to natural selection. Those animals that can exist in the new envornment survive, others don't. That's what natural selection is all about.
Of course, I'm not saying let's pave the earth.. only that natural selection happens whether we interfere or not.
Kind of shows the inconsistency in YOUR worldview, friend, unless you posit that God is a hypocrite....
I have to say that he was talking about the Plains Indians, who happened to have been common in the area I am in (Texas Panhandle). About 2 hours north of here is the Paloduro Canyon, which, when I was growing, up always seemed like the basis for those Looney Tunes cliffs. Guess what is at the base of many of these cliffs? That's right, evidence that Plains Indians drove buffaloes over the cliffs-Buffalo bones
Slackware: old school feel, new school gear.
Check out this book (title in subject line) that looks at the same issue and posits that on land masses where the large mammals were mostly exterminated, the societies failed to develop technology and more noxious diseases because there was less surplus food.
It is much more complex and detailed than the summary I provide above, and a good read. (It won a Pulitzer).
>Have it ever occured to you that only people,
>surprise, surprise, kills animals in an
>unecessary manner, and the richer you are, the
>more you need to kill? (not that you would do it
>your self, mind you, but all those BicMacs were a
>cow before).
See my comment about my cat below, but I've
noticed that the richer I am, the more I can
afford to go down to the local stockyards and pick
out a cow and butcher it myself. I don't have any
reasonable evidence that this is reducing the
total amount of animal deaths due to me, but one
cow sure lasts me a very long time.
On to the fun part.
-Do overweight people need to eat that much meat?
Apparently, I have met more overweight vegetarians than you.
-DOes somebody that has already a leather jacket
(that could be replaced by something else) need
another leather jacket?
Well, the cow is hamburger anyway, it would be a
shame to waste the skin. Leather is a byproduct.
-Do animals kill other animals as a sport or
entertainment?
Where do you think we got the phrase "cat and mouse"
-Do people need to eat shark fin soup? (throwing
away all the shark, after cutting away the fin,
in the process).
My cat regularly leaves her kills after taking
just a few bites. I don't know how long the local
ecosystem is going to last. Guess I'll have to
start buying kittykibble.
> Do you think that is is morally and ethically
> acceptable for you to toy with something before
> killing it?
I find it ethically acceptable, but not
necessarily morally. Sometimes it may be necessary
to extend the death of something, but that doesn't
mean I should necessarily feel good or bad about
it.
> Assuming you are not in danger, do you consider
> it more noble to kill something or not to kill
> something?
I don't consider killing something noble or
ignoble. As far as I know, I only kill in three
ways: to obtain food, to prevent some parasite
from sucking my blood, and when driving(or any
time the death is not a deliberate action). The
first two might be construed as "in danger". The
last is perhaps unfortunate, but hardly ignoble.
> Imagine for a moment that God exists and has
> appeared before you at a young age and given you
> a choice to make for your future. You may either
> become a fisherman who kills sharks for their
> fins and becomes very wealthy, or you may become
> a low-paid doctor in a small urban community.
> Which would you chose?
Well, first I don't have to imagine:}
Second, I would do the same thing I do every time
God gives me a choice: ignore the obvious for the
correct. Free will and all that.
If truly forced to pick, I would become a wealthy
shark fisher, pay the doctor salary when my
neighbors can't, and start a fish farm. There are
no black and white choices.
Thou art God!
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
Jesus is cool, it's His fan club that I cant stand...
Starman97@Gmail.com (bring it on spammers)
Jesus didnt invent religion, he just made it profitable, annoying, and dangerous.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
From what i understand, part of the avacado's(sp?)life cycle involves being eaten by a giant sloth to help break the seed shell, then being crapped out and growing from there. Then the giant sloths died off, the avacado would have died, except we thought they were tasty, and startd growing them larger for food.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
Its annoying and dangerous if you dont accept jesus as your god. It dosent matter if you follow the general philosophy of christianity, if you refuse to accept the athority and name of *your* god, you still wind up burnt at the stake, labeled a heretic, generally annoyed and pressured into accepting *your* god as the only acceptable on. THat commandment you are so hot to obey, 'thou shalt have no other gods before Me' means that anyone who isnt with you must be converted, killed, or pitied, you just cant leave em alone.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
>Actually, it is strongly believed that Jesus was
>an actual person whom existed, though whether he
>even remotely resembled (in action, not
>appearance) the Jesus described today is
>concidered extremely unlikely.
All I can think of is: "He has given us... a shoe!" - Fanatics, "Life of Brian" (Monty Python)
I hope you disposed of them carefully. Wild birds, especially those that roost in large numbers like crows, frequently carry viruses, such as influenza, Eastern Equine Encephelitis and (now) West Nile Virus, that can infect humans. As their bodies break down, they can be pretty "hot".
A book I read recently, "Virus X", posits that some viruses which inhabit animal populations (sometimes, as in the case of hanta virus and rodents, with no ill effects) have a symbiotic relationship with their host. They are a form of natural defence against other animals moving into the host's range.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Try picking up a stick and approaching a strange dog on his territory, and see how much he likes playing "fetch".
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Take a visit to Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology. They have quite an exhibit of recently (within the last few tens of millenia) critters. North America of a few tens of thousands of years ago was packed with exotic megafauna that would make the Serengeti look like the North America of today in comparison. The reason Africa has so many animals is that they evolved with people, and instinctively know to avoid them.
A friend of mine showed me an interesting trick. If a dog is harassing you, reach down and touch the ground with the knuckles of your first two fingers. The dog either backs off, or it goes completely ballistic, because that posture, that of a human being reaching down to pick up a rock, is hardwired into its genes to mean trouble.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
and if you can name a greater despoiler of the environment than the Godless commies, name one, cf. the Caspian Sea has shrunk in half due to Communist environmental degradation and water diversion
I believe you mean the Aral sea, which has shrunk in size due to the diversion of the Syr Darya and Amu Darya river for cotton agriculture.
While authoritarianism in its various forms is particular prone to environmental abuse, the Aral disaster is more due to the unique nature of the place than a divine punishment of an evil economic system. The Aral is a landlocked lake in an arid region, and is fed by two major rivers that are the only source of water in the region.
I've exactly seen the same practices in captialist countries, it's just that the impact is different because the geography is different. For example, I've personally leaped over the Rio Copiopo of northern Chile where it meets the sea -- it starts as a good sized river in the mountains and it ends up about two meters wide and 3 cm deep. If there were a landlocked lake that was fed by this river, it would be gone. The difference is that it empties into the Pacific.
What about the mighty Colorado? What if that emptied into a lake instead of the Pacific? It's hard to believe that if the Aral were in the US or any other capitalist country, it would be much better.
Capitalist countries have their own litany of environmental disasters: soil salinification in Australia, mass forest die offs in Europe, eutrophication or sterilization of lakes in North America, and so on. This is not a value judgement about Capitalism, just an simple observation. Planned economies stick people in a cycle of environmental misery from which they cannot escape, because of the general low level of development and adaptability in the economy ties them to the land. Capital nimbly redeploys itself so that as an investor I am blissfully insulated from the "bads" that my investments creates.
So capitalism is better for people, in the short run, in that it provides them with ways to route around environmental damage.
It doesn't mean we have to live this way. We don't have to catch the last two cod in the sea. We don't have to leave toxic waste ponds behind our gold mining operations. We are not unthinking animals. However, there are two kinds of positions to take in this debate. The first kind is taken by those who see an intrinsic value in nature and want to preserve it to some degree by regulating the actions of the market. These shade from moderates like myself to environmental extremists who would consider me no better than the worst of the lot. On the other hand there are those who believe there is no value other than what can be assigned by current market prices, and thus for whom any kind of regulation or limitation on environmental impacts is simply an irrational, unwarranted interference in the workings of a system which by definition is perfect.
There are axiomatic differences between these camps, and thus in the final analysis not much basis for rational discourse between them. So, we must fight.
You'd think that at a web site devoted to computers, nerds and logic, we would be immune to fellatious [sic] arguments based on emotion instead of logic, but you'd be wrong.
People who don't recognize the force of emotion in their arguments are doomed to be its unwitting slaves. I've never seen anybody who claims to be ultra-logical who actually puts down his axioms and produces theorems from them in a formal and correct way. Instead, they use the term 'logic' as a content-less emotional blugeon to dismiss people who weight evidence differently from them or disagree with their values. These are the people who are so blinded by their emotions they mistake their subjective preferences for objective reality.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The above provides an excellent example of my point about political ranting. In the original post, I (quite deliberately) had nothing to say about the relative ecological morality of Europeans vs. Native Americans, the role of politics in the practice of science, or the objectivity and ethical responsibilities of scientists. I merely pointed out an aspect of the biology and history that struck me as interesting. I am all for working to understand the larger social context of scientific theories, but this needs to start with a real attempt to understand the data rather than a with a reflexive leap to defend pre-existing ideological positions. In the interests of full disclosure, my own ideological position is that biology is so much deeper than politics that the attempt to see the former through the narrow filter of the latter is an all too common prescription for foolishness. In the interests of staying on topic, a larger way to make my original point would be to say that the research into possible causes of the North American megafauna reminds us again of a major theme in 20th century science: a rejection of dogmatic Uniformitarianism (not Unitarianism! ;^) and a growing appreciation of the role of catastrophic events (some perhaps man-made) in shaping the modern world. Clearly this is a topic with potential political, philosophical, and even religious implications, but this is one biologist (and Unitarian!) who finds this a call for further study and reflection rather than for a tirade on slashdot.
One interesting side point on the subject of New World Mass Extinctions is its implications for how we think about Native American cultures as seen by the Europeans after Columbus. Typical European portrayals depict the Native Americans as existing in a pristine aboriginal state of Nature. What we can see now is that North America at the time of the first European colonists had actually undergone enormous environmental upheaval in the previous several thousand years. What the Europeans saw was not an original state but a hard won equilibrium. The striking harmony with nature seen in many Native American tribes was itself the product of a long process of natural selection.
As an aside, as a biologist and a grownup, I find it dispiriting to see the fraction of posts on biological topics that degenerate into sophomoric political ranting (invariably from non-biologists with a very shallow grasp of the topic). Even the simplest biological phenomenon -let alone something as complex as a whole ecology- is so much deeper and more complex that our simple political theories that it is just foolish to try to score polictical points by making the biology fit one's ideological preconceptions. Please, for the sake of the readers, keep the political ranting somewhere else and spend some time actually learning the biology.
Let me ask you a couple of questions:
Do you think that is is morally and ethically acceptable for you to toy with something before killing it?
Assuming you are not in danger, do you consider it more noble to kill something or not to kill something?
Imagine for a moment that God exists and has appeared before you at a young age and given you a choice to make for your future. You may either become a fisherman who kills sharks for their fins and becomes very wealthy, or you may become a low-paid doctor in a small urban community. Which would you chose?
You'd think that at a web site devoted to computers, nerds and logic, we would be immune to fellatious arguments
Nope, your post disabused me of that notion.
I expect the green factions on Slashdot (oddly enough, they overlap with the Communist factions, and if you can name a greater despoiler of the environment than the Godless commies, name one, cf. the Caspian Sea has shrunk in half due to Communist environmental degradation and water diversion
Wow, that's such a list of logical fallacies, I can't pick which one to point out first. Let's start with the straw-man:
"green factions" "overlap with the Communist factions"? Ok, you don't support this thesis, but there, you've made the statement. Not having backed it up, you will of course refrain from using it as the foundation for futher argument, and get to your original point? Nope, "Godless commies" (appeal to fear/ignorance). "despoiler of the environment"... gee, Dr Potter, are all Godless commies despoilers of the environment? That must mean that all "green factions" are commie, tree-burners too, right? Strawman: 0, Slashdot: 1
will soon be out in force declaring man to be the most heinuos figure of environmental disaster
Strawman #2
instead of our Lord's crown of creation
Offtopic, and unsupported, but ignorable.
If it was up to those greenies
Insults are hardly a form of logical debate, but we're going for "fellatious arguments based on emotion" here, aren't we?
the human population would be 100 million, and we'd live in huts eating soybeans.
Irrational and unsupported strawman #3. I love this guy! What it must be like to be totally unfettered by reason....
The post goes on to posit that Native Americans, given guns would have wiped out the bison herds... Of course, no supporting evidence is given, so I can't really debate the point.
Can someone please mod the original post down a tad?
--
Aaron Sherman (ajs@ajs.com)
Are ALL taking this WAAAY too seriously! God and politics have nothing to do with it. The meaning of this is simple, one of my favorite poems has now come true. :)
JMR
Try e-gold - (contact me). I'm NOT e-
3: Flamebait, and rightfully so. There is nothing in the bible that excludes evolution, early man, or dinosaurs.
Go and talk to your local pastor; even if you think it would be embarassing (it won't be) there are probably hundreds of possible churches nearby. He'll have the answers.
Maybe they were just camped there eating the buffalo? Also are there a sea of buffalo bones becuase if you read the lewis and clark diaries (and you should it's very interesting) they describe waiting for three days for the buffalo herd to walk by. If you have stampeded such a herd it would seem to me you would have thousands of buffalos in one spot not just one or two.
War is necrophilia.
It's a vicous cycle. Modern farming enables 6 billion people to live thereby needing to feed 15 billion in a few years. Eventually it will fold like a house of cards.
War is necrophilia.
"Has it ever occurred to these people that animals (Surprise Surprise!) eat other animals?"
Did you ever kill a cockroach? Did you eat it?
War is necrophilia.
Actually it had nothing to do with any of that. It had to do with scarcity. In the Americas (especially the north americas) food wa plentiful and the population was low. Whenever resources got scarce in some area the tribes simply moved up the road a little and ther was more food. There was so much food from animals and plants that there was never any need to develop agriculture.
Europe and Asia on the other hand were much more populated and there was enourmous competition for food and fertile land. It is because of this reason that cities were born, armies were raised, animals were domesticated. The Europeans after waging non stop wars for centuries had perfected the art of killing humans in ungodly numbers.
War is necrophilia.
If I recall the theories that have been put forward regarding the Wrangell mammoth population was that they survived on that island becuase there was less competition there from other large herbivores which were better suited to the changing climate. Man had been coexisting with mammoths for some time prior to their extinction. However, man was not a factor in thier extinction from that island, which lends some credence to the idea that climate change was a stronger influence than most other factors.
It seems unlikely that any predator would be able to sustain a population while simultaneously driving most of its prey to extinction. I don't categorically reject all the conclusions of the authors, mind you, but I will be skeptical until I learn more.
Also, there have been some thoughts that the Cro-Magnon population might have out-competed the Neandertal because they had a more diverse diet. Both ate meat almost exclusively, but the Neandertal ate exclusively large game while the Cro-Magnon ate both large and small game, including birds and fish. The researcher who reported this based his findings on studies of the bone chemistry of well-preserved bones. He found almost no chemical signature associated with eating fruits and vegetables, which suprised me. I cannot find the URL for the story, or remember where I saw it, but it was very interesting. If anybody else saw it and can remember it, I'd appreciate it if you'd post a response.
if ($it != $onething) {$it = $another;}
Some of the areas that are now desert in Australia used to be covered by bush. It would appear that man came and hunted a large (hippo sized) wombat like thing to extinction which caused the underbrush to get out of hand and the resulting fires would wipe out huge areas.
I was told that there Australia has a few types of trees that lose their leaves in the summer which is the fire season. These seem to have evolved at the same point as the large animal extinctions. These also seems to be some cases where a few local plants are adapting to the new fire conditions brough in by the european trees.
Keep in mind that there are places in Australia that are about the same climate as they had for the last million or so years.
Anyone will tell you it's a prisoner islandHidden in the summer for a million years -Icehouse
You can make your point without insulting people's beliefs.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Judging from the comments, it seems as though the best way to get modded up is to express a view from the far right or far left. So I doubt this post will get very far :(
;-)
In my short stay on Earth, I've learned on important fact about science: no one knows a damned thing. I'm not trying to knock scientists; in fact, I'm currently studying so that I can work in the bioinformatics field. However, in reading books on the subject, and listening to professors, I've found this phrase quite often: "Well, xxx _seems_ to work this way, but we're not exactly sure how or why."
That's when I'm getting the information directly from someone "in the field". When I listen to things from general news sources, I've found that they tend to filter those statements out. So that every scientist is reported as being much more sure than they really are.
This is how we get "science proves that eggs are good for you (high protein, etc.)" one year, and "science proves that eggs are bad for you (high cholesterol, etc.)" a few years later. And of course, both are stated as absolute, undeniably-proved facts.
All in all, I tend not to believe "science" as reported by the general news. When I read it in a science publication, I give it a little more weight. Although, it's best to remember that this isn't a perfect world, so science is affected by society.
For instance, around the 1920's science "proved" (through our vast knowledge of genetics) that whites were genetically superior to blacks, that criminalism was genetic, etc. This folly could almost be amusing in it's naivete (sp?), if so many people were not sterilized to keep their "inferior" genes out of the gene pool. Unfortunately, this is one of many examples of society leading science, and not the other way around.
All in all, if I read this in a reputable scientific publication, and the majority of scientists believe this theory several years from now, I may believe it. Otherwise, I'm going to be just a touch skeptical
If you're going to claim something as being false, just remember that everything can be faked, so fo everything that you can prove, someone else can disprove it.
The great flood? Real. Was it world wide? No. Was it everything in the scope of the writer's known world? Most likely.
[Imagine if in 1993 that we didn't have today's communication network, and we lived in the Mississippi flood plain.... if you weren't in a boat, everything you've ever seen in your life might have easily been wiped off the earth].
Moses may not have parted the tides, but based on data to estimate the time [when there's a total solar eclipse over the area which coincides with a major locust year], there were abnormalities, combined with low tide, which could have resulted in the river being significantly low.
Science has proved that almost every item _could_ have happened. That does not mean that these things were an act of a higher power [unless you consider physics to be a higher power], but it strongly suggests that these things happened, as it's just a freaky coincidence otherwise.
People who are can't figure out why something happened tend to make up something. That's how almost all religions start. When people can't explain a 'miracle' that they've obviously seen with their own eyes, they're willing to believe in higher powers.
That's not to say that there aren't things that have gotten blown out of proportion over the years. [Is the 'loaves and fishes' story about a guy who took a knife and cut everything into smaller pieces, only people doubled the number of servings with each retelling?]
Now, that's not to say that there isn't use for religion. Personally, I'm going to go with what Rufus said in Dogma, that it's better to have ideas that beliefs, as you can change ideas. However, religion can have a major calming effect on populations where there would be no reason to go on living otherwise. [The whole 'God works in mysterious ways' argument] Religion is infinately more effective in controling a population than government is, as to someone who believes, hell is a much scarier place than prison will ever be, even if they take the TVs away.
Religion seems to be one of the few institutions that still instills a sense of morality on people these days, and it's a major thing which many people are simply not being taught these days, as their parents divorced, and they're both working to make ends meet, and so no one's home to watch the kids, so they decide to take a few guns and shoot up their school....
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
"Guns don't kill bison! Bison kill bison!"
But you yourself provide evidence that it's a self-limiting phenomenon:
> All the high school kids expected to follow thier dads into the local mills. But, we cut the trees faster than the trees would grow. Some companies survived cutting second or third growth. But the scale had to be incredibly restricted. Most of the kids are doing things other than working in the lumber mills.
"Where are we gonna work now that the trees are gone?
Will the big boss have us wash his car, or maybe mow his lawn?
I'm a man, I'm a man, I'm a lumberjack man, but I fear it ain't for long, so tell me
Where are we gonna work when the trees are gone?"
- Mojo Nixon and Jello Biafra
As we run low on fish, fishing becomes a less-viable source of life. Old fishermen find something else to do, or go on welfare, or are supported by their families. Their kids don't become fishermen to begin with. Within 50 years, fishing as a way of life dies out. Eventually, a few large boats keep fish stocks at a constant level, and provides the population with fish.
Natural selection? Here's natural selection for you - In all probability, much of the native population simply starved to death when they ran out of large herbivores to eat, and winter came. But this is what happens when any new predator is introduced to a region - prey numbers decline, predator population grows until there's insufficient prey to support the predator, and then the predator population crashes.
It doesn't matter whether the "new technology" is GPS (Homo Sapiens, 20th century), spears (Homo Sapiens, -250th century), or big claws (Big-assus Saber-tooth-tigerus, 10M BC ;-).
I'm not taking sides on the enviro-debate here. I'm just pointing out that we're not "destroying the ecosystem" - we're part of the ecosystem.
The environmentalist argument is usually phrased along the lines that human activity is somehow bad because it's bad for other species. ("Save the Whales! [because they're cute and humans are icky]")
I'd submit there's an equally valid "rational self-interest argument" to be made that certain human activities are bad because they're bad for our food sources, and could lead to a population crash of the human population. ("Save the Plankton, [because if we run out of plankton, the hell with the whales, what are we gonna eat next week?]!")
(Of course, as an American, I'm not terribly concerned. If it happens, a population crash will wipe out the poor/subsistence economies first. There will continue to be plenty of food for the rich industrialized nations for the 20-30 years while the devastated areas recover. And with a post-crash population of 1-2 billion, there'll be tons of food to go around after the crash. Hey, bring it on! :-)
Anthropology in the News has links to a lot more news stories on these findings. The BBC story is very short, but noteworthy for including a little bit of information on the dating methods used in the Australian case.
Anthropology in the News updates a lot and doesn't keep stuff on its front page for very long, so for the sake of Slashdot's archives, I'm copying the links here.
--
The scalloped tatters of the King in Yellow must cover
Yhtill forever. (R. W. Chambers, the King in Yellow)
The scalloped tatters of the King in Yellow must cover
Yhtill forever. (R. W. Chambers, the King in Yellow
A lot of research over the last 10 or 20 years has indicated that humans have been here for at least twice that long, with verified evidence of human presence dated to 20k or 3k years ago, and with some tentative evidence of humans being here as long as 50k years ago. I grant that this settlement wouldn't have been all at once, and maybe there was an increased wave of migration during the timeframe in question, but the fact remains that these researchers picked an (out of favor) date of human settlement and then massaged their research to fit that timeframe.
That's bad science, and the reporter was negligent not to call them on it, either directly or by bringing in an anthropologist that would have raised the point. It's this sort of sloppy research and sloppy reporting that allows pseudo science to flourish. There may have been an interesting fragment of new knowledge at the heart of this research, but I (as a science nerd)am no closer to understanding it now than I was before, and the average non-technically literate reader could well be even more confused now.
This is terrible.
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
Comment removed based on user account deletion
We couldn't decide which movieto watch. I for myself like to go to the IMDB and read the reviews to get an idea. She told me that film critcs are biased by peopels personal likings, that some might have been paied by the studios to give good critics and all that. There was no point argueing her. She was right. But then I asked her what she was relying upon to choose her film. Then she told me that she like to see the pictures shown infront of the cinemas and that she tries to get an idea looking the trailers...
So I guess there are many points for not believing sciences. They had been wrong before and they will make mistakes in the future. But what are the arguments for creationalism? I'd like to hear some of them.
Humankind: the only species capable, and dumb enough to wipe out prior species, and themselves.
uh huh huh.... :-)
He said "fellatio"
---- It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. It does this whenever it's told.
the humans brought 2 mammals with them - rats and dogs - and also started to hunt the indiginous Moas (think ostrich/emu but twice as big) within about 800 years all the moa species were extinct - and in the process large parts of the ground cover had been burnt and, in places, the topsoil blown away (there are whole mountains covered in nothing but shingle still today) - the result was wide spread, lasting ecological damage - as a side effect of hunting these species to extintion.
We have this myth of indigenous cultures as having this close affinity with the land ... and in fact the polynesian people who came to NZ had a well developed system for managing and protecting their fisheries that must have developed over the centuries surviving on small islands totally dependant on the sea. But when they came to NZ none of that applied to the land and the promptly did what europeans have done moving to new places (think buffalo, whales, etc) - slaughtered everything in sight assuming it was infinite and supply would last for ever - rather taking more of a controlled (farming like) approach to resource management. I suspect that sanity in resource management is sadly something you learn by screwing up badly - and as the Moa shows sometimes by the time you realise that it's a problem it's too late
Read this book by Tim Flannery (if you can get your hands on one - it's out of print). It details exactly the process by which man, on arrival in a land not adapted to them, extinguished most edible species within a few hundred years. This did not happen in Africa and Asia (until recently) since the fauna there was adapted to man.
Bottomquark coverd the story that appeard on Scientific American's website last week... i'd like some NEWs here!
"The best laid plans of mice and men gang oft agley..." - ROBERT BURNS
...on the subject can be found here.
--
May we live long and die out
When I am writing this reply, the post from Erikson has got (Score:5, Informative). Who are the stupid cavemen moderating this up? WE LIVE IN THE 21st CENTURY! We know about evolution, dinosaurs, the big-bang et al. Creationism is a myth! There is not one scientific fact in creationism. Not one.
I'll do it for cheesy poofs.
I have been taught and have taught science. Yes sir. As a scientist I try to demonstrate theories with facts. I teach facts and not myths. I tell my students to be critical and not to believe at face value what they are told (even by me) or what they read (even from Darwin). Then they decide by themselves. Is that too liberal for you? You would prefer them to be brain-washed from an early age with the bible or whatever other book. That's your prerogative. That's not what I do.
I'll do it for cheesy poofs.
Surely you're just a troll but I'll bite anyway...
If God went through the trouble of instantaneously creating the universe, evidently "with age" as many have said, in order to make it appear to be billions of years old and be consistent with scientific observations, then why did He gloss over such details like the radio halos in granite or whatever? If you're gonna create the universe With Age, do it right, and don't skimp on the details! Either 1) God isn't perfect, or 2) God intentionally "missed" certain things for some reason.
-CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
Early man's hunting the cause of extinction?
I doubt this is plausable, looking at the population of early man, where they lived, and
their hunting techniques it's doubtful that early
man was a notable contributor to the extiction
of any large species.
I have no
Like Don Knuth and Larry Wall?
To me, even more interesting is whether or not man killed off Neandertals. These guys were all over Europe for a very long time, and they were smart enought to fight back. A war with them would have truly been "World War One".
It's possible, but it's only a possibility among others. The only thing we know about interactions between Cro Magnon (the modern man) and Neanderthal is that they actually existed. Other than that, the evidence is scarce, and it's difficult to figure out. As of now, we think that Neanderthal were simply displaced by Cro-Magnon (modern man) immigrants who pushed them further and further, until they got "cornered" in southern Spain and Gibraltar, then eventually disappeared altogether. Interbreeding was long thought impossible, but recent evidence indicates that it was. Maybe we (white men of European descent) all have Neanderthal genes. Maybe not. We don't know.
The first genocide in history probably happened quite some time later, between two kind of people belonging to modern mankind: mongoloids and blacks: it was the destruction of Australian-like Aborigines (i.e. Blacks) by Northeast-Asians (i.e. the ancestors of what you call "Native Americans"). We have some archeological evidence, and more surprisingly, we even have documents !
However, even in this case, it is very possible that actual fighting only took a minor role, and that the first inhabitants were simply driven out of their lands further and further, up to Terra del Fuego (the island that forms the other side of the Magellan Strait).
When the number of years exceeds four figures, the only thing we know is that we hardly know anything.
Thomas Miconi
What weenies, it took those guys thousands of years to cause mass extinctions. _WE'RE_ accomplishing the same goal in decades!
Then we can kill and eat those animals again. I can't wait to try a wooly mammoth steak. With a side of bald eagle and passenger pigeon. And whale for dessert.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Sahir- Maybe before spouting off about Christianity and making yourself look like an idiot why not do some research on the subject? After all it is something that always has a lot of research happening about its various periods. Oh...and heres another hint: religion existed long before Jesus. One other question: have you actually *read* the Bible to have any idea what it really says?
My blog: http://jkratz.dyndns.org/~jason/blog/
Religion is a mind-controlling device invented by a certain Jewish huckster named Jesus of Nazareth 2000 years ago.
Just a nitpick. Religion is much older than 2000 years. You said it yourself, Jesus was Jewish. There were many other faiths all over the world thousands of years before that. Perhaps you meant Christianity??
"The obvious is that which is least understood and most difficult to prove." -- A fortune cookie
Once Fred and Barney got SUV's, it was all over for Dino.
Unfortunately, you are not superior to nature. If you really believed in Ayn Rand's philosophy, you would follow two of the basic premises: a) reality is what it is, and b) logic is the only absolute. Logic dictates that if you drive many animals to extinction and greatly upset the cycle of nature, you will eliminate your own means of survival. The reality is that you will die. You are not superior to nature, as much as you'd like to believe; that is the reality.
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
well if you deny God's existence you could believe that.
The issue of God is irrelevant to this point.
However, for me, Genesis 1:26 applies... I have dominion over everything non-human on the earth.
You seem to be confusing two issues. Dominion over something does not indicate superiority to that thing. Dominion is the ability to exercise control. You are right that Man has dominion over the Earth because we have the capability to completely obliterate it if we wanted to. Or we could be more selective and completely wipe out only one life form. That is dominion if I've ever heard it.
However, you are not superior to nature in that you depend on nature to sustain you. Nature on the other hand, does not depend on your existence. If you depend on something you are not superior to it - especially if it does not depend on you. If you don't give back to nature what you take from it, then you will eventually exhaust it's resources and you will die. Humans are different from other creatures in that we have the capacity to recognize our dominion and that we can cause our own destruction. It's unfortunate most people don't realize this.
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Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
You've just demonstrated why so-called "pure logic" is difficult to use as a good basis for making decisions.
:-)
:-) (see my response to him if you'd like to see why) He has put forth the argument that humans can obliterate nature if they like and replace all this land with farms for our own purposes. He hasn't stated it as clearly or bluntly, but that's what his argument boils down to.
I have never encountered any situation where so-called "pure logic" has not provided the best solution to a problem/issue. If you come across a situation where you have two contradicting solutions to the same problem, you have made an error(unless you can provide me with a counter-example).
Both of you have "logical" arguments that come to very different conclusions, opposite conclusions actually
If our conclusions are different, there are two possible reasons: a) one of us is wrong, or b) we are trying to accomplish different things. In a case like this where the argument has no direction(ie. we are not trying to accomplish anything), one of us is wrong. In this case, I am right.
One of you is no more "right" than the other, but you both think the other is wrong.
No, I am right.
Just to add my own $0.02, you'd be hard pressed to say that farms are not nature.
Of course they are. They are an imitation of a stripped-bare nature based solely on our needs. Due to our limited understanding of how nature actually works, farms are severely lacking in what is actually needed for a sustainable existence. That's why he's wrong.
They're just a small part of nature contained but still subject to the larger overall system that includes sunlight, rain, soil, and many other things that are hard (or impossible) to replicate on a large enough scale to feed everyone.
Impossible to currently replicate especially since we don't fully understand even 10 percent of it. That's why it's unsustainable, and that's why he's wrong.
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
So you are saying that relieving Nature of a single species does not impact Nature because Nature is not dependent upon a certain species? How does that jive with your position that destroying species one by one, as Man is wont to do, will destroy Nature?
Excellent point. Destroy one species and nature will most likely adapt in it's absence. One species is usually not so important to the overall system that it would collapse in its absence; life and nature has alot of built-in redundancy. But obviously, the more you destroy, the more likely it'll be the straw that broke the camel's back so to speak.
Also, humans are at the top of the food chain if you hadn't noticed. Nothing depends on us for food or sustenance, or... anything for that matter. Being at the top of the chain means that eliminating you would have the least impact on the overall system.
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
That is clearly false. Eliminating the top of the food chain would result in the proliferation of the species in the second link of the food chain. This in turn could upset any necessary balance that supports the food chain many links below.
Yes of course. But then second links' food supply goes low as their population increases and they start dying of starvation until the population and food supply balances out. It's not a catastrophic occurrence; it happens in nature all the time.
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Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
I want you to think about your position for a minute. Man has the ability to eliminate every single life form on this planet including himself. Can nature recover from that? No. Therefore Nature cannot self-correct any damage Man can do. It's as simple as that.
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Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
it comes down to values and beliefs. And those aren't based on logic.
:-)
So please tell me, if they are not based on logic, what are they based on?
My response to the fetus challenge is coming...
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
Now this served as an example evaluation. Had I chosen a slightly different definition of human being, the process would have resulted in a different conclusion. There is no logical way I can reach a contradictory result. Say I define a human as follows: Now should a fetus be protected? Yes. A fetus has the proper genetic composition, can act(as pregnant women can attest to the kicking) and can even think in limited ways since they respond to stimuli. See? No contradiction.
Perhaps then, you were asking "what defines a human being?" Well that's a MUCH more difficult question to answer. Let's ponder this together shall we? I will use what I believe to be your criteria for what constitutes a human being(though I may not share your opinion). We are searching for the simplest(read:shortest) definition that fits your criteria of human while simultaneously excluding everything else. You believe a newborn is a human being, but human cells are not. Somewhere between fertilization and birth a collection of growing cells becomes a human being. So now we must find a set of criteria for determining what this point might be.
Is a squirrel a human? I'm sure you'll agree with me when I say no. So only a life form with a human genetic composition can be classified as human. That's requirement 1. This category is too broad though; cells easily fit here but you've already stated that simple human cells are not a human being(and I agree). Therefore, we must find a general dividing line to separate human cells and human beings. How about this: a human being is an entity composed of human cells. That's the tightest definition you can use; it effectively cuts off only human cells from being a human. This is requirement 2.
But what about a human liver? It's an entity composed of human cells and has human genetic composition, but clearly it's not a human being. So we must narrow our definition further. Here's my next suggestion: a human being must have the basic anatomical features of a human being necessary for sustaining its life. By necessary anatomical features I mean stuff you couldn't live a day or two without, ie. organs such as heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, brain, etc. Not necessarily feet, hands,eyes, ears or other non-essentials. Therefore, people born with physical deformities are still human. If they were born without an essential organ they would no longer be alive. So now we have eliminated organs and cells with a tight definition of a human being: This definition is sound because it is general and simple enough to encompass all human beings, yet is just tight enough to include only human beings according to your criteria(newborn == human, cells != human). Now let's see if we can apply it. I did some quick research and it appears that after 14 weeks a fetus has functioning lungs, heart and most other necessary organs. It also says that after about 20 weeks, the baby can live outside the womb. This is the point of guaranteed, minimal, necessary anatomical development. In conclusion, according to the determined definition of a human being, a fetus becomes a human being between 14th and the 20th week of pregnancy(I would have to do much more research to narrow this further) Theoretically, this point moves with the pace of fetal development, so if the fetus matures faster, it will attain human status sooner.
There, was that so hard?
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
Furthermore, think about removing beams from a bridge. You can only remove so many before it collapses(or think about Jenga for that matter ;-)
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Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
They are called nuclear weapons. We have more than enough of them to obliterate the Earth. I'm not saying say it will happen, I'm saying it could happen. We are not dealing with Bible prophecies here, we are dealing with cause and effect(ie. logic).
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Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
I don't understand your thought process here. How are we gods if we manage to wipe out the human race? Are you saying that countermanding a Bible prophecy would make you a god?
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Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
Your flaw is in thinking that your definition of what is human is logical.
:-) I would comment on your other points, but I really want to shut off this computer. ;-)
I derived it for you right there. Point out my mistake.
Some Christians say that the fetus/embryo is human the moment conception occurs.
I'm sorry, but one of the criteria is that human cells are not human beings. An embryo is a single cell, therefore it does not qualify.
If their religious beliefs are correct, then that is the logical answer.
This is something I find very amusing. You have backwards reasoning. If something is logical, then it is correct. If it is correct, then of course it's logical - it has to be otherwise it would not be correct. If you find something which is not correct but appears logical you have made an error. If you find something correct that does not seem logical you have made an error.
1) beings that cannot survive by themselves, but could with help. examples: patient with failed kidneys on a dialysis machine. patient with failed heart with an artificial heart. patient with failed lungs with an iron lung or something of the sort.
They had these vital organs to start with, but they failed during the course of their life. I think this could easily fit with the def'n I gave for a human.
2) some sort of freak chimp that is as smart/sentient/conscious as a human(I won't even get into normal chimps, which are probably on the level of small children, and which I have huge reservations about using in medical research)
3) a computer with human-level intelligence
4) some being from another planet with human-level intelligence
Perhaps they are entitled to the same or similar rights, but they are not human. My only purpose was to define human and to logically prove whether a fetus was human.
5) related to #1, a human fetus that, even if it cannnot sustain itself outside the womb, has human-like brainwaves, and can survive inside the womb
Human-like is not necessarily human.
some other people might add exceptions to the list that I don't agree with, or say some of mine are invalid. I don't think I or anyone else can give a completely logical reason for saying: this one is human, this one is not.
I could provide you with a logical reason. Like my previous post, I started with the challenges' criteria and I came to a logical conclusion. If I started with your criteria I would probably come to a different conclusion. The only problem I have with all of this is that it's essentially pointless because you have poorly defined morals. That's not to say you don't have morals, because I'm sure you do; I'm saying they are poorly defined in that you don't know exactly where any particular one comes from, you don't know why you believe in it and you probably can't provide many(if any) logical reasons why you should believe in it. In short, they are not morals or beliefs grounded in logic, they come from many (sometimes) conflicting things your parents, realtives and friends have told you while raising you.
On the other hand, if you started from scratch and logically defined all of your morals from a logical foundation there would be none of this confusion and it would be quite clear what a human being is, what would be a proper course of action etc. It's what I did, and it's quite nice IMO.
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
Your definition for a human being is arbitrary.
Not my definition. If you read my post, I explicitly stated that I might not agree with the criteria of the challenge. Theoretically, the def'n very well could be arbitrary because of different opinions, values etc. If everyone had beliefs grounded in logic, this would not be the case.
whose kidneys were destroyed by disease
When? Before birth? After? If after, then they were born human. Once you are human, you can logically extend the law to say that you are human for the rest of your life. That does not have to be part of the def'n though.
That's one of your criteria, and it's based on your beliefs of what makes a human human.
No actually it's not. I have no beliefs, I have only proof by logical conclusions.
if so, what would be the logical reason for saying that a fetus with a brain capable of thought but no kidneys isn't human, but an adult with a brain capable of thought but no kidneys is???
The reason is simple: It doesn't fit the def'n. Just as a squirrel is not human, and a fox is not a hippo. I explained why an adult who loses kidneys would still be human above. Keep in mind though, that the conclusion I came to was based on the challenge's criteria. If I were to start from scratch based on my logical morals, I am almost certain I would come to a different conclusion.
What criteria? There was none listed. The poster simply said: here are two different possible views, now you try to logically say why one is right and the other isn't. It would appear that you drew criteria out of thin(i.e. illogical) air.
Well, read the challenge again. He explicitly stated two possible conclusions. Conclusion 1 was a fetus is a human, Conclusion 2 was a fetus is no more a human being than a human cell. That logically implies that human cells are not human beings. That's where one criteria derived from: human cells != human being. According to the law, a newborn is a human being and so is protected. Therefore, newborn == human being. Consequently, somewhere between embryo(human cell) and newborn, human cells become a human being. Where is the illogic in this?
Wow, congrats. I don't think anyone in human history has been able to give a logical from the ground up definition of morality. Wonderful that you were able to...
Oh no, I am by no means the first(as I found out awhile ago). Many people have done the same to lesser or even greater degrees. Ayn Rand is one such person.
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
And why is that exactly? What is life?
Good question. I could provide my own def'n, but for our purposes I shall simply that the life of an organism is it's life in the medical def'n. Therefore someone in a coma or who has part of their brain destroyed may still be medically alive.
Perhaps you have a problem with extending the 'human being' label to the entire life span of an individual who may no longer even fit the def'n. Very well, I shall amend my previous statement and say an entity shall be protected as a human being for as long as it continues to at least partly fit the description of a human being, or for the duration of it's life, whichever happens first. I expand on this further below in response to your other comments.
Is someone who essentially has his entire brain destroyed in an accident still deserving of human rights?
Why not? If they are still a living human being (according to the def'ns we are discussing), please provide some logical argument why he/she should not have such rights.
With enough technology, it would be possible to replace pretty much every organ in your body with something artificial(even just some simply artificial brain to tell you to keep breathing and what not). Could someone(something?) like that still be said to be human?
Yes, if it once was and if it still contains human remnants(such as cells or organs). If you replaced absolutely everything with a machine such that they have no human cells left, then they no longer fit the def'n at all and can no longer be considered human. (which does not mean they don't deserve the same rights - we are just discussing a classification for a life form here) You can summarize it as follows: if they were once human, are still alive and still fulfill part of the def'n of a human being they may remain under the classification of a human being.
If not, when and why does the change in status occur? Your definition of what is human is extremely lacking.
Allow me to repeat myself again. The definition I reached in my lengthy post was not mine. It was derived from the criteria of the challenger. Even still, it is lacking how exactly? With a little thought it should be quite obvious how to apply the def'n in any situation. I have easily and logically answered all of your challenges in this and previous posts despite the fact that I don't even fully support the particular def'n I derived for the other poster.
But I am made up of human cells. Am I not a human being? So what makes me human? You are saying that a fetus with a brain but not kidneys isn't human...why?
You're kidding right? I wrote a lengthy post deriving in pain-staking detail the logical process that resulted in this conclusion. I'm not going to repeat myself. Go read it again if you're confused.
You seem to think that because you used a definition which can distinguish a clump of cells from a newborn, you have a definition that can distinguish a human from a non-human.
You seem to think I can't. Why not? Provide a counter-example that illustrates a situation where my def'n is meaningless or doesn't make sense and I will gladly revise my definition of a human being and I will fully applaud your success. I don't think you can.
ROTFL. OK, I think we're done here.
Care to explain that? So far I have found few significant logical flaws in her arguments. Please, point out any such flaws she may have made, and I will gladly agree. If you can't provide any logical argument then don't bother responding.
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
Actually, that is completely incorrect, logically.
I'm afraid not.
Logic dictates that you plan the destruction of the ecosystem in an area and plant massive farms. This will enhance greatly your species' ability to survive.
So are you telling me you can precisely predict the exact impact of exterminating a species(or many species by your logic) of plant and animal life? If you can, there's a Nobel prize waiting for you. The fact of the matter is, we know very little of the cycles that continually renew the minerals in the earth and the keep the air fresh to breath or about what animals contribute what parts to this renewal. You kill some bacteria and upset the nitrogen cycle, plants die. If plants die you may upset the oxygen cycle. Once all this starts happening, you may affect climate change because of changing atmospheric compositions. Animals will start dying because of the little plant life there is and differing levels of oxygen in the air. Humans wouldn't be able to eat since meat would run out quick, they wouldn't be able to plant since plants wouldn't grow. The only thing they could do is die. This scenario wouldn't happen overnight, but it would happen given a sufficient disturbance. Sure life may adapt, then again, it may not. Are to willing to bet your life and all your kids' lives on our ignorance of how the ecosystem actually works?
Assuming a life form is worthless simply because it appears to have no significant impact is the sign of short-sighted ignorance. Acting on ignorance is not only illogical, it's mad. Doing any such thing as you propose on a massive scale is suicide. The blind, ignorant and uncontrolled destruction we pursue nowadays is bad enough.
To preserve plants and animals in a "natural" area is not logical. It leads to the death of many people, not the large farms, which feed many.
Leaving an area alone does not lead to any deaths. Deaths are the result of incompetence in the pursuit of illogical goals(or sometimes even just incompetence in the pursuit of logical ones).
To summarize, humans are not above nature; they are a dependent(at least for the time being).
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"Goose... Geese... Moose... MOOSE!?!?!"
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
Actually mammoths didn't die off as long ago as everbody thought. There was an isolated group on an island that survived until only 5000 years ago. The thinking is that being on a remote island protected them from hunting by man which is why they survived so long. Details here, including the quote: "...surprisingly recent dates on woolly mammoth remains from Wrangel Island in 1990, ranging between 7390-4740 BP. The finds were remarkable for two reasons: they indicated mammoth survival on Wrangel Island for as much as 5000 years after the last known date of mammoths on the Eurasian continent, and they documented the evolution of a distinct dwarf mammoth population on Wrangel Island." Other theories include a virus induced extinction , but I think it was man... To me, even more interesting is whether or not man killed off Neandertals. These guys were all over Europe for a very long time, and they were smart enought to fight back. A war with them would have truly been "World War One". There is so far only one possible example of a possible human-Neandertal hybrid , so their disappearance probably wasn't from interbreeding...Let's take a poll, did humans deliberately destroy neandertals or were they the original Homer Simpsons that just died out???
(or of the great wooly Yak)
Now, when you start leveling land and killing off animals, that's stupid. But when it's natural selection or whatever, just let it go!
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Free Mac Mini
it's depressing how many of these "intelligent, open-minded geeks" show themselves to be nothing more than brainwashed bigots when it comes to discussing religion. People have been intelligently debating God and science issues for ages, and it's not about to stop because some /.er has it all figured out and dismissed it.
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"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief."
Obvious to me under my circumstances. And that statement is applicable only to me. You see, I choose to interpret on my own, pray about what confuses me, and have faith that God knows that my understandings will be flawed but my heart is in the right place.
Other folks choose to take other paths. Some need a big, centralized church with lots of fancy robed teachers to interpret for them. Some choose to follow a single charismatic voice. Others find other ways. More power to 'em. God gave 'em free will; they can use it as they wish.
Yep. I know those same people. And I look at 'em kinda funny, too. I admire their faith, but that particular viewpoint is one I choose not to share.
Speaking for myself only, of course, I've never experienced doubt creeping in. It usually charges in at a full and noisy gallop. Daily.
I don't believe God expects us to be perfect and have perfect confidence. I think He would call people who think they've attained that level of enlightenment "total assholes" or some such. (I trust He could come up with a better description, though.) After all, not even His son escaped doubt. I think He just expects us to try. And usually fail. And then to deal with it.
I dunno. I suppose some day God will clue me in. Till then, such things will bother me.
Well, God knows I don't want to look like a raving lunatic. :-)
Yep. Sure do.
Bible worship? Nah. We're supposed to worship God.
You bring up an excellent point, though, about the corruption of the scriptures. There are multiple editions being published all the time. They don't agree. So, obviously, not all Bibles can be, as a famous TV preacher used to like to say, "the inerrant word of God." I don't have a problem with that. "The Bible," meaning the inspired word of God, is without error. Having said that, though, I must immediately follow up with that fact that I doubt there's ever been a copy of the thing assembled. People have done their best to put together the fragments of those writings and the books we have today are a pretty good approximation. They get the basics right. But I've never been one to argue that, in precise detail, everything written in the most recently published book with "The Bible" embossed on the front is exactly what was originally written. Or even intended.
Maybe I just come from a long line of doubters. My grandfather, an uneducated itinerant hard-shell Baptist evangelist in depression-era rural Mississippi, taught himself both Greek and Hebrew so that he could read and study more and older versions of the Bible. He knew that "the bible" that you go buy in the bookstore today is probably more than a little different from "The Bible" that was originally hand-written by people in, essentially, direct communication with God. I agree with him.
But they're pretty close and I'll continue to use them till something better comes along.
Thanks for the correction on the phrasing. The memory isn't what it used to be and I don't have a Bible close at hand.
As for the literal Hebrew...you make a very good point. On the other hand, I have serious trouble wrapping my mind around lots of big, important concepts like the big bang and the long stretches of time in the history of the world. It wouldn't surprise me at all if the original author simply didn't have a handy word for such epochs.
I consider your point just literalism taken to an excess degree. We know that a week, on our calendar, isn't the amount of time that creation took. From that I draw the conclusion that the days in Genesis aren't literal 24 hour days. And if the last transcriber of that book in Hebrew used a word that is at odds with that conclusion, it'll be up to God to either punish me for my impertinence or congratulate me for using the brain He gave me.
I'm betting on the latter.
I admire your faith, but I separate the notion of faith in God from faith in every single bit of physical evidence on earth of His power. The evidence here is strong, but my perceptions of it are necessarily, humanly flawed. That, and the fact that anything on this earth is subject to corruption by the forces of evil, leads me to discount the physical world (though I certainly do not discard it) in favor of the supernatural, believing that that is the essence of faith.
Reasonable? Or, in your view, just wishy-washy?
Accepting evolution and the big bang as truth doesn't require rejecting religion. It doesn't even require rejecting fundamentalist Christian religion.
I've never really understood all the hoopla about this subject. There was a time, roughly the 1950s, when most of the U.S. professed to Christianity and nearly all of the U.S. was enraptured by science. If there's such a big conflict between science and creationism and evolution, wouldn't you think it would have been a big topic of debate back then? Yeah, the discussion flared up occasionally then and before (Scopes, anyone?), but most people just seemed to go along with one foot in each camp.
Or did they?
When I was a wee child, I was taught that science had most of the answers precisely because it was helping us understand the wonderful universe God had made. I was taught that God created everything in 7 days. And I was also reminded that the concept of time is pretty elastic. God probably doesn't view it like we do. Remember your Bible: "A day is like unto a thousand years."
So when I first asked about the conflict between "7 days" and "creation and evolution takes a bazillion years," I got a simple answer. To wit: "Everything in the Bible is literally true except where it's obviously intended as a parable or metaphor. In this case, of course God created the world in 7 days - 7 of His days. From our point of view, 7 of His days looks like a mighty long time. Don't get hung up on literalism and legalism. They are mere intellectual cudgels used in meaningless verbal battles between self-important idiots furiously engaged in competitive but highly transient mental masturbation." That always seemed reasonable to me.
God created everything in 7 days. The big bang and evolution are probably some of the tools he used to accomplish that task. Between those two statements, there is no conflict.
Is that so hard to accept?
YES! I have always wondered if our ancestors exterminated the Neandertals. If its true, then there is still a lot of relevance in understanding what happened.
Think about it, they WERE smart enough to fight back. It would have taken thousands of years to kill them all. And they would have killed a lot of humans in the process. A genocidal war that continued through a few hundred generations.
Now, imagine the society that would have to develop to carry this out. Humans were hunter gatherers, living in tribal groups with little communication. How would you mobilize such a scattered population? Not that there would be any sembalence of organized structure. At least no more than that shown in pogroms.
What do you think living in a perma-war culture would do to humans? To human society and values? This could really explain a lot about human nature and particularly blood lust and genocide.
It could also explain why the first thing you see in organized groups of humans is defensive structures. Not against the long gone Neandertals, but against other humans. People conditioned by generations of genocide, to use violence as a first step in competing for resources.
It doesn't actually. You are thinking that fittest means most fit, most intellegent, most capable. That is not what that word meant to people in the 19th century and not what Darwin meant.
They meant fit to mean fitting in. The specied that best fit the envronmental variables at a given time was the fittest and would survive.
The point being that there is no inference of moral, intellectual or even physical superiority.
For example, you have two species on a planet. One water dwelling, one land dwelling. During the ice ages, the land dweller would do better, because there would be more land as the water collected in ice sheets. On the other hand, during warm periods, the water dweller would do better because the ice sheets would melt, raising the water level and cutting down on the amount of land available to the land dwellers.
Some of you idiots just don't get it, do you? No?
Well, that's no surprise, it just tells us that you are even more stupid than those ancient cavemans... at least they knew that mankind _CAN NOT SURVIVE WITHOUT NATURE_, we are a part of nature, which seems to be a point that you have forgotten, human is an animal as much as any of those killed ones, we depend on food, clean water and air just as well as they did, so far I haven't seen a human that can eat rocks, breathe air full of toxins and with no oxygen, and drink contaminated water... have you?
'Cause that's the world of future if we do what your kind of people seem to think is "right", and kill all living things besides ourself and continue poisoning the atmosphere and waters...
Dunno about you, but I prefer our children to be living normally, instead of forced to live in sealed domes, eating some hydrophonically grown food, because their ancestors (that would be us, guess twice are they going to like us because what we forced them into?) destroyed the world, turning it into some strange, dead, moon-like alien rock instead of our beautiful, living home planet.
We may well be superior by power, and cold, mathematical intelligence, compared to the rest of animals, but as we lack wisdom tho use that power and intelligence, we are stupid, very plain and simple. People must learn to think about long term consequences before the immediate benefit if we are going to survive.
Hey! I'm the IT guy at the department where Richard (Bert) Roberts works. Woohoo!
Pity he's just resigned. Doh!
Tim Flannery (also mentioned in the linked article) wrote a very interesting book a few years back called The Future Eaters . It was an eye-opener for me on fire-stick farming and megafaunal extinctions due to humans in Australian prehistory. Very cool book, although the guy in the office next to me snorts in derision every time I mention it (Well, he did discover Mungo Man in 1974, the oldest known human remains in Australia - so I guess he's entitled to his opinion :) Flannery has a new book out on the ecological history of North America, The Eternal Frontier , which also looks interesting.
--
The real Captain Avatar is a fictional character, so I suppose he doesn't mind if I impersonate him.
Ai-yah! Where do I begin?
"When animals hunt other animals, it's survival of the fittest, but when humans do it, it's mass extinction?"No, when animals hunt other animals, it's hunting. When humans use their planning abilities to destroy the possibility of ever seeing a species again, much less hunting it, it's mass extinction. Let's be clear, I'm not here to pass judgement on right and wrong, and I'm not even saying animals don't cause extinctions (dogs probably have). But, I am saying that we can plan to avoid it. If you want to act like a caveman, go right ahead, but don't use it as a philisophical point in a debate. Neolithic man wasn't much for the round table format.
The rational way to use the information presented in this study would be to say: "Hmm, even before we invented chemical plants and fishing trawlers and DDT, we were able to cause mass extinctions pretty handily. We better be even more careful in the future if we expect to have a planet with plants and animals and oh, say, oxygen." The irrational way would be to raise your arms in victory and say "Yes! One for our side you mammoth bastards"
Or, you could ignore it entirely. That's what a lot of people plan to do, I'm sure.
Disclaimer: MINAA (Mummy! I'm Not An Animal!)
Syphilis. Yup, we gave them measles, smallpox, etc, and they gave us Syphilis. Hmm, doesn't say good things about our interactions with the natives, does it?
The only "intuitive" interface is the nipple. After that, it's all learned.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
However, for me, Genesis 1:26 applies... I have dominion over everything non-human on the earth. So while I don't plan to try and make everything extinct or make the earth totally toxic, I'm still superior to my dog and to any other wildlife I see (not to mention plants, soil, etc, etc).
Unfortunately, I think lots of people use this an excuse to do whatever they want, even if it makes 'everything extinct' or 'totally toxic'. The extinction/toxification becomes a side-effect, unfortunate, but too bad, we need more strip malls, anyone who says otherwise is worshipping the earth. But where do you draw the line? If 99.99% of your state's high-quality prairie is now farmland, houses and roads, isn't putting aside that last 0.01% acceptable? Would you rather have natural areas with rare animals and plants in them, or another Kwik-E-Mart?
On a sidenote, if you were God and you saw what humanity is doing with the earth (strip malls, toxic waste dumps, wiping out species that you created) that you gave him dominion over, would you be happy?
"Bugger this, I want a better world." - Jenny Sparks
Damn, where are my modpoints when I need them!? Seriously, I would give you "informative points" just to spite Jon Ericson.
---
Slagborr
Oh Jeez... :)
Of all days to not be a moderator...
Get over it and yourself.
You Christians don't even agree amongst yourselves, so how in blazes could you expect anyone else to agree with you?
Yep, moderate this as Flamebait...
Goofy, Geeky Gifts and More!
Man was created by God right? and if all these huge creatures were around, "mensmeat" might have been the prime delicacy in those times!
--> Your Wisecrack Here
Oh..My..God. Does anyone really take that hippie trash seriously? Leavers and takers indeed. Only a simpleton would think that book has deep insight into human nature. Why don't you read some good primatology research if you want some insight into human nature? Jane Goodal, et al? You know, REAL apes, not ridiculous talking gorillas. Derek
Obvious to whom? Under what circumstances? I knew people who would argue literally to the death that those were 7 24-hour days, just like days are now. Such arguments are pointless, because the Christian has his world-view, his sense of self, wrapped up in the argument: once he admits that some of the Bible might not be true, doubt creeps in. "Did Elijah the prophet really have control over bears? Did he really use that control to kill 42 little kids who were mocking him? Was that very nice? Aren't we supposed to turn the other cheek?" [2 Kings 2:23-24]
The Bible is not internally consistent, and you'd look like a raving lunatic to claim so. Thus your point of view: "Um
The Bible is a great book, but so is The Lord of the Rings. It doesn't make sense to get science, or a template for your life, from either of them.
question: is control controlled by its need to control?
answer: yes
This isn't as much "normalization" as it is "don't take so many drugs when you're designing tables."
question: is control controlled by its need to control?
answer: yes
This isn't as much "normalization" as it is "don't take so many drugs when you're designing tables."
Ah, a person who has no clue what they're talking about. Whee! :)
The issue is not the fact that humans make species go extinct - lots of animals do that. What is truly amazing is the vast numbers of animals that humans have caused to go extinct. Humans have this incredible habit of killing off every last one of every last thing that is dangerous to them when they organize in a certain area, with an efficiency no other animals are capable of.
Do you know what used to be the most widespread mammal in the world? The lion. Where'd it go? The same place almost all large preditors went. At the exact same time human remains started showing up in the regions they existed, lion fossils started to cease to exist. So did several thousand other large species. Not just mammals. Large predatory bird species, large enough to kill a child or injure an adult, were widely killed off. Same with large reptile species. Even many non-carnivores. Humans are just that way.
Don't believe it? Fine. But the timing off the fossil record is waay too detaileed to be even close to a coincidence. Wherever humans have spread in the past 60,000 years there have been mass-extinctions on the scale of the dinosaurs.
Humans have made the genetic diversities of many other species too weak to sustain themselves. You mention corn. Its hardly the only other plant we've cultivated into dependance. Have you ever seen, for example, a wild onion compared to a commercial onion? Or wild tomatoes vs. commercial? Etc? The difference in the fruit size is huge. Our cultivated crops are mockeries of their former selves. We've made them so disproportionate that they *need* us to care for them to keep them alive. We've bred this into them.
Not just animals have we killed off. Think native people used to be in touch with their environment? Read about what happened on Easter Island, or with the Anasazi. In both cases, mass-scale deforestation and desertification destroyed both their societies (in the later case, over a 120-mile radius of forest was cut down, until transportation, even over the elaborate roads and canals they made, became impossible).
And how you got "liberals" into this is just ridiculous. Bring anthropology into it next time.
- Rei
You know when it's okay to shout fire in a crowded theatre? When it's on fire.
We just need an 'Ask Slashdot' with Caveman Ogg. He can clear this right up.
"The Giant Moa (elephant bird) went extinct in New Guinea..."
Umm...what are you on about?
Are you talking about the Moa - large flightless bird that was hunted to extinction in *New Zealand*? If so:
a) How can you confuse such different countries? and
b) Where did the "Elephant" bit come from??
If not, please post a link - sounds interesting!
Zilch
(I thought it was funny)
This was also covered by the BBC a week ago.
In many ways, this was the book that really started people thinking about the influence of disease and population growth on human history.
From Amazon's page:
** The opinions expressed here are my own, and do not reflect those of my employers - past, present, or future**
This evidence of mass extinctions caused by early humans is going to rattle some people that I'd very much like to see smacked down.
In particular, there is this line of thought in environmental history that primitive humans were the "first ecologists". Many people seem really wedded to this idea to an extent that runs far, far beyond the facts. For example, the book Conquest of Paradise by Kirkpatrick Sale argues that not only were native americans environmentally enlightened, but-- by god!-- they were pretty much late 1990's liberals.
Since we know so extremely little about, say, native americans before 1000 AD, they too often serve as a sort of inkblot test. You can project your own fantasies about how people "should be" upon their culture. Not surprising, then, that a slipshod researcher like Sale "discovers" that humans in their natural state were card-carrying democrats.
Awkward facts, such as the native practice of stampeding buffalo heards off cliffs or burning entire forests to flush game get talked around in a fashion that would do ICANN proud.
The problem is that these notions do a great disservice to aboriginal people. First we colonize their land, and then we colonize their history: we run roughshod over the delicate, real evidence of their cultural history, and instead impose a fantasy history that serves our current political agenda. It's disgusting, and I'm glad to see another nail in coffin for such thinking.
I can vouch that this book is well worth the time and money. It even has a talking Gorilla. What more could you ask for?
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
I'd have to say that the idea is pretty un-likely.
Think of several factors: how many humans were there? how many animals did they kill on a regular basis? (one per week? month? how much could a 5 ton animal feed?) where were the humans located vs. the animals?
If it's any indication, we seem to find a lot more remains of animals (even of just one type) than human burials. That would seem to suggest that they were a lot smaller in population.
Just my thoughts.
.
Jake
Dating: while( 1 ){ call_girl(); get_rejected(); drink_40(); } return 0;
Oh great! Oog the caveman runs around killing and eating anything that he can get his hands on, and thinks no one will notice! Well, now we have definitive proof that he is truly the first compu-geek. Sitting at his TRS-1 and munching on a big bowl of giant armandillo shells. Well OOG, they aren't doritos, if you crunch all you want, they won't make any more! Next time you raid the fridge (or North America for that matter), leave some for the rest of us!
Speeding never killed anyone. Stopping did.
Only a simpleton would think that book has deep insight into human nature
Dear Troll,
This is a book written by one man stating his views on the world and how it came to be in its current state. I've read Jane Goodall (note the spelling!) and I can appreciate her work as well. But, instead of forming my own views and opinions, I would much rather you tell me what is right/wrong.
So, great Derek, please lead us...let us know where and when we run askew.
btw, you should get together with JonKatz...you guys could have an unfounded assumption party.
"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch." - Jack Nicholson
called Ishmael. This book has so many interesting concepts and ideas... I won't even attempt to summarize in a blurb. But Ishmael talks at length about how man puts himself in a position where he(she) is at odds with the world.
I highly recommend reading this book, as it will open your eyes to some new ideas and most of all, make you think.
Take a look at amazon
"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch." - Jack Nicholson
Funny isn't it? How humans advance that is. Back then we had to run around and kill all the animals into extinction. Today we're so advanced that we simply induce the climatic change to kill all the animals (and eventually ourseslves...erhm maybe we haven't advanced that much anyway)
-.sig sauer-
It's not that dramatic. They actually didn't start huge fires, they just used torches. And the cliffs weren't Looney Tunes style mile-high cliffs, they were more like 75-degree hills. And they only got three or four buffalo at once. You can see this at Wanuskewin, outside of Saskatoon, Canada.
Tell me what makes you so afraid
Of all those people you say you hate
- sarcasm on -
Actually, I'm also opposed to factory farming. Of all varieties. Including vegetables and grains. Think of the pain and anguish we're causing those poor plants by forcing them to grow in tightly regimented rows! Even those evil organic farmers have to go for their enslavement of the plant races. I say, if you're willing to gather it yourself, bon appetit. At least those plants get to live decent lives before we get them.
I'm also opposed to vaccines and other drugs. Think of the environmental destruction we're bringing down on all those poor viruses, bacteria, amoebae, worms, and other parasites that cause us pain. We should end this senseless destruction! We should let those diseases take their toll.
And schooling, let's not forget to eliminate that. If we were supposed to be taught in schools, they would have existed in nature. And homes, houses, electricity, heat in the winter, cooling in the summer. It's all wrong! Ban it all!
- sarcasm off -
Needless to say, I disagree with you. We should always be mindful of the potential outcomes of our activities, because there are downsides (I would prefer to see more biodiversity in our food crops, and less use of antibiotics as growth factors in farm animals, for instance). And there is no reason to cause unnecessary pain or harm to farm animals. But, restrictions and regulations should be based on real science, standards that strive mightily to be objective. Modern farming methods are far from perfect, but they manage to feed 6 billion humans daily, and they have helped to give us longer, richer, safer, healthier lives than our ancestors had. I don't want to go back to the age of the hunter-gatherer, and the agony, disease, and short life expectancy that entails....
Jon Erikson, you are a master troll, and I, for one, salute you. Some swine seem not to have recognized or appreciated your pearls, however.
Anything NOT worth doing is NOT worth doing well...
Whilst it can be seen as amusing. This guy actually believes this stuff. He's a last fridayist. He doesn't deserve to be moderated up.
Check out his other postings, including the one about his wife's menstruation being a sin...
What a loon.
In this case I would be intrigued to know what he thinks about the frozen woolly mammoths that have been found in the Russian tundra... actually no, on second thoughts, I don't care.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"Science is the worlds biggest jigsaw puzzle. We've connected up hundreds of thousands of pieces, some of the sky and quite a lot of the bits of the earth, and it's like you're sitting there going: you've made these 6 mistakes! It doesn't fit!
Jigsaw puzzles don't fall on a few mistakes (if these are mistakes), jigsaw puzzles have their own internal consistency, and so does nature.
Take one "Origin of the species" and come back in the morning. Hopefully your religion will have cleared up by then. On the web at a browser near you.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"No. You are saying these pieces don't fit, THEREFORE these theories don't fit. But you're missing the other 100,000 pieces that DO fit.
Unfortunately for you. Darwin is true, verified science. We can read the genome well enough to see the entire family tree of life. Everything is interrelated. You and every other person shares 50% of their genes with bananas, and that's because we have a common ancestor. There is no reasonable doubt that Darwinian evolution has happened. In your language evolution is a fact. Hard, hard evidence.
Another example. Wheat. Wheat is a mutation. We know this, because it's very recent and the mutation has been studied. A random mutation. Actually wheat is almost sterile. You have to winnow it to allow it to propogate. So it stuck for one reason and one reason only. A person walking past spotted it, and manually propogated it. Random mutation plus selection. Unnatural selection in that case...
Oh BTW. Theories. You've been had. Totally suckered. Formally, 'theory' is the scientific name for any law, concept or set of laws or concepts. It has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with doubt or absense of trust. I can equally claim that you have a theory of God; you would call it 'belief'. And we'd mean exactly the same thing, (actually there's a lot more evidence for scientific theories!)
e.g. Einsteins Special Theory of Relativity is substantiated thousands of times per day in cyclotrons all around the world. Even GPS (a navigation system used by aircraft, cars ships and boats) is off by literally miles without corrections that can only be derived using the theory. There is no doubt but that this theory is true; its a law and a fact. As certain as water flowing down hill.
Like evolution. Genes don't lie.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!">Theories are hypothesis with insufficient evidence to be laws... What do I mean?
>Theories have a few pieces of 'evidence' that support it, but not SUFFICIENT 'evidence' for it to be a law."
I'm glad your such an expert on the technical use of scientific language. Tell me, how many scientific papers have you actually read lately? Do you have any scientific qualifications? Or do you write dictionaries? Are you a lexicographer by profession? Who the hell are you to tell the scientific community what a word they use in a technical sense means?
'Cos I got news for you buddy- that ain't what a theory is. Thank you for playing.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!">A law is an observation of an occurence, such as the law of gravity. The law states that gravity occurs, but does not seek to explain why. There are innumerable THEORIES of gravity that seek to explain why.
Negatory. Newton's law of gravitation in fact is a theory. It is a theory that nature agrees with the law. In fact it has since been discovered that nature doesn't follow Newton's law, and does follow Einstein's general theory. Newton's law of gravity in fact has been disproven.
Unsurprisingly, modern physics now uses 'law' and 'theory' interchangeably.
>A scientific theory is NOT law, and it is NOT fact.
I have a theory. My theory is that I won't see anything in the cup in my hand when I look next. Gee, my cup really was empty. My theory is proven. So it is possible to prove some theories which can be explored via exhaustive search; or atleast come up with extremely persuasive evidence that amounts to turning the theory into a fact.
I know where you are coming from. But taking your argument to a reasonable conclusion, you are saying that there is no such thing as a fact ever.
So what is a fact in a scientific sense? It's the simplest theory that has good evidence to support it, and no known disproof.
By that standard, Newton's law isn't a fact, but Einstein's General Theory of relativity is.
>In science, a theory is an idea that has withstood the test of time and has not yet been disproven. You can NOT prove a theory. Never. EVER. You can only disprove it by experimentation.
An interesting scientific theory. Can you prove it?
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"This looks suspiciously like an attempt to disprove the validity of the fields of archaeology with (guess what) more archaeology.
--
NO TOUCH MONKEY!
OT, but I'm guessing you saw that giraffe killed in an anthropology class of some kind. I saw that one in college, too. There's a sort of behind the scenes part you may not have seen that my professor showed us: the giraffe was actually killed by a couple bushmen standing behind the camera with rifles. Too funny.
...can be directly traced to the sudden appearance of strange double-archlike structures built throughout the American landscape.
Most of these "arches" were made out of two pairs of crossed mammoth tusks, and a good deal of butchered mammoth carcasses were found not too far away, either.
One popular theory is that various tribes would expend a great deal of additional energy hunting, butchering, cooking and trading mamomth meat in exchange for other staples of life, such as clothing. A great many mammoth skins with the double-arch "logo" emblazoned on them have been found buried nearby as well.
Evidence indicates that the meat was cut up into large lumps, pressed into discs, and then roasted between two highly-heated rocks. There appears to have been a rivalry between two factions, one who used heated rocks and another who chose to heat the meat directly over the fire...
Honorary Member of Jackie Chan's Kung Fu Process Servers
To me this shows something different. We have heard time and time again that Native Americans and other indigenous (sp?) people from Australia and other continents live at one with the land, taking only what they need.
1) There are many demonstartions of Indians driving entire Buffalo herds over cliffs since that was easier than having to hunt 5 or 10 at a time.
2) Early man was not at one with the land, any more than man today is at one with the land.
3) Early man seemed to have some drive to eat meat... makes you wonder why, if we'd be better off as vegetarians.
I demand a million helicopters and a DOLLAR!
1880's, that is.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
They found that the mass extinction occurred around 46,400 years ago, give or take 3,000 years.
Indeed. Not to mention that, if CNN quoted him accurately, the idiot quotes a figure with more significant figures than his margin for error ("Hey Roberts, are you sure it's not 46,500?")
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
During the periods under discussion, hunting implements were extremely crude. I don't think to many of our ancestors used stone boardheads on the end of spears to decimate heards of pre-historic animals. Most of the animals taken were by a large group of people and usually the old or injured animals only. Mother nature didn't outfit all these areas with "Cliffs" so as to kill animals with either. Once again a case of scientist fitting data to a pre-conceived theory.
Obviously one Neandertal survives to this day here man didn't hunt these primitive peoples or any prehisotric animals to extinction!
Excuse me, but I was wondering. How much did Dreamworks pay for this advertisement?
Go Kathryn Thurber!
This guy traces America's lag in technological development (pre-colonization, that is) to: - the lack of domesticable crops; - the N-S orientation of the continent; - the lack of useful domesticable animals. The latter also account for America being devoid of human viruses (someone mentionned smallpox. why didn't they have an equivalent?). So if this theory is correct (and it's been around for a long time), the humans colonizing America doomed themselves by overexploiting their land. Not that other colonizers behaved differently, but the local animals, evolving along with humans for a much longer time had a better chance. Now, you say the human specie is vastly superior to anything else on the planet. Correct. Significantly, we can thing about the consequences of our actions. Now for more than years. I believe pharmaceutical firms still have people foraging new molecules in plants or animals. We still need nature around. So it might be a good idea not to mess things up too much. Which is why nuclear plants are a Good Thing.
One of the greatest lies that historians have ever told is that the continent that we now refer to as North America was inhabited by "native peoples" at the time of its discovery by Columbus. This, as true history has shown, is sheer poppycock; it is a nefarious fantasy concocted in the minds of those who wish to control our collective destinies. Not only are there no contemporary documents that support the existence of these fantasy "natives", the people who are responsible for inventing them have never been particularly secretive about their true motives.
It is interesting to note that in the late 1950s, no American (indeed, no person) had ever even heard of these so-called "native Americans." But then, in the 1960s, stories of them suddenly started appearing seemingly from nowhere. Your next-door neighbor started relating stories from his great-grandmother about "Injun attacks." Schoolchildren started to get educated about the different "tribes" and "nations" of these people, and yet not one parent demanded to see evidence of their existence. Our children were taught stories about how the great white pioneers of this nation supposedly plundered these peoples and took their land from them, and our children felt ashamed.
Of course they felt ashamed! That's the whole reason these fantasy "native Americans" exist! They were invented by radical leftist agitators at Berkeley in the early 1960s. The primary purpose that these mythical "Indians" serve is to instill false guilt in white people. They exist to make the Chosen People of this land feel badly about their own history and heritage, and that is a thought crime. Liberalism is about (first and foremost) the hatred of self and love of collective. To that end, this nation's leftists felt it necessary to invent an entire imaginary race of people that were "pillaged" by this continent's Anglo-Saxon discoverers. The goal: to make this nation's guardians hate themselves and their heritage, and be sympathetic to that which is alien and unacceptable.
The truth, of course, is that none of these stories has the least bit of credibility; despite repeated requests from the conservative community, liberals have been unable to produce a single "native American." And so we must file this lie in the same trash dumpster as the (extremely overexaggerated) stories of so-called "slavery" of the 1800s. Patriots must constantly guard their country from its enemies, and we must realize that more today than ever before, its enemies are more likely to attack from within.
Jon Erikson, IT guru
It is the scientific theory that prehistoric people moving for the first time into new geographical areas during their spread around the world invariably hunted large animals into extinction.
The scientific theory? Already we can see the hubris of the professional scientist at work here, portraying one of several such "theories" as the only game in town. Well, I'm sorry to say it here on such a liberal hive of scientism, but there's another game in town, and one which has more proof behind it than a few elephant tusks dug out of the ground.
There were no mammoths! Nor dinosaurs, nor any of these so-called "extinct species" that have been placed in the ground by God Almighty. It's all a myth concoted by the liberal agitators intent on supressing the humanist notions that the Bible teaches us, that people can better themselves without prostrating themselves before the holy god of the State.
Don't belive me? Well, there's evidence! Yes, despite what the liberals would tell you, there is plenty of evidence that the Lord created the world not that long ago. For instance, radio halos in grantie can only be explained by instantaneous creation. And the thousands of skeletons and chariots found at the bottom of the Gulf of Aquaba - with no boats! - perfectly matches the Bible's story, as do a thousand other pieces of historical information that archaeologists have uncovered over the years.
No, we owe nothing to these pseudo-scintific theories that exist only to allow the liberals to continue their pogrom against those that see beyond their hateful lies. Do yourself a favor, and get down to a church on Sunday to find out what real truth is.
Jon Erikson, IT guru
We know about evolution, dinosaurs, the big-bang et al.
And how do we "know" indeed? Yes, that's right, because you've been told so! And who by? The liberals in charge of "educating" our young, that have made it impossible to have decent Christian teachings taught in schools because it would let people see the lies they have wrought throughout our society!
Creationism is a myth! There is not one scientific fact in creationism. Not one.
See how you've been indoctrinated into hate? That is the legacy of the liberal - hatred of their fellow man and a love of the State. See here for why Creationism is scientifically proven, and that currently cosmology is nothing more than a tool of the Godless in their purge of Christianity.
Jon Erikson, IT guru
As usual, wheneve the issue of ancient history (where ancient mean "before last Friday"), the flaming Jesus freaks emerge from their self-flagellating to inflict their disgusting morals and creation myths on rational people.
Of course we do. Whenever nonsense like this is released from another liberal brainwashing centre, then it is the duty of all concerned Christians to fight back, to show to people that the Truth of history is already out there in bookshops, churches and missions across the world!
For any truly rational person, persuing wild theories about hairy elephants and "giant lizards" is a waste of time and energy, and playing directly into the hands of the anti-humanist liberals.
Let me give you a hint: Science works. I don't need proof of that.
See how you have been brainwashed! You attack me for not having proof (despite it sitting here on my desk at work!) and then go on and claim science doesn't need any. How hypocritical of you! But then again, the Bible does warn about the hypocrites. Thankfully, they will receive their just reward.
Religion is a mind-controlling device invented by a certain Jewish huckster named Jesus of Nazareth 2000 years ago. 2000 years!
If you believe that, you are even more profoundly ignorant than I had thought.
There is *no* proof for any facet of creationism. Not one.
As I said before, radio halos found in granite, the decay rate of planetary magentic fields, the amount of interplanetary dust and many more. But you obviously haven't taken the time to find out these things, sure in your smug liberal ideology.
Why doesn't he open his big mouth anymore, Jon?
Why should be have to? All the evidence is already there!
Jon Erikson, IT guru
well if you deny God's existence you could believe that. However, for me, Genesis 1:26 applies... I have dominion over everything non-human on the earth. So while I don't plan to try and make everything extinct or make the earth totally toxic, I'm still superior to my dog and to any other wildlife I see (not to mention plants, soil, etc, etc).
The Hebrew word for 'day' in Gensis there is pronounced "yowm" and means a LITERAL 24 HOUR DAY
I would ask you to recall from English class, what a simile is... a comparison using 'like' or 'as'. The Bible says "one day is with the Lord as a thousand years" (2 Pet. 3:8)... note: "*AS* a 1000 years".
Why doesn't he open his big mouth anymore, Jon?
2 Tim. 3:16-17 - All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.
The reason He doesn't open His mouth to anyone thru miracles, revelations, prophecies, etc, etc is that He has already done so. I've personally never seen a person raised from the dead, however, John 11 already showed that, and if I have proof that the Bible is true (which I do, things call Christian Evidences), then I don't need to see someone raised from the dead.
the truth, shown by science.
I think we will both agree (or at least should), that science is NEVER in error. However, THEORIES and HYPOTHESIS can be and many times ARE wrong. Also, no one started believing the scriptures 2000 years ago, they started to believe it about 6000 to 10,000 years ago.
I still argue that I am superior to animals and plantlife and soil, etc, etc... I take into account the human soul that is God-given (again if you deny God, you could believe otherwise)... no other lifeform, nor any matter has that, so whether I depend on it or not, I am in fact superior to it in that fashion. That does not make me superior to other humans or God, of course, because I am equal to other humans and God is still superior to me. Nevertheless, I still contend I am superior to anything non-human.
Once again, that is to deny God. The Bible clearly states there will be people alive when God returns, so for man to assume we can completely wipe ourselves out is to make ourselves gods.
1st question: Would you agree with me that God is all knowing, all powerful, and omnipresent (everywhere simultaneously) ?
2nd question: If you agree to the 1st question, couldn't God have made 100% certain that the exact words He wanted in the Bible were there and that language supported such concepts? and if not, why is He not and what scripture supports this claim?
If you support these questions, it becomes easy to see that He wanted the word "yohm" because it would express a literal day and therefore one week (minus the one day He rested from His labors) for creation of the universe.
And further, if God is all powerful, how could it be impossible for Him to create the universe in 6 days? If He created billions or trillions (or more?) of stars, made man from dust, fortold over 300 prophecies of Jesus and all of them were fulfilled, is it infeasible that He can do exactly what the wording says He did? Or is what the Bible records of God inaccurate and therefore false, and the very God we believe in doesn't exist, or at least isn't the God the Bible records. The Bible is one cohesive work, you pull out one thread it collapses. But since there are Christian Evidences and not one PROVEN contradiction in the Bible in 1000's of years, I lean towards the exact record given.
Communist environmental degradation.... federal hydro-electric dams.... same thing, huh? I mean, environmentally friendly power sources couldn't POSSIBLY influence the level of water in such a small sea, right?
Oh, and the biggest polluter on the planet is still the US, which, at last check, isn't Communist, and produces ~6,503,800,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas yearly (as of 1997). China places second, of course, with ~4,964,800,000 tonnes and Russia (fourth, after India) produces ~1,980,300,000, although it is no longer Communist (amazing, huh?). Of course, these numbers alone don't suggest much, unless one considers the per person emissions. US: 24.3 tonnes. China: 4.0 tonnes. Russia: 13.4 tonnes. In fact, out of the top 10 polluters, China has the second lowest per-capita pollution level, falling behind India at 2.2 tonnes. Seems these Communist countries aren't faring so badly after all, huh?
Oh, and since when have all "commies" been Godless? The one thing I hate more than senselessly blaming others for off-topic issues are false generalizations. Last I checked, most major religions tend to encourage equality of some form or another, and is not Communism based on the hope for pure equality?
Last I checked there were more Godless capitalists worldwide than Godless communists, by simple virtue of there being far more capitalists.
Communists? Killing themselves off? While I'll be the first to admit that the quality of life in China isn't on par with that in most major "first world" countries, the death rates aren't drastically different.
Maybe picking up a history book would make the population difference a little bit more clear for you: Communism came after Capitalism, and has existed in its current form for less than 50 years (modern Communism isn't pure Marxism).
At least check, Communism didn't end in the USSR because the entire population died out. One might even say that Russia would be worse off today if not for Communism having brought some equality between the classes that would carry over to their modern economic system (although I don't condone the specific actions of Stalin, who, as we all know, wasn't a Communist so much as a Totalitarian political leech).
Stalin couldn't possibly be a "true" product of Communism in the sense that Russia was never able to reach a stable state of Communism before Lenin's death. Stalin's immediate actions upon seizing control were not to preserve Communism (by equalizing the classes) but rather destroy said equality, starting with the traditionally unstable urban areas and then having the nerve to target the rural farmers by turning them against each other (who had lived in a far more equitable state since long before Lenin's uprising). Of course, when Trotsky (true believer in Communism) attempted to reprimand Stalin for his butchering of Lenin's dream, he was forced to flee with the newly formed Gestapo-esque federal enforcers at his heels.
Stalin wormed his way into position and then snatched his position as leader from Lenin's funeral bed. He represents one of those individuals who prevent Communism's success by attempting to twist it to match his own self-serving vision. If Lenin had survived, and Trotsky not been forced into exile, a perfect three-pronged system could have been established in order to prevent one individual from gaining too much power.... "in theory."
Of course, to go off on a bit more of a tangent, one might simply identify that Stalin never fully embraced the concept of a "Communist leader," which requires quite a stretch from the conventional (western) idea of leadership. Under Communism, country "leader" is simply a job, not position of inherent status.... it's a position of social management and international relations.
Oh, and I know this is off topic, so mod-down away!
It seems that the Greens don't want any increase in the standard of living since it kills off various species.
Now it seems that even if we go back to living they way we used to, no matter how far back we regress we still cause extinctions!
The solution is simple.... Humans must undergo a mass extinction in order to save the planet for every other species.
I'm only joking....really....I don't mean it...
"a tool of the Godless in their purge of Christianity."
about time, considering you sheep have been purging other religions for thousands of years... God died in the 80's, get over it
Jaysyn
There is a war going on for your mind.
I've really had enough of this crap! The mankind is being blamed for everything these days. In the case of extinctions pure logic dictates that most of them happened due to MANY factors, only one of which was an existence of SUPERIOR species, namely humans. It is actually truly amazing for me that an early human, who was definately not the best predator (in fact for most of their early lives humans were scavengers, until they were able to organize and start hunting in packs) was able to overcome all the obstacles and become the dominant species.
On the other hand, now that we are so dominant, I believe we do have a responsiblity to the environment, to keep the balance. This doesn't mean going back to living in the caves and eating soybeans, but rather properly funding and developing alternative fuel sources, and making these technologies desirable for the masses.
Damn! My Java is too hot again!
Michaels been posting trolls to the front age for years now, and people still bite
DNA magic, as it were, is an interesting, and perhaps worthwhile, scientific curiosity, but it doesn't fix the underlying problem, which is the question of whether or not these species should have been driven extinct in the first place. Until we can figure out how to address that, bringing them back doesn't really mean much.
Sean Daugherty "I have walked in Eternity -- and Eternity weeps."
[I think this way because I believe everything I read.]
As Gas-Guzzling, Anti-Kyoto Americans, we should know this best. Ever since we handed those typhoid blankets to the land's original occupants, we have cut a swath of pollution and evil human influence across the continent.
Right now the ugliest ugly American is defending his oil-friendly policies to the more enlightened leaders of the EU. I bet they're making fun of him using words he doesn't understand. Ha.
Everyone tells me that human beings are bad for the environment, and why should I doubt them? If it weren't for us hunting the dodo to extinction, we would still be able to see that funny little bird hopping around in its non-adaptive fashion. I remember someone in a lab coat telling me that all of Nature is connected in a beautiul and delicate network. Even the macroscopic shifts in climate over the eons is probably caused by human under-arm odor or something. And since the guy was wearing a lab coat, I recommend we listen.
So, why can't we all just vanish and make the Earth pure again?
NOTICE: We will begin distributing the "magic pudding" at noon.
-- .sig are belong to us!
All your
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I don't know either...I'm just saying there is an agument within science for a super natural being or "god." I liked the guys origonal post, but I still think the bible's a lot of bunk :)
dynamo
Let's remember that Europeans killed off all their megafauna too, then invaded the western hemisphere and slaughtered the buffalo, then slaughtered the Native Americans along with them. Euro-centric white scientists point the finger of blame for mass extinction of mammoths at the aboriginal populations of North America and Australia but are blind to their own role in the perpetuation of the stereotype of Native Americans as savages.
I don't agree that politcal ranting has no place in science. Science is not objective. Quite the opposite -- numbers can be manipulated, and statistics can be used to prove any point. Thus, it is necessary for scientists to be socially and politically responsible for their studies and findings. To claim otherwise. . . well, look at the Nazis.
<-- when this side is empty, slide door to the left -->
I think all the huge animals evolved into Americans. Check out this survey : http://www.theonion.com/onion3722/surgeon_general. html
-- Cheer, Cheer, The Red and the White.
The alien sightings that have been occuring... they are just checking up on how we are doing. Probably wondering what is taking us so long.
After we are done, we will be taken back to our REAL home planet as slaves
It sounds like they set out to prove that man had an involvment in the extinction. The best research never sets out to prove or dis-prove something, rather, it sets out to find out what happened without any prior opinion.
Perhaps man did hunt the animals into extinction, but I wouldn't go by it 100% since it set out to prove that they did.
The penultimate illusion of my childhood has been shattered. Next you'll be telling me that santa isn't real. sigh.
We are the first generation of Morlocks. Eat the rich!
to accept our role? The Giant Moa (elephant bird) went extinct in New Guinea & points east about a thousand years ago - right after humans showed up.These disappearances had nothing to do with climate change. Plains Indians were hunting buffalo (sometimes) by setting fires and driving whole herds off cliffs. A great waste. They didn't pick them off one at a time by horseback until they acquired the horse from the European invaders. (The American horse had disappeared about 10000 years earlier.) You think we couldn't kill a mammoth with a pit, or a glyptodont with poison tree frog arrows? I watched a film of the Kung! of the Kalahari (bushmen) kill a giraffe with sharp sticks (and poison). This has nothing to do with "guilt" BTW; several postings have brought this up and there will be more. It's just that it's stupid, and self-destructive. A simplified biosphere is less robust. Like a cyberlandscape with only one OS available... variety is more flexible, and adaptable, and interesting. Sure, the biosystem recovered from the dinosaur extinction, but it took a coupla million years.
We are the first generation of Morlocks. Eat the rich!
In fact this theory has been around for 30 some years and in the middle of the article, one of the guys to whom the theory is atributed qualifies his argument in such a way to make it sound quite reasonableOF course, if you introduce a new predator into any closed or reasonably closed eco-system there will always be a draumatic result. Why would anyone be suprised by that...? It's not like ancient man had the tools nessecery to kill off a sufficient quantity of any animal as to drive it to extinction (unlike more modern man drove the american water buffalo to extinction - using more modern weapons like guns - imagine doing that with a knife or spear, in sufficient quantities to drive any animal to extinction).
But then the guy goes on.... he really does a masterful job of fence sitting here:Nah... That's not really plausable... Climate change could vary easily have contributed to the extinction. Look at Gloval Warming, or destruction of the Ozone Layer. These events represent large scal climatic events, but they are affecting different regions of the globe in different ways, and at different rates, baserd primarily based on proximity to the epicenter of the event (antarctica in the case of the largest Ozone Hole) and the pre-existing climate.
I have two problems with this article, first, it didn't cover the theory it strives to cover in a fair and non-judgemental fashion, and it presents it in the light of the enviromentalists versus the conservatives. Well, this is science. It is an exploration of historical events to try and determin fact. There are not politics to it and there are no accusations being made here that would impact modern man. No one is using this theory to try and band deer hunting, or something like that.
People need to relax and take science for what it's worth, rather than taking it so personally. The article it seems was designed to be inflamatory, co I can't fault the traders - perhaps that was the only way it found its way into the mainstream media in the us, after all, an earlier poster pointed out that the BBC had this story a week or more ago...--CTH
---
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
It isn't our fault we started killing all these animals. I mean 4 millions years ago we were happy starving, surviving day to day. And then one day a weird black rectangle appeared in our cave entrance, and taught us to eat meat and beat the shit out of each other. We weren't smart enough to get the fact that we would have been better off starving, and being prey to the cheetah. Blame it on those damn monoliths. They did it!
They stuck me in an institution, said it was the only solution, to...protect me from the enemy, myself
Yawn. Go look up the CMBR *before* spouting off ill-informed crap.
"Evolution is just a theory"
"Yeah. But so is gravity."
- Dan I.
You, yes YOU should stand in awe of men (your ancestors and mine) who hunted these animals - their acomplishments will never be recorded, but just imagines the balls it took to hunt an animal many time their size, and bring it home for dinner.
Display some adaptability.
Chris
You're definately on the right track, but Jesus didn't create Religion. Religion existed quite a while before that (Um, budhism maybe?).
Actually, it is strongly believed that Jesus was an actual person whom existed, though whether he even remotely resembled (in action, not appearance) the Jesus described today is concidered extremely unlikely.
No, rather our friends the Romans turned Christianity into a tool of control that has lasted to this day. Christianity came first, the Romans took it, destroyed all workings of it, created 'The Bible', and gave it back to the christians whom falsely believe to this day that they are following the one and only truth. If they'd only realize that their precious bible was the first truly massively successful use of propeganda in known history.
No Comment.
Wow, amazing how many people miss the point.
This article states that it is likely that man, and therefore likely native americans, wiped out the mammoths by over-hunting.
But did the native americans go on and wipe everything else out? Um, NO!
Gee, maybe they learned from their mistake and thus began conservative hunting/living practices.
Hmm, and just maybe this article is suggesting that we 'Remember' this lesson lest we either have to learn it again, or worse, we fuck it all up without ever figuring it out again.
BTW: 13000 some odd fucking years after the Mammoths were extinct the Bison were still roaming, the next day the europeans killed them all...yeah, you must be right, it was just the guns.
No Comment.
If you come across a situation where you have two contradicting solutions to the same problem, you have made an error(unless you can provide me with a counter-example).
Here is a counter example:
A human fetus is a collection of cells that may one day grow up to be a neurotic 40 year old.
Conclusion 1: The fetus is innately human and should be given protections under the law.
Conclusion 2: The fetus is no more human than a clump of cells scraped from the inside of your mouth and should not be given any special protection under the law.
Which of these conclusions is correct?
Dancin Santa
I totally agree. In fact, I think it is pretentious for anyone to believe that the universe just *is*.
Why is the sky such a fabulous blue? Why does every tree resemble a unique artistic masterpiece of unequaled beauty? This stuff just happens...right. Just remember that nothing people have devised matches the awesome magnificence of the universe.
It's not like ancient man had the tools nessecery to kill off a sufficient quantity of any animal as to drive it to extinction. Yes they did, at least for herd herbivores (horses, camels, mammoths). You follow the herd until it is near a cliff, then the whole tribe comes out screaming and waving torches or whatever, and scare the whole herd over the cliff. Everyone eats until they puke for a few days, then when the remaining 99% of the meat smells too bad to eat you go looking for the next herd. Of course, you do have to live off of roots and bugs for a week or two until the next opportunity for a herd kill arises, but on the average you are well fed.
I think the bison ("buffalo") avoided going with the rest of the large North American herbivores because they mostly live where there aren't enough roots, bugs, and field mice to keep a man alive until the next bison herd comes along. Indians living on the fringes of the great plains where there is barely sufficient sustenance only bagged one or two buffalo herds a year before Europeans brought back the horse, and they did it by driving them over a cliff.
The large predators that also died when man moved into North America are more of a mystery, but it is not inexplicable. The large animals they depended on for most of their meat became scarce. Strange new animals were around and looked like easy prey teetering on their hind legs, but few of those who tried eating them lived to learn better. And in the end, "trophy hunting" may have become a factor; grandpa keeps showing off his necklace with dozens of saber-tooth tiger fangs, and you really want some, but he won't share so you go hunt down the last saber-tooth in the area...
... was turned off. Or your antagonist probes that conservative religious people are amazingly funny to read.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
When animals hunt other animals, it's survival of the fittest, but when humans do it, it's mass extinction?
I find it funny when I hear about environmentalists who are vegetarian because they believe that animals should be held up to the same level as humans.
"The day a human goes to jail for killing an animal, that day we will become civilized" Leonardo Da Vinci, I think.
In case you don't feel rosy about animal rights, go and visit an intensive farming facility, and I dare you to eat meat of one of the animals slaughtered there.
Has it ever occurred to these people that animals (Surprise Surprise!) eat other animals? The only difference between what we do and what a wild cougar does is that we _debate_ whether we should do what we are doing. The most ironic part is that by debating, we prove our distinction, nay... superiority over the animal kingdom.
Have it ever occured to you that only people, surprise, surprise, kills animals in an unecessary manner, and the richer you are, the more you need to kill? (not that you would do it your self, mind you, but all those BicMacs were a cow before).
HUmans are the only animal that kills other animals when all the basic satisfactors the slaughtered beasts provide have been fully covered.
Don't believe me? A few example tokens:
-Do overweight people need to eat that much meat?
-DOes somebody that has already a leather jacket (that could be replaced by something else) need another leather jacket?
-Do people need to eat shark fin soup? (throwing away all the shark, after cutting away the fin, in the process).
-Do animals kill other animals as a sport or entertainment?
And so on and so forth. Carnivore animals in the other hand kill only what they need.
As you can see, the differences betweeen cougars and humans are pretty appreciable and go far beyond our ability to debate things, which is something also important.
We can value life, because we have culture and a brain, anybody with some degree of education understands that the uniqueness of every animal species is a rarity that ought to be disturbed as little as possible.
Yes, I know we shouldn't extinguish an entire species, but I can't wait to hear environmentalists use this news to try to prove the destructive nature of man.
Oh yes, I know, we are not destructive at all. All those rain forrests, jungles and more are tales that older people use to tell us to make us sleep.
There was never a rain forrest many times bigger than the current Amazonas in BRazil, and all those houses in Western Europe, where there is almost no wildlife left, were all the time there, God put them there the day he created the world.
To try to blame modern man for the actions of its ancestors is absurd.
And who is trying to do that? To say that our ancestors were very destructive of their surrounding environment will just show that there is trait in human behavior to use beyond our needs. But us being humans should learn from that.
This is almost as stupid a notion as Americans today being in any way responsible for their great, great grandparents owning slaves.
I don't see what one thing have to do with the other.
Actually...
Actually you started allucinating at this point.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
God created everything in 7 days. The big bang and evolution are probably some of the tools he used to accomplish that task. Between those two statements, there is no conflict.
The problem is that both evolution and big bang can exist quite happily without a god. Both of them are pretty good theories of how the universe works that don't require of a superior being to try to explain how things happen.
That is why religious extremists can't stomach these and other similar theories, in spite of the evidence screaming in their faces.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I did not say something comes from nothing, I just said that some theories that explain how the universe works don't need a god at all. Some scientists are already working at ways to probe the irrelevance of a god (Stephen Hawkings) in the Universe as we know it.
At the smallest amount of time before the big-bang lets concede that a god decided to create the Universe (what reasons an all powerfull, perfect being all of the sudden needed to create a Universe is something I let to the reader as homework)
After that moment we don't need of any god to explain a good deal of many things, the more we learn about nature, the less we seem to need a god to explain anything. The more we study and scrutinize, the more a god seems like a pretty dumb assumption. We know that if you let a pen drop on Earth, it will drop, and no god will ever stop that. That is the whole point: natural processes are mindless, and many are predictable and measurable: no god needed.
That scares fundementalist religious people. They could be out of work if the trend continues because it is becoming more and more evident to more and more people that there is no god out there playing with us as little chess pieces gorging itself in our shortcommings. This is daunting: is then there no purpose to our existence? Perhaps no, and I say, so what? Can't you remember before you were alive? Well you will feel the same when the time comes. It did not hurt.
I am sure many philosophers and scientists have already written something like this in a better and coherent manner, I am no so stupid to claim the idea has no ocurred first to any other midly intelligent person.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
So they're not considering climate changes that may have made it easier for ancient Man to get to Australia, or climate changes that may have bulged ancient Man's brainpower a bit more, allowing them to spread to Australia at about the same time?
Climate changes --> dying animals + smarter humans who figure a way to get to Australia
or
Climate changes --> dying animals + changed trade winds blowing humans floating on logs to Australia
I want a job blowing smoke out of my ass!
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
I'd rather live in a world of rapidly-advancing technology with lax environmental laws dictated by greedy corporations causing nature to run "a bit dirty" than live in a world where technology is ground to a halt by an overbearing, intrusive government that insinuates itself boldly with moral self-righteousness into every last decision, every single corner of everybody's life from sunup to sundown and all through the night.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
> Logic dictates that if you drive many animals
> to extinction and greatly upset the cycle of
> nature, you will eliminate your own means of
> survival. The reality is that you will die.
Actually, that is completely incorrect, logically.
Logic dictates that you plan the destruction of the ecosystem in an area and plant massive farms. This will enhance greatly your species' ability to survive.
To preserve plants and animals in a "natural" area is not logical. It leads to the death of many people, not the large farms, which feed many.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
> In all those places, the arrival of humans
> coincided with catastrophic mass extinction of
> animals.
Nah, rats, cows, chickens, horses, sheep, pigs, ducks, geese, and so on have all blossomed.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
> Conclusion 1: The fetus is innately human and
> should be given protections under the law.
>
> Conclusion 2: The fetus is no more human than a
> clump of cells scraped from the inside of your
> mouth and should not be given any special
> protection under the law.
Well, this isn't a problem. It is a difference on the definition of a human, part of the premise.
Is it proper to assign a clump of cells (not yet sentient) a property called a "soul" (assumption: having a soul is a reason to not kill something; this adds a second reason beyond sentience). The "soul" however, has no scientific evidence to support it, and loads of circumstantial evidence that it is just a fantasy concept made up long ago deriving from superstitions. Is that proper to enshrine in law?
Furthermore, there is another assumption in both of those arguments: even assuming the broadest definition of a human, that it is wrong to terminate their life if they are dependent on your body (argument from implied contract to host them when you freely engaged in intercourse -- note that the number of claimed rapes would skyrocket since that was not free will).
Also, there is the even deeper issue that one's reproductive organs are one's one to control, regardless of the human status of the fetus, and that includes your own body's production of said fetus -- fetus, human or otherwise, is a product of one's body and one may abort that production at one's own will up until the moment of birth, when said fetus becomes an individual with unalienable rights.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
It's difficult to imagine human populations in the few thousands somehow wiping out large indigenous species through over hunting. On the other hand, introduction of new diseases can be disastrous very rapidly. The article gives a brief mention of this possiblity, but it seems intent on promoting the concept of the inherent destructiveness of humanity.
Bob Bakker, the off-beat paleontologist, has been promoting disease scenarios for years as a primary cause of mass dinosaur extinctions. It seems a more probable cause in these cases of large mammalian extinctions as well.
---Any philosophy that can be put "in a nutshell" belongs there.---
A good couple of decades of trying to convince people that native americans lived in harmony with nature and were happy bunches of vegans pretty much forced teachers to stop even considering it.
My personal thinking is that climate change, combined with (hu)man's effects, still seems to be a bit more plausible, but one thing archaeology never fails to teach us is, what goes around, comes around.
Someone refresh my memory: are dinosaurs warm-blooded or cold-blooded this year?
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
You read Tim Flannary's 'The Future Eaters'. This will give you detailed information and evidence about the enormous influence man has (had) on the environment, and on the extinction of many many animal (and plant) species.
If an experiment works, something has gone wrong.
"Man the Hunter" was a pre-Raymond Dart era philosophy that was thrown out by almost all paleoanthropologists. Early humans and pre-humans were not great hunters. Most paleoanthropologists suggest that early humans were scavengers. The article immediately launched into a suggestion that since there were mass extinctions associated with the arrival of people, it must have been because people were hunting the animals to extinction. That is pure crap. Later in the article, someone suggests disease as a possible agent of extinction. This is much more likely. Any change to an ecosystem can result in disaster. People could have introduced new diseases, replaced the soon-to-be-extinct species in the food chain, or any other action that resulted in an imbalance in the ecosystem. However, the idea that our ancestors wasted all the big animals by hunting them to extinction is patent, sensationalist nonsense powered by a drive by modern scientists to say that extinctions are caused by people. While this is definitely the case today, it most likely was not so many millions of years ago.
Possible, but not necessarily...
Uhm...this theory has been around for over 30 years now, people...it's an old theory and has a lot of evidence to support it. Like most news agencies, CNN will take any subject and try to convince its viewers it's brand new and they brought it to you first. Blech.
"Courage is being afraid to do the Right Thing, and doing it anyway."
Actually, it's not circumstantial evidence. 1) When archaeologists uncover evidence of large groups of humans having migrated into an area at a particular place and time, they always uncover evidence of enormous numbers of animal bones and other remains with mortal damage to the bones of said animals in the form of crushed or cracked bones (as with a blunt instrument) and/or deep nicks and scores proven to have been made by crudely sharpened edges. 2) They've also discovered ancient pit traps with the remains of long, thin poles of sharpened wood stuck in the bottom and more animal bones piled up in them, as well as old prehistoric cliff bottoms literally strewn with piles of animal bones...evidence that humans deliberated created traps and drove herds of herbivores into stampedes in the direction of cliffs where a few animals will get shoved off of by the panicking herds. 3) Anyone who can provide DIRECT and INCONTROVERTIBLE evidence proving for or against all this 'circumstantial' evidence had better be able to produce a working time machine as well, because that's the only way you're going to get anything more solid than an archaeologist's findings.
"Courage is being afraid to do the Right Thing, and doing it anyway."
The scientific theory? Already we can see the hubris of the professional scientist at work here, portraying one of several such "theories" as the only game in town.
As usual, wheneve the issue of ancient history (where ancient mean "before last Friday"), the flaming Jesus freaks emerge from their self-flagellating to inflict their disgusting morals and creation myths on rational people.
Let me give you a hint: Science works. I don't need proof of that. Religion is a mind-controlling device invented by a certain Jewish huckster named Jesus of Nazareth 2000 years ago. 2000 years! No other pyramid scam has lasted so long. Allow me to congratulate all christians for such longevity (but don't become complacent: Amway is catching up).
There is *no* proof for any facet of creationism. Not one. The myth of the "great flood" has been widely debunked by scientists, so much that only right-wing nutjobs, on a high-holy rollarcoaster for JEEZUS could possilby believe them. Not too mention this "god" fellow, who has apparently only spoken to a few desert-wandering lunatics who overdosed on locusts and wild honey. Why doesn't he open his big mouth anymore, Jon? Maybe because there is no god, and every educated person knows it. Rationalism is the only hope for mankind, and the only rational approach is to reject religion and accept evolution and the big bang for what they are: the truth, shown by science.
...survival of the fittest! What's to be ashamed of?
TODO: Something witty here...
I have been reading a discussion of this in Australia we used to have wombats, burrowing marsupials related to koalas (about same size) as big as rhinoceros. This was in a Paleontology newsletter. They said that climate change occured at the same time. Areas that are now rain forest became open savanah, for instance, so loss of habitat is more likely it. Personally I don't think the numbers on human beings on the planet at the time would have done it, and in Australia there are sites which were not occupied by Aboriginals until about 5000 years ago, such as Grampians in Victoria. I think the idea of the "noble savage" is bull, but it smells of a campaign to invalidate native people, and their rights.
Actually, I'm a vegetarian, but I'm not opposed to hunting. I am opposed to factory farming. I say, if you're willing to kill it yourself, bon appetit. At least those animals get to live decent lives before we take them. Not only that, but depending on where you go looking for food, if you're not careful there's a chance a bigger animal might get you. Fair's fair, and if you don't like the rules, don't play. (I don't.)
Are you suggesting that wild cougars take entire species of animals & keep them chained up & fed so that the cougar population can grow fat & lazy & not have to work for food? I don't think you are. But there's a fundamental difference between predation and agriculture.
[Incidentally, as a rule I never preach vegetarianism, acknowledging it as an eccentricity of mine. But you provoked me. 8{)> ]
As for rational discourse, it's a tool that our species has adapted to help ensure survival. Nothing more, nothing less. Boy has it worked! I dig it & wouldn't have it any other way. That's why I'm here. But let's not get too full of ourselves. We are a species, & we do what we do best.
Fight for your right to read books!
That's really all I have to say. I mean, now when we do it by being decadent and wasteful it's horrible, but back then it was just their time to go. So much for the thought that humans used to live in harmony with nature I guess. We've always been a plague to other species, but to some extent, it is our right.
"A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire
Is that so hard to accept?
Why - yes.
Can I invoke Godwin's law on
yes, we have no bananas
Bingo.
yes, we have no bananas
I bet they're making fun of him using words he doesn't understand
You mean words like competence?
Reboot macht Frei.
Don't know if you have kept your eyes closed, but I have seen people drink contmainated water becuase they have nothing else to drink. That doesn't mean they have survived the experience, though.
I see this here often, when something is news that relates to old theories on something. People mistake the old theory was the reason for news, when in fact the actualy news is that there is some new evidence pointing this way or that way, possibly strenghtening the theory's case or shooting it so full of holes it'll whistle in the wind...
It would be nice if people could separate the news and background in their thinking on: "What is this doing here, it's old already?"
I also recommend reading Ishmael, because it touches on a lot of the human condition and explains the illusion that we've all come to live and accept as the truth. My psych professor required this in a class I had, and it has forever changed my attitude toward Western Civilization. Especially in the world off technology we all live in, it's a refreshing perspective shift.
When (not if) genetic engineering is perfected (or at least largely understood) the whole matter of species going extinct will become moot. Whether or not you would want to live in a world whose organisms that were designed by corporations run by PHB's, however, is another matter entirely.
...
string* plamenessFilter =
*plamenessFilter = "Flaming Death!!";
... Nor a particularly surprising one. Why does this even qualify as news? It's something that made logical sense to me long ago. Think about it - there's a lot of meat, bone, fat, and hide on large mammals, and we needed those things in ever-increasing amounts. We didn't have agriculture or synthetic materials, where else would we get them? I don't get why this is news.
think for yourself, you won't like the results if others do it for you.
'Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.' So spoke Miss Rand. What this means is that in order to be master of my own life, I must first understand the laws that govern it, and then use those laws to my own advantage. The laws of nature dictate that I must use the only weapon I have, my mind, to gather the tools necessary to preserve my survival. This means I will develop a spear and kill an animal to eat and to clothe myself, or in modern times, I will study harder and learn more and get a better job. It's all the same process, the same abstract, only the concretes of the situation are different. I do hunt, I do not feel guilty. I do succeed in business, I do not feel guilty. And there's absolutely no difference between the two.
think for yourself, you won't like the results if others do it for you.
Yeah, what you say is true (in my humble opinion), but how do you explain the losses in Kangaroo Land coinciding exaclty with the arrival of humans?
and a terrible smell... -TK
I may only be an Admiral from the future, but that's my perogative.
Climate change could vary easily have contributed to the extinction.
... they invented fire and tools without which none of our so-called civilized inventions would have been possible.
... it's 100 years old and has witnessed the most catastrophic rape of nature of any society. Unlike foragers and agriculturalist, the modern industrial society dug deep into the earth's crust causing all kinds of adverse effects to nature with no regard to future generations (indeed present generations) in the name of profit.
:).
At one time I had my doubts about the ice age wiping out prehistoric animals and man as well, but in January 1998 I lived in Kingston Ontario during the ice storm and that effectively erased any doubts I had about the theory of the ice age being a factor in extinctions.
Two thousand miles of land were effected to the point that it brought all of our modern innovations to a screeching halt for weeks on end. Indeed, in parts of Quebec, normalcy was not restored until May that year.
This was caused by three days of constant freezing rain that coated everything with 2" of ice! It was hard to sleep at night because all you heard were large tree limbs crashing to the ground under the weight of the ice. It wiped out hundreds of miles of forest and threw thousands of people into a state of absolute awe at the destructive powers of nature. Many people lost their lives.
It is highly unlikely that early man wiped out great creatures. They lived in tribal communities and lived off the surface resources of the land alone. To say they were primitive savages is more than ignorant
These foraging societies were indeed in tact with all seven social systems in place and endured at least 40,000 yrs. The agricultural age followed which endured 10-12,000 years with all seven social structures in tact. Then the Industrial society came along
Did man wipe out extinct large mamals? Yes, but not with spears and rocks. Got doubts? Well take a swim in the Hudson River and then swallow a nice glass of that water daily. Throw out your asthma medication and your suntan lotion. Keep supporting the massive daily destruction of the rain forests (our oxygen tent) and bring back coal and other fossil fuels. That will take care of you and I nicely
"My cat regularly leaves her kills after taking
....
...
just a few bites. "
Well, the correct answer for this would be that your cat has been corrupted by dealing with you other humans beings.
Hehehe
Hell, some day some green wacko will come up with theory like that
...and you can't blame meteors for everything.
"or YOU CAN LEARN SOMETHING BEFORE YOU FUCK UP THE ENTIRE PLANET YOU IGNORANT FOOL!"
Hell, I would rather trust CEOs and real scientists than bunch of green-tree-huggers...
...and you can't blame meteors for everything.
"? Nope, "Godless commies" (appeal to fear/ignorance). "
Fear ? True.
But ignorance? These "Godless commies" were (and in some cases still are) responsible for oceans of human misery and only idiot would call fear of them "ignorance".
...and you can't blame meteors for everything.
"(although I don't condone the specific actions of Stalin, who, as we all know, wasn't a Communist so much as a Totalitarian political leech)."
No , you not gonna get out of this one that easy...
Stalin was a product of Communism and therefore can easily be included into legacy of this social system.
He and his tyranny was not what original Communism was about but all utopian systems end up being terrible caricatures of itself and great breeding ground for lunatics and mass murderers.
...and you can't blame meteors for everything.
What it is with this "you" ?
Did I "abused" you ?
If not then stop generalizing and answer the question.
...and you can't blame meteors for everything.
Actually, God created the world just over 15 minutes ago.
Imagine having to make up all those "old" Slashdot posts.
Mighty indeed.
What were you expecting?
hey, if the mammoths wanted to survive, they would have evolved to the point where they grew opposable thumbs and could walk upright on their hind legs.
kidding aside, who the hell cares? man has destroyed everything he has come into contact with for eons. This isn't news, it's a fact of life.
I recently read Ishmael too, and found it to be one of the best books I've ever read. Not because of the writing technique, not because of the story, not because of anything that usually makes a book great, but because it completely changed my attitudes towards the world, especially the human condition. When the book posed a question, I often found myself putting it down and trying to think it out on my own before continuing on. Hell, it also makes me want to live a couple thousand years ago or find a remote tribe somewhere to "join".
WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
You'd think that spelling would've been a giveaway, but no. You have been soooooo trolled.
-- Robert Bunn, gun-toting neo-Nazi anarchist redneck freak
Precisely what advanced techniques are these? Good enough to tell us that humans came and the animals died, in that order, rather than the animals died, and then the humans came because there weren't any large animals to scare them off?
-- Robert Bunn, gun-toting neo-Nazi anarchist redneck freak
In my Anthropology class in college, shey showed that: The Neandertals, contrary to popular believe, are not stupid. Their brain case is actually significanly larger than that of homosapiens. Modern anthropologists actually believe that neandertals were bigger, stronger, and smarter than homosapiens... Kinda throws a monkey wrench into survival of the fittest and such....
Yeah, yeah, hunting, sure, but human intervention does not completely explain the other anomalies associated with past extinctions...like why many mammoths and other animals from that period have been found totally complete, with undigested food still in their stomachs, almost as if they were flash frozen...it also doesn't explain the sheer volume and completeness of the last extinction event...I don't buy the human hunting theory totally at all because there is too much geological and archaeological eveidence for a drastic climate change/event. Oh and the reason this is important is because it can and will happen again. Read Art Bell and Whitley Strieber's book for a really interesting alternate theory.