Slashdot Mirror
Dinosaurs Died Within Hours of Asteroid Impact, says New Study
colonist writes "SPACE.com reports that most dinosaurs were incinerated within hours by the 'heat pulse' of an asteroid impact 65 million years ago. The study 'Survival in the first hours of the Cenozoic' presents a scenario where the only survivors were underground or were underwater in swamps or oceans. All unprotected creatures were 'baked by the equivalent of a global oven set on broil.'"
An appropriate post for the Memorial Day weekend. Imagine the world's largest barbeque.
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
For us ignorant Brits, wthat's that in Gas Mark?
Stick Men
Isn't the whole "asteroid impact" scenario a theory? Doesn't that make this new theory a theory based on a theory?
We're getting kind of thin here.
I'd like to RTFA, I really would !
it's too bad their all-star oil drilling team didn't quite make it in time...
At least the dinosaurs went out baked!
----
Go canucks, habs, and sens!
The real reason dinosaurs became extinct!
Yummy.... Cooked Dinosaur, our ancestors must have been feasting!
For sending a Brontosaurus to do a T-Rex's job.
Alright, so what do I need to survive the next major asteroid impact of this magnatude? It sounds like most buildings won't be sufficient protection.
Do I need a cave to hide in? Should I go to a large body of water?
The Emeril Lagassaurus Rex would have added some prehistoric garlic when he saw the meteor coming...then BAM!!!! Another notch!
"Hey, Lou, what the F is " *SPLAT*
Only the underwater subterranean cock roach survived.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
The theory that temperature mucked with sex ratio casuing too few females seems more plausible. Human ratio (which is 106 men per 100 women--that's why only boys have to go stag) is not influenced by temperature.
-I am an elective eunuch.
I find this funny. I always love hearing about catastrpophic asteroids and things. But the US has 10,000 nuculear warheads, enough to 'overkill' the worlds pupulation 12x. For those of you not in the military, this means that if the bodies of the dead were to get up again, we could kill them all 12 more times. We humans are capable of creating a much larger catastrophe than our often theoretical cousins in space; and it's saddening.
Not having read the article, it's hard to see how one meteorite could bake animals on the other side of the world. After all, this impact wasn't during the Pangea time, when all of the land mass of the earth was joined in one great continent.
If this is true wouldn't there be a large carbon layer evenly distributed over the earth's surface from that time?
I have to stop wasting so much time reading Slashdot. It's interfering with my crystal meth addiction.
Dinosaurs Fried Within Hours of Cosmic Collision, Study Concludes
:)
According to the article, the dinos were cooked by super-heated air. That would mean they were broiled, not fried
"There's no question over whether an asteroid hit. The roughly 6-mile-wide (10-kilometer) space rock carved out the Chicxulub crater off Mexico's Yucatan Penninsula."
But fairly recently there was another article posted on slashdot, about the alleged impact having occurred in (what is now) Australia. (check, e.g., here http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4969840/ for a similar story.)
so what is the consensus *really*, in the scientific community? or is there just none?
Pretty scary if nature selected them in a matter of seconds. Too bad the vastly hyper-intelligent dinosaur civilization's NASA counterpart didn't have a Near-Earth Object Program.
Hm, I don't think the dinosaurs overkilled themselves with nuclear weapons.
sic transit gloria mundi
Gas Mark is a Fahrenheit scale.
From this chart it is possible to infer that Gas Mark 0 is 250 Fahrenheit, and each increment of 1 Gas Mark is equal to 25 Fahrenheit degrees.
So at what Gas Mark setting did they bake/flambe the dinosaurs?
As an exercise for the interested reader, using spectroscopic data, estimate the surface temperature of Zubenelgenubi in Gas Mark.
Stick Men
The asteroid mass extinction theory is substantial but it has always had a lot of holes. The original idea that the sun was blocked out long enough for plants to die did not explain how bees and other animals that depend on plants survived. Now we need to know how bees survived in an oven without food for years?
http://nyamenation.org/
...Microwave.
...dinosaurs were incinerated within hours by the 'heat pulse'... All unprotected creatures were 'baked by the equivalent of a global oven set on broil...
Well...Kinda hard to "broil" per se but Bon Appetit!
I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. -- Hunter S. Thompson
NT = no text
-molo
Using your sig line to advertise for friends is lame.
Of course I didn't read the article, as I don't subscribe and am lazy, but wouldn't the heat kill all the plants too? And I thought there were "many" survivors. Mostly small animals, besides plants and lower life forms. And how could 1 impact effect the entire planet with such a high amount of heat? Wouldn't that metemorph rocks as well? Or even react the atmosphere?
Why don't you guys have friends or journals?
Here...Try this...Pinky to Mouth everyone :-)
"dinosaurs were incinerated within hours by the 'heat pulse' of the Frickin' Laser Beam!
I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. -- Hunter S. Thompson
The majority of the dinosaurs were instantly fried, like in a nuke blast that wrapped around the globe. I haven't seen a movie lately, that had those kind of cool FX. How about you?
Think about to all the meteor's crashing into earth movies there are, now think about all the FX. Nothing as impressive as ALL THE DINOSAURS getting fried as a heat wave travelled around the globe.
Why can't Hollywood just pay attention to history and science. It's way cooler than the drek they come up with.
But seriously folks, just think of all the Brontoburgers. I bet Fred and Barney boiled off the surface still salivating at the endless plains of dino ribs.
Arrogance is Confidence which lacks integrity. -- me
So many things survived from that time other than the Dinosaurs. Large trees, many forms of reptiles and mammals that are virtually the same (based on fossil records) to this day.
Not too mention that the fossil records for Dinosaurs don't stop on 1 day.
It seems that the Doomsday theory gets more headlines than other theories suggesting, disease and climate change (a much slower, more boring process) were the cause. Even though the damage of a meteor strike would have been far more devastating and left the planet set back near square one as far as life.
If the earth was baked and then the sun was blocked by smoke and ash, how come so much survived?
*Note IANAS (I Am Not A Scientist), just wondering.
http://www.kubuntu.org/
"this means that if the bodies of the dead were to get up again, we could kill them all 12 more times."
Given enough fallout, we might see that happen!
I bet there are a lot more than 12 "planet-killer" asteroids out there. Heck, I bet there are more than 12 of those in orbit around our sun.
So what's your point?
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
"Alvarez Hypothesis" is the term used to describe the idea that dinosaurs died as a result of a catastrophic asteroid impact. I do not believe that the hypothesis has attained the status of theory, however. The main evidence for such a hypothesis seems to come from the observation of geologist Walter Alvarez of a significant layer of Iridium on the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (KT boundary), due to the fact that Iridium is a very rare element on Earth but found in abundance in asteroids and meteorites. This link has some more information along with Wikipedia.
Is how they ever managed to live in the first place. The strength of muscles is a function of the area of their cross-section. It increases only roughly at a rate of the square of its size. Weight goes up as a cube of its size. Things get heavier much faster than they get stronger.
And just how much stronger could dino muscles have been than modern mammalian muscle? 140% stronger, 170%? That's really stretching it, and it still isn't nearly enough.
Land animals probably can't be much bigger than an elephant.
And no, I'm not a christian scientist. I don't think it's a conspiract, the bones are there, and they show how big the things must have been. I'd just like answers (prefereably those that don't have anything to do with superstitious bible crap).
That the asteroid ruined it for those dinosaurs vacationing in Mexico, at least.
1. Do the Americans really have enough nukes to destroy the world ten times over?
This one I hear a lot. First of all, despite what you may have heard, really the majority of the energy of a nuclear explosion turns into heat and blast immediately, NOT radiation. The only exception to this is the so-called Neutron bomb, designed specifically with radiation (more specifically fast neutrons and gamma rays) in mind. But realistically, although the Americans have built approximately 70,000 warheads of almost 70 different types, they now possess a stockpile of around 9600 warheads. Surprising as it may sound, this is NOT enough to 'destroy' the world. Even hitting every city in the world with everything in every country's arsenal would not be able to 'destroy' the world. The world is still a
BIG place. Keep in mind the Russians have around the same numbers of warheads.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I find this funny.
B-but your post wasn't at all amusing... it was just completely offtopic.
("Uuhhh, speaking of asteroids - I just picked up this great collection of old Atari games on sale at the store...")
I did appreciate "pupulation", though, and wish I had mod points today 'cause that's got potential for being a nifty and useful word.
<grrr>
Someone post the article so we can make intelligent comments on it.
To be honest, I have no idea why an article like this is not considered spam, if we have to pay to read it.
The fact that man has the power to potentially do something shouldn't make you sad. It should actually make you proud. Now, if man would actually do it, that would be sad.
Man can kill man, but until they do, there is nothing to be sad about.
Don't spread myths, last I checked all humans do not live in one giant city.
http://www.beyondweird.com/nuclearwar/s73p912.htm
I think we can now all breathe a huge sigh of relief as we know the dinosaurs did not, I repeat, did NOT suffer. We will all gain a few hours of sleep a night, I'm sure.
Think about it. The rest are not carbon, if there is complete incineration, then only some non carbonic element are left (Ca, OS, etc...). If the frying is not complete, the bacteria in the body then start their work and eat up the corpse. As for baking on the other side of the world, it really depend on the energy of the impact. It heat up the atmosphere which then in a heat wave travel around the globe. Whether the heat wave is enough is another question which the article seems to answer : yes.
But as the article point out, this theory does not explain the water extinction of the animals.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
According to this this while the brighter (Alpha-2) is a much warmer white class A star with a temperature of 8500 Kelvin.
Which google says it's about 123.9 gas mark.
Why do you ask?
All unprotected creatures were 'baked by the equivalent of a global oven set on broil.'"
Thanks for the metaphor. This "heated air" concept is difficult to get across to the layperson.
Personally, I'd like for these theories to go through a bit more critical review before they're broadcast to the public. This smacks as sensationalism more than science.
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
Zubenelgenubi is a double star. Which one do you mean? Assuming you're talking about the hotter one, Alpha-2, that'd be about 583.
Bruce Willis says, "Yes."
Google wouldn't do the conversion for me :-(
Stick Men
so what! just watch that mega-impact gasoline producer. YOU don't want to end up in a tank. ...
why is slashdot.orrrg slow? because they PICK their
editors. sorry for your post and non post reply.
it's proly an japanese feature slash back moral/ethics thing.
p.s. i wouldn't acre less as long as you post a descent link, but now-a-days it's all about form. tiny island though
"Now we need to know how bees survived in an oven without food for years?"
Million year-old barbeque.
Of course it is. Silly me. That's what you get for drinking beer.
Stick Men
Not too long ago, I think 2002, we signed the SORT treaty with Russia, where we limited ourselves to 2,200 nuclear warheads.
I find this type of alarmism annoying...nuclear weapons have only been used as weapons twice in all of human history. If we survived the Cold War, I find it highly unlikely that we'd blow ourselves up now. Nuclear terrorism may be a valid threat, but nuclear war is a thing of the past.
Sangloth
I'd appreciate any comment with a logical basis...it doesn't even have to agree with me.
So now we have prior art for animal crackers.
Everyone knows that dinosaurs died during the Great Flood.
Read the Bible!
We need those extra warheads to kill all the post-apocalytic zombies created by the nuclear war!
We humans are capable of creating a much larger catastrophe than our often theoretical cousins in space; and it's saddening.
This claim simply is not true.
In the following article you can read that 1 mile-asteroid impacts happen about 5 times every million years. Each such impact has the energy of several million megatons. I think that the world's nuclear aresnal sums up to several thousand megatons (most nukes around a megaton or less, times 10,000).
In any case, this is for the "five times per million years" size rock. The rock that hit the dinosaurs was much much bigger (but such big rocks only fall down once per a hundred million years).
Tor
Insects are much older than any vertebrate.
g i?artid=281984
Look at this link http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fc
and this one created by honey bee farmers
http://www.angus.co.uk/bibba/bibborig.html
Bees are almost as old as flowering trees which are much older than dinosaurs.
http://nyamenation.org/
That's what I call a grill-out. BBQ sauce anyone?
I read the article
Another wild hypothesis without a shred of verifyable evidence.
I couldn't read it THIS time (because the server is slashdotted). But I did read it - or another describing the same theory - when it first became newsworthy some years ago.
There's plenty of evidence for it.
First off, the prediction comes straight out of physical modeling of what happens when a big asteroid hits:
- A bunch of rocks are kicked every which way.
- If the asteroid is big enough a LOT of them go into space.
- A fraction of them have enough energy to get above the atmosphere but not achieve escape velocity.
Once you realize those three things, it's straightforward for a physicist to calculate, for various size impacts on various sites (land, shallow ocean, deep ocean), how MUCH mass goes up, how MUCH of it comes back down, WHERE it comes down, HOW FAST it comes down, and what the results are.
So they calculated that. And came to the conclusion that for impacts of a certain range of sizes the result would be several hours of a rain of sand, all over the Earth, at speeds of up to several miles per second (plus rains of rocks of varying density at different distances from the crater and its antipode). The sky becomes essentially solid meteor trails for hours.
And those are HOT! Hot enough to dry out most of the plants and set them afire. Hot enough to kill any animal life on the surface that can't get underground or under water right away and then stay there for hours.
So if the sky turned into a broiler oven over the whole Earth for several hours all at once, what does this predict? One hemisphere is day and the burrowing nocturnals survive, the other is night and the burrowing diurnals survive. (And in particular regions it got REALLY hot, or REALLY shocked by the primary impact or the secondary rain of rocks, and NOTHING survived).
So they looked at the fossil record and that's what they found. Prediction confirmed - very good evidence for the model. Further, they could now tell WHAT TIME OF DAY the impact occurred and roughly where.
Then they looked in the area where this model predicted the impact should have been and FOUND A CRATER of the correct size (along with plenty of other evidence that this PARTICULAR crater's impact coincided with the extinction event).
Looks solid to me. Unless something new comes up I consider the puzzle of the extinction events solved.
The only question I have is: Why is this news NOW?
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
That's a lot of nonsense. There is no comparison to a whopping big asteroid hitting the planet, even as a simple matter of the total energy equivalence. Its like saying that a liter of botulinum toxin can kill the entire race. Technically it might be true (I don't really know), but in practice you can't come remotely close to killing the entire human race even if you had the toxin and nobody stopped you from using it.
If the US used its entire nuclear arsenal with the specific intent to maximize the body count, they still would probably not be able to kill more than one billion at best. Do the math. You have to kill 100,000 people per nuke for every single nuke, and even that will only get you the first billion. And in practice, there are only a relatively small number of targets that will net you that many kills if you nuke them.
Nukes are very destructive, but most people have a conception of their destructive potential that is totally out of proportion to what they are actually capable of. We have enough nukes to scorch a good bit of earth, but not even remotely enough to do a planet kill or even make more than a minor dent in the total human population.
This story makes me hungry...
The really large asteroids can kick up up billions of tons of sulfur and other materials into the atmosphere. This can cause prolonged darkness for about half a year after the collision. The resulting darkness cause global temperatures to plunge near freezing. The COLD not the HEAT could result in large scale extinctions, including the dinosaurs
I'm glad they didn't suffer.
They're alive I tell you! ^_^
This article proves it!!!
Remote New Zealand Volcano Sees Dinosaur Alert?
Homonyms are fun!
You're driving your car, but they're riding their bikes there.
Doesn't seem to explain birds or insects very well, does it?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
What kind of stupid theory is this. It seems the imagination of a american movies director! What happened to the insects and other animals that lived out of the water and over the soil and that originated the actual animals like modern birds and spiders?
Is it possible to recreate all the birds and reptiles from nothing in such a little time by evolution?
At least that's what many Fundies seem to think.
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.
PETA boycotts all asteroids in protest of the senseless murder of the dinosaurs.
They are throwing red paint on meteorites, and showing up nude at natural history museums everywhere.
Unfortunately the linked article is available in the Online Journal which you can either subscribe to or go to you neareast Uni Library and check it out.
A Thermal heat pulse and the ejecta from the impact could travel around the world because of gravity dragging the ejecta back towards the earth. Upon reentry, the ejecta emitted IR radiation, brightening the sky globally. This means no night and no shadows (as the heat sources were distributed across the sky compared with the single-source solar IR radiation). This means there was nowhere to hide unless you were underground. Even rock crevices were no shelter. Subsequent fires igniting simultaenously [the suggest that there are isotopically uniform charcoal deposits at the boundary] would have added to the carnage. These fires were not significant compared to the intensity of the IR radiation. Normal solar flux ~1.4kW.m^-2, this event was calucated by Melosh in a previous paoer in 1990 to product ~10kW.m^-2. Note that ambient air temerature would have only rise ~10 K.
As for survivors, those burrowers > 10cm below the soil surface would survive. Sheltering and semi-aquatic birds are posited to be survivors.
The important thing is that this paper presents no specific fossil evidence. It does offer some phylogenetic evidence to support the bird survival hypothesis. It presents one model that can be further refined and/or refuted with evidence. It is not necessarily true or false but it can be falsified. They suggest checking Gondwanan sites for evidence of spherules (proof of ejecta reentering) and their distribution. That is the nature of science which the majority of posters thus far need to grasp. Think of science in terms of mathematical functions that approach a limit/converge as evidence and models accumulate.
Slashdot: Where nerds gather to pool their ignorance
Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event
Chicxulub crater
Impact event
I'll tell you the problem with the scientific power that you're using here. It didn't [re]quire any discipline to attain it. You read what others have done and you took the next step. You didn't earn the knowledge for yourself so therefore you don't take any responsibility for it. You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could and before you even knew it you had it.
So you only "earn" the "right" to make a product if you personally developed every single scientific theory and technological breakthrough necessary to construct it, working from first principles you personally developed?
Reminds me of how "The New Math" created a generation of ilnumerates by (instead of teaching counting and arithmetic skills) requiring them to invent for themselves the entirety of several millenia of number theory behind arithmetic and mathematics - while being distracted by "helpful" information about multiple bases and the like.
You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could and before you even knew it you had it.
It was a GIANT who characterized his own scientific breakthroughs as being able to see farther than others because he stood on the shoulders of (previous) giants.
Following the Ian Malcom character's advice leads to abandoning, not just genetic engineering, but all of science, history, engineering, industrial society, archetecture, farming, hut-building, and even stone knife making. Humanity would be reduced, not just to the level of hunter-gatherers, but to the level of purely instinct-driven animals (below primates, cats, birds, and even some reptiles).
= = = =
None of which in any way detracts from your point, which was dead on. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
What do you mean they all died off my mom is still running around!!!
Just practice your "Duck and Cover" drill like Bert the Turtle
Or get one of the 1950's vintage A-Bomb-proof school desks.
Chip H.
Actually I think the most common misconception is not of the destructive potential of nukes, but of just how damn big the world is!
"Studies have shown that people who eat peanuts live longer than those who do not eat."
"Yes, Squat. I think it would be safe to say that failing to destroy that asteroid in time would fit NICELY INTO THE BAD THINGS CATEGORY!"
"Oooh, does that mean we get to kick some puffy white mad zionist butt?"
... or even any primates in existance at the time of the dinosaurs' mass extinction 65 million yeargs ago. In fact the only mammals around were only some very small rodent-like primitive mammals around then. Well, maybe you might call those critters our "ancestors", and maybe they did feast on rotting dino meat.
poor dinosaurs... couldn't swim... so they drowned
what about pliesiosaurs and icthyosaurs... all packed up and went to scotland?
not to mention the fact that, over the mesazoic era, we see various species of dinosaurs come and go...
evolution aside, i think literal translation of the bible doesn't allow for dinosaurs
however, with some liberal hebrew translations, genesis can be altered from "And G-d created the great sea monsters, and many kinds of living creatures that creep." to "And G-d created the great lizards, and many kinds of living creatures that creep." and BAM, we have dinosaurs again.
just food for thought. going off to defy gravity now...
The Neo-Bohemian Techno-Socialist
What about that crater that people thought was an extinct volcano off the coast of Australia? I can't find the source to back it up, but I heard it a while ago on NPR (National Public Radio). Those in the US who listen to that program might have some sources. All I could find after a very quick Google run is Australian Impact Craters.
... the dinosaurs died for our sins... or how does that go again...
The Neo-Bohemian Techno-Socialist
I couldn't find a way to email you or contact you in some other way (lousy mods will probably attack me for being offtopic, too. Especially since I mentioned it myself).
At any rate, as someone who graduated with a degree in Theatre and is very well trained in auditioning AND a director who has listened to a fair share myself, I should tell you it is a VERY BAD THING to use movie monologues as your audition pieces.
Your best course of action is to go find a good and relatively unknown play and cutting your own monologue out of that. Your director will respect you more and you'll really stand out in their mind.
Trust me!
fs
p.s. Even Bill's Big Book O' Monologues is a big no, no.
Then why do NONE of the current fossils show signs of that? You would think that would be a pretty obvious thing.
Wired News is covering this topic too: A Fiery Death for Dinosaurs?
The new study reviewed existing geologic evidence for the known impact and considered interesting patterns in species survival. How did some birds, mammals, crocodiles, snakes and other animals endure the calamity that wiped out larger species?
That's a good question. But it's got a bug in it - the phrase "wiped out larger spieces". Better to say - selectively wiped out one branch of animals that came in all shapes and sizes, and lived in all kinds of environments right alongside animals that *didn't* die out.
That asteroid sure was amazing!
The survivors burrowed underground or were protected from the firestorm by swamps or oceans, says study leader Doug Robertson of the University of Colorado at Boulder. The details were published in the May-June issue of the Bulletin of the Geological Society of America.
That's so plainly idiotic that it beggars belief. Dinosaurs came in a wide variety of sizes, some smaller than chickens. And there were many aquatic animals that also became extinct, that supposedly would have been safe according to this "study leader".
Another win for the hypothesis that makes for a good special effect, then. And published by the Geological Society - well colour me not suprised.
The dinosaurs still died from smoking...and baking, and roasting, and broiling!
"I am Heisenborg. You will probably be assimilated"
Scientific studies have proven that if there was a nuclear holocaust, or a giant asteroid like the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, that the RIAA would continue to survive.
Open Standards Portal
According to the abstract fires would have begun wherever there was available fuel. Wouldn't there be a world-wide charcoal layer to go along with the Iridium layer if that were true?
Who are these 'often theoretical cousins in space'?
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
You are correct. An asteroid 10 kilometers in diameter, a density of 3000 kg/m^3 and a velocity of 20000 m/s would have a kinetic energy of roughly 3 * 10^23 joules. The largest nuclear bomb ever detonated, the Tsar Bomba, had a yield of 50 megatons, which is equal to 2 * 10^17 joules. In other words, one impact will release (roughly) as much energy as 1500000 such bombs. And that's the biggest bomb ever detonated, compared to an asteroid that is only moderately huge. The world's nuclear arsenal is vanishingly small in comparison.
Delicious!!!
Nah.
I can't believe people still believe in an unproovable evolution theory. I guess they just make it up as they go along. Dino's are reptiles one day, mammals the next, then back to reptiles.
> (Am no longer religious.)
Religion == Re-linking (to GOD, to humanity, to humans...)
"I for one welcome our new nickel and iridium overlords." (circa 65 million years ago)
http://sushi-x.com/gallery/4d/chicxulub.zip
This is easy to visualize if you imagine a strike at the North Pole and the debris traveling along the lines of longitude to the South Pole.
Lasers Controlled Games!
eom
When is the MOVIE coming out?!? :-D
;-) Remember this, cause I'm always right! *cougch" ;o)
This scenario has about 100% chance for being made into a "disaster"-movie! bla bla bla bla
I'll give it 3-4 years
Naaah. Whatever killed the dinosaurs had to be very specific, because many quite delicate species (especially amphibians, which are exceptionally sensitive to environmental changes) survived, and that wouldn't happen if everything above ground was burned to a crisp.
Besides, the dinosaurs didn't die out all at once; extinction took at least 100,000 years (a fact generally ignored by the catastrophists).
Thank heavens! At long last, we've discovered how the dinosaurs because extinct. I'm sure this will bring all speculation to an end.
Now if we could ever figure out that Kennedy thing, we'll be all set!
You mean to tell me that Brits don't use the word "broil"? Ok, so who's the American culinary marketing genius who came up with the term "London Broil"?
Evolution can never be proven by science. And that goes for the entire array of evolutionary theories.
Domestication is a form of evolution. By man learning and practicing husbandry of animals and selecting desirable traits he (he in the generic sense) exerted specific pressures on large based familial lines. Thus was eventually born our concept of breeds. The blue heeler was bred for herding ability, the greyhound for running, the poodle as a dare (?). nearly every trait that a modern dog has is genetically coded in his ancestor the wolf it is only the frequency of expression which sets them apart. That information is part of the reason that the smithsonian (who is responsible for taxonomy) reclassified the dog from C. familiaris to C. lupus familiaris.
For all you homebound geeks who have never been to a barbeque, I will attempt to translate the above for you:
"Burning dinosaurs? Imagine a Beowulf cluster of those!
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
Wouldn't the global oven have been set to Bake ?
*DrugCheese rants*
My oven gets 700 Kelvin to the Kilocalorie, and that's the ways I likes it!
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
As defined in several of my science textbooks, a theory is a scientific picture of an aspect of the physical world comprising a collection of related hypotheses that have been confirmed by empirical tests.
You sir, are an ass.
That's right. All your base.
He's got a fucking laser cannon, you fool! And a ragin' hard-on the size of a buick! Repent!
That's right. All your base.
The Grand Canyon was created by water movement, but it could not have been the Colorado River because there is no buildup of sediment - a "delta".
The oldest living thing is a bristlecone pine in the White Mountains in California, at about 4700 years old. Since these trees can live seemingly forever in harsh conditions, why aren't there any older? After all, the history of life on earth is millions of years long.
Nearly every ancient culture has a great flood story. Most are strikingly similar to the Biblical account.
The Black Sea is believed to have once been a much smaller freshwater lake. This is because human artifacts and the fossils of freshwater creatures have been found there.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Since you appear to have a knowledge in such things. There is a strength training book called "Power to the People" by Pavel Tsatsouline. In it, a program for training the nervous system to access dormant and rarely used muscle fibers for greater strength without gaining weight is detailed. It's pretty good, but a tad pricey. Used prices are great though.
www.Dragondoor.com
That's right. All your base.
Obviously, the dinosaurs were ignorant of the "Duck And Cover" method for surviving an incinerating holocaust. Or is that only for nukes?
Sounds tasty. A feast for the entire village.
Wha-? I don't know that. WAHHHHHHhhhhh... [as I am flung off of the bridge I used to guard]
Yup, and most people don't realize that 3/4 of this enormous planet is covered in water. Pop a nuke anywhere and it makes nary a ripple in the ocean. Nuclear bombs pale into insignificance compared to volcanic eruptions and we get those regularly. You need one helluva big explosion to cause a global extinction...
Quick question to those well versed in the theory of evolution:
I think i have an informal understanding of the Theory of evolution, but i cannot for the life of me understand the evolution from asexual creatures to sexual creatures. Evolution (or maybe im just confusing this with natural selection, or they might be the same) says (roughly, IANAevolutionist...) that a creature with a beneficial mutation will be more likely to survive and prosper, and that mutation will become a new feature of the species. Now... at what point did a small creature "mutate" himself a male reproductive organ and say to himself "ya know i think ill stick this in that other freshly mutated hole, and we'll have ourselves some kids" Am I to believe that this happened and somehow it was so beneficial to the new species that they prospered more than the organisms that were reproducing asexually?
Alternate theory:
Scientists have shown that the moon is moving away at a tiny, although measurable distance from the earth every year. If you do the math, you can calculate that 85 million years ago the moon was orbiting the earth at a distance of about 35 feet from the earth's surface.
This would explain the death of the dinosaurs... well, the tallest ones at any rate.
The sending of this message pretty much inconveniences everyone involved.
because of earth's magnetic field. Every once in a great while it switches polarity and as it does it crosses over zero which leaves the earth vulnerable to solar radiation i.e. thats why everything on land died and animals tend to be nocturnal becaues their ancestors were on the other side of the planet when a solar flare struck. Its just another theory but it seems more likely than not.
Crispy Critters.
under the Yucatan as well as a small mountain of additional confirmatory evidence. Its been what, 2 decades, since Alvarez proposed this as a hypothesis? A lot more has happened in that time than just peopls sitting around saying, "well, isnt that elegant."
the reason Dino turned up on a Volcano was because some sicko wanted to cook him !!
The extinction event killed off all species larger than about 20kg. That wouldn't have included any mammals. Mammals 65 million years ago were tiny (mice sized) and most likely nocturnal.
He got the point right, there is not much air to heat (when compared to the mass of all the water in our planet).
Certainly this theory would go a long way to explain the increase in obesity which is apparently fast becoming the world's biggest health problem. Personally I've always found the answer to avoid getting obesit to eat less but heck what do I know I'm just a lanky techi with a beer gut ;)
Taking into account the insightful comments here that the die-off was restricted mostly to dinosaurs of all shapes and sizes in all environments, with the exception of the ones that later became birds, I have to doubt that this theory is accuarate.
If one considers the theory maintaining that many species would have had to hide under water to survive one really has to ask what happened to the many aquatic species of dinosaurs, and why they died off but aquatic mamals and fish did not. One would also have to conder that there were many species of dinosaurs that were as small as or smaller than chickens (courtesy of Jurassic Park 2). It wasn't only mamals that were small at the time.
I truly wonder if the die off wasn't the result of a virus or bacteria that mostly affected dinosuars. There are numerous virii and bacteria that are species specific. Even if the illness didn't kill offf all of them (as evidenced by birds) it would have perhaps killed off enough of them to make survival of the species as a whole impossible.
It's unlikely, I know, given that dinosaurs were biologically as diverse as modern animals but it at least sounds better to me than dino burger.
Another good example would simply have been not enough food for the larger animals after an asteroid strike kicked up enough dust to cause dark skies for a number of years.
Bacteria exchange genetic material.
Viruses mediate the exchange of genetic material.
The development pathway that unites all animals includes a stage in which a viable (usually fertilised) egg cell (zygote) divides a number of times to form a ball of cells (morula, blastula) gradually differentiating because of (dorsal/ventral etc.) gradients in (HOX) gene expression.
Sponges (porifera) are a likely candidate for the oldest surviving animal lineage, potentially dating from the recently annointed Ediacaran Epoch through the Cambrian explosion, so called because the basic developmental forms of animals diversified wildly in a (geologically) short time.
Hermaphroditic sponges produce sperm and eggs at different times, obviating themselves, and thus the last common ancestor of all sexually reproducing animals, from any requirement for different male and female phenotypes.
Sexual dimorphism came later and very differently in different taxa.
Such "all or nothing" questions are a standard intellectual trap for people who cannot see the overwhelming evidence for the fact of evolution, a fact that various theories strive to account for without ever needing to overturn the core Darwinian insight that everything alive today is the product of a very long history of variation and selection from multitudinous common ancestors.
-- Our systemic servants do not good masters make.
"I think this is the most likely scenario for the death of the land fauna," Melosh told SPACE.com. He added, however, that the idea does not explain ocean extinctions, "which were pretty extensive also." So sayeth the article... doesn't it follow that ash would change the pH of the water in the oceans (IANAC-- I am not a chemist), BUT, wouldn't it also follow that oceanic extinctions would be easily accounted for either from this or the reduced level of O2 in the water (or air) around the world's oceans? It doesn't take much...
add a monkey and it's gold
Domestication is by artificial selection. That theory some people disagree with isn't really called evolution the way Darwin wrote it, it's much more properly called natural selection. This is to distinguish it from at least one major theory of evolution that has been very largely disproved only in the last century(Lamark's Theory of eveolution by inheritance of acquired characteristics, see also Lysinkoism), and may be necessary to distinguish it from some other variants still floating around in the zeitgest.
One of the problems some people have with the Darwinian theory, is it is too often presented as "All selection is natural selection" or "Natural selection is sufficient to account for all observed variation", which is precisely what you yourself just offered a fine counter-example to. Proof of natural selection would be better based on those wolves you bring up towards the end, but the evidence there is in the line that extends backwards in time from the modern wolf to the varois proto wolves, rather than the branches off that line that make up domestic dogs.
Who is John Cabal?
> "slow down" by accelerating
I do this all the time. I can also turn the corner by accelerating. In fact it is not possible to slow down or turn a corner in any other way!
Acceleration is a word even more mis-used than 'theory'. It simply means to change speed or direction. Not just 'getting faster'.
The man with no surname and a silly hat
On the universe: It's bunk.
:-P
The man with no surname and a silly hat
On the universe: It's bunk.
The archive is over at asstr,org
A comet hits off the Pacific, and half mile tidal waves moving at 600 miles an hour finish off what the earthquakes didn't. Those remaining fight to survive, and those with guns survive longer.
An off-duty cop (a gulf war vet) who was camping in the woods fights to survive, and ends up using his skills rallying a neighbourhood east of Sacramento in the Sierra foothills against militias. (Lots of widowed housewives too, thus the s in the a.s.s.t.r...) Again, surprisingly well done and gripping.
Everything accelerates to slow down, just as it accelerates to speed up. Acceleration = change in velocity over time.
...Even though we all totally knew what you where getting at
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
I find it disturbing how many people here think the main destructive capability of a nuke going off is the initial blast.
I've worried for so long about the poor little dears suffering and dying slowly
in my life God comes first.... but Linux is pretty high after that
Francis Smit
you do not need to flip them
the impact will do the trick if the tangential velocity is correct in the first place
you may need to alter the impact spot, call Bruce Willis, he's got it figured out already
add some cayenne pepper to the brontosaurus as they tend to be a little bland
do not eat any pterodactyls as they are very tough and can cause irritable bowl symptoms (diarrhaea and bleeding from the rectum)
dinosaurs=birds?
Tastes just like chicken!
Completely ignorant question, as I can't be bothered to RTFA at this hour, but isn't the latest theory about the evolution birds is that THEY are in fact, the closest living descendants of dinosaurs? If modern bird descended from archaeopteryx, then how did these survive if only buried/underwater creatures made it through the inferno? Or for that matter, how did any modern reptile make it that did not descend from an amphibious ancestor?
-cp-
The truth is...
The dinos started a world war among themselves.
They were technologically advanced enough to use nuclear weapons and nuked themselves to total annihilation.
Believe it or you're an asteroid zealot.
The big pieces that were thrown on suborbital trajectories, at reentry (supposing they reach the ocean) will function as huge anti-submarine grenades. One such piece might have more effect than a undersea nuclear explosion.
This might explain destruction of species with a narrow living area.
Calin
This post and all its comments has absolutely mention about Microsoft, Linux or OSS. Is this a first?
Oh, wait a minute... DOH!
The new study reviewed existing geologic evidence for the known impact and considered interesting patterns in species survival. How did some birds, mammals, crocodiles, snakes and other animals endure the calamity that wiped out larger species?
Asteroids also caused huge flood. Birds could fly, all others that survived learned to swim.
Dilbert has proven that the dinosaurs aren't extinct. They're still here, but they're just hiding. Check behind your sofa!
Domestication is by artificial selection.
Right, but it utilizes the very same mechanism which allows for evolution and is indeed termed a "micro-evolution". Yes what you state better supports the history but as a biologist I really am more interested in the mechanisms.
The British Word is "Grill". It can be a verb "To grill a lamb chop", or a noun "Puty that chop under the grill".
Regarding London Broil, I've seen tins of stuff called "London Grill" which appears to be beans and bacon bits and sausages and black pudding and bits of kidney all mixed together in tomato sauce. Which sounds pretty grim, but grim in a particularly English way.
evil math within Nature's Cubic Creation!
3.5 foot iguana, and she is FAR stronger than any cat or dog of equal or greater size that I have ever owned or played with
Now improve her heart design from a bivalve to quad, and I think we can project some incredible performance improvements.
How do you like you Dino? Rare, Medium or Crispy?
Come the revolution, the Bourgeois, Capitalistic, "A PARKING STICKER HOLDERS", will be first against the wall!
I should have been more specific - evolution in the molecules to man, goo to you via the zoo sense can never be proven.
Borrow money from a pessimist - they don't expect it back.
If "because it did" is not good enough for you, then creationism will not float your boat either "because God mage it so".
Newton's Law of gravity has been disproved, and I find it ammusing people still call it a Law. It's still used because under most circumstances it is a good aproximation. Einstein's theory of relativity / special relativity is still a theory, but it has gone far enough to have disproven Newton's Law of gravity.
I caught a documentary recently that convincing argued against the overt domestication of wolves as the origin of dogs. The theory was that as Man dropped his nomadic ways and became (relatively for the time) "urban" he created trash for the scavanging. These garbage dumps could reward only the most docile, submissive wolves, who lacked the aggression and skittishness needed to hover near a village's cast offs. Symbiosis separated dogs from wolves as the former adapted to a lucrative environment.
From lunar impact studies it is well known that the focus of surface waves after a large impact can lead to visible surface disruption at the point antipodal from the impact. You see this mon many moons of the solar system. Especially the smaller ones. I doubt that the Chicxulub impact was large enough to cause these effects. If it was, antipode to Chicxulub is somewhere in the southern indian ocean. Oceanic crust there might be old enough to record the event. Tectonic movement has probably offset the spot considerably.
an ill wind that blows no good
Another experience with "frying" in the US: It can mean deep frying, but it can also mean pan (or shallow) frying. In my experience, "frying" on its own usually means pan frying. Possibly that's because I grew up in Virginia, where, for example, real fried chicken is pan fried. YMMV.
Actually it was because the dinosaur governing councile legalized gay marriges.
http://www.leadmagnet.50megs.com
...baked dinosaur.
A computer without Windows is like a cake without mustard.
Does the theory of gravity say that it's instantaneous? Or does it only act at a certain speed.
65,000,000 years ago? Since little I've doubted the accuracy of these scientific research findings. Especially when based on *carbon* dating etc etc. When we are uncertain of so many events that have happened in the past 200 years, how can we be so sure what happened 65 million years ago?
The phaomnneil pweor of the hmuan mnid. Fcuknig amzanig eh!
Feeds 2-3 billion what? Nice going, everything on land is dead. You're going to have to wait a few million years for the stuff still living in the ocean to figure out how to walk out. By then, the dinosaurs are going to be a little stale.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Indricotheres were considerably bigger than elephants -- around twice the mass. They're mammals, the closest living relations being rhinos. Dinosaur-sized mammals, easily. Think giraffe height with the mass of a rhino.
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
The Greys had a big Chicxulub-Combo take-out order. And then they super-sized it, bastards!
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
"Thank you for your order, please pull up to the next planet."
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Good point. So exactly what made big animals a bad idea, long ago? (though the megafauna never did get as big as the dinos) I personally don't think it's exotic muscle, I was saying that couldn't be the explanation. I don't think gravity has changed either, or the size of the planet. So just what gives?
My word!
They didn't suffer long.
I can rest easy at night now.
As I See It:
step 1: big asteroid hits earth, bummer.
step 2: giant heat pulse cooks lungs of surviving dinosaurs causing them to have a 'bad' day.
step 3: all dino's meet creater, total bummer.
right, got it. makes some sense.
ok, one small question: birds, amphibians, reptiles, plants, and insects should be dead also? the historic record doesn't give foundation to this 'theory'. i say this because these animals are VERY fragil and ANY change in their enviornment is LEATHAL! i can see the part about the surviors being under water; but the plants, and birds doesn't fit in this theory.
somebody needs to invent time travel so we can see what really happened!
--------------
Older Stuff
-> Dinosaurs Died Within Hours of Asteroid Impact, says New Study (666)
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
(The "larger" mammal you show was still just a few kg: not much larger than a large rat. You mention bird ancestors- the closest relatives like the velociraptors were larger than 20kg. But, by 65 myo birds themselves- recognizable to us as being like what we have to day- existed. This would include species that lived in water or near water.)
2. This new article suggests that only burrowing / nocturnal animals (mammals, small non-dinosaur reptiles like snakes) and animals that lived in swamps / water (birds, small species of crocodiles) survived. These two patterns put together can account for the survival patterns amoung classes / families of animals. Only the smallest dinosaurs (birds) survived- probably branching out from water-dwelling species. Mammals and other reptiles branched out from the nocturnal and/or burrowing species that survived. Everything large on land died. I would still wonder about the large ocean-dinosaurs (the ones that looked like dolphins). Perhaps their food supply was disrupted long enough (if the whole food chain was broken) for them to not make it. Sharks and crocodiles could be more versatile. But who knows... its an interesting theory that the article had, but it still needs much more corroboration: thats how science goes.
Non-religous zealots (Communists) have killed just as many people in the last 300 years as Religious people.
Dude, communism is a political and economic belief system. Not a religious belief system.
Hope you didn't pay for that education...
--Phillip
Can you say BIRTH TAX
It's Lavos. He burried into the earth and made it impossible for such big things to evolve because he is umm.. suckign energy out of the earth.. Less energy = less biomass = smaller cretaures. yes thats it.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
I believe he meant, "Fuels 2-3 billion," as in "keeps 2-3 billion in fossil-fuels for well two to three hundred years."
Tim
In a scientific context, "theory" should be used to mean "scientifically accepted explanation." If the explanation isn't accepted yet, it should be called a "hypothesis."
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
I've read conjectures that dinosaurs had distributed brains. If some control were in a place other than the head, reduced blood in the head would not necessarily lead to loss of control.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
So not even a single pair of dino hid out and escaped this barbeque??Think it further, why every dino died but some other animals could survive?
If ants train aphids, people call that part of natural selection. If people train dogs, then that is often deemed artificial for some reason. People are part of nature. Our will can exert a natural influence the same as an ant can instictively influence other species development. The symbiosis of people and other animals in our environment with the primary gain in humans direction is no more artificial than ants herding and using aphids. IMNSHO. We choose to make a distinction to further separate us from other animals, and it is that distinction which is artificial.
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
And here's a question, how large would an incoming asteroid have to be in order for the force of its impact to cause massive earthquakes and volcanos on the opposite side of the earth?
Would it be possible for a large asteroid's impact to travel through the center of the earth to the other side and cause objects/people to be thrown high into the air? (similar to how hitting one billard ball can cause a billiard ball on the other side to roll away)
Another question--- would an asteriod collision with earth be an elastic or inelastic collision?
Oi. (head shake) Too many questions.
The Outer Limits episode you're describing is titled "Inconstant Moon," and it was based on a Larry Niven short story (published in the book of the same title).
I highly recommend picking it up!
"The gods can either take away evil from the world and will not, or, being willing to do so cannot.... If they have the will to remove evil and cannot, then they are not omnipotent. If they can but will not, then they are not benevolent. If they are neither willing nor able, they are neither omnipotent nor benevolent."
The world we live in is consistent with indifferent gods, or with no gods. Epicurus figured that shit out in 300 BC.
And he was wrong then, too. A god constrained by a sense of justice, a god with the foresight to see that good may come out of evil, or a god that did not wish to pre-empt the free will of man are all consistent with out world. Epicurious had a too-narrow view of benevolence.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
"Is it right because God commands it, or does God command it because it is right?"
A god constrained by a sense of justice (or by anything) is an oxymoron.
These are very old questions, and thanks to Occam's razor, we don't need to be burdened by them-- gods are an unnecessary postulate, an epicycle tacked onto a creaking model of morality that fails to recognize the simple truth: there is no justice but what we make ourselves.
Woo-hoo! Look at you! "Epicurus was wrong." Well, that settles it.
A god with "foresight to see that good may come out of evil" is pretty hazy on the meaning of good and evil. If that means god created both, then both must be okay. God evidently condones evil? How can you call him good then?
Foresight comes with omniscience, by the way. Another point for me--nothing can happen that god did not want to happen. 'Sin' is suddenly an oxymoron. Your house of cards is collapsing.
It depends on your definition of a god, really. The definition of god I'm working with is something along the lines of "a supernatural, self-aware entity".
When it comes to the Christian god, I would further qualify that definition with the qualities listed in the Bible: just, merciful, all-powerful, all-knowin - and yes, angry, wrathful and jealous. Those terms are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
"Epicurus was wrong." Well, that settles it.
No, what settles it is the argument that follows the assertion, not the assertion itself. If you want to debate, then debate. If you just want to mock people, go away.
A god with "foresight to see that good may come out of evil" is pretty hazy on the meaning of good and evil. If that means god created both, then both must be okay. God evidently condones evil? How can you call him good then? Foresight comes with omniscience, by the way. Another point for me.
Firstly, I was not necessarily ascribing those particular qualities to the Christian god. I was merely pointing out categories that would fit with our world that were not covered by Epicurus' model.
I don't think God tolerates evil for the sake of the good that comes out of it. I think he tolerates evil because he is constrained by his sense of justice (see the other thread if you want to talk about this). God says "Here's the best way to live: love me, and love each other". Humanity says "Pfft. Stuff that." Evil results. God will not stop the evil, because the evil is a just consequence of humanity's decision.
nothing can happen that god did not want to happen. 'Sin' is suddenly an oxymoron. Your house of cards is collapsing
Bzzzt. That has not been demonstrated. Nothing can happen that God could not forsee happening. That doesn't mean he necessarily condones it. See the other threads if you want to discuss how God's omnipotence doesn't extend to logical contradictioons.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
I guess that is what I want. So that's what I'll do!
Now you're just being evasive. You were giving an outright rationalization for your assertion that god permits evil because it suits his "sense of justice." The existence of the Christian god depends on that assertion.
What about when god commands the evil? Are you omitting the Old Testament because it suits your touchy-feely idea of god? You know, the loving god who commands rape, pillage and infanticide?
If you're going to make your religion into a smorgasbord where you pick and choose what you like and forget the rest, then I think I'll pass on this meal.
There's no logical contradiction in omnipotence requiring responsibility. Your argument is in favor of the contradiction--God supposedly created a universe with 'sin,' which he abhors. You haven't refuted that claim, because it is impossible.
What about when god commands the evil? Are you omitting the Old Testament because it suits your touchy-feely idea of god? You know, the loving god who commands rape, pillage and infanticide?
Nope, I believe the old testament is just as true as the new. I can't remember anywhere God commands rape, offhand - most of the time the Jews are pretty darned punished for fraternising with the gentiles. But as for the rest, you've got to remember one of the fundamentals of Christianity is that, essentially, every human is evil by nature, and deserves to die. Including Christians and Jews. It's only because God is a god of grace as well as a god of justice that there's anyone left on the planet.
As I said in some other post on this thread, I don't think that a wrathful, angry god and a loving, gracious god are necessarily mutually exclusive. I can name a number of people I love who I've been justifiably furious with, but was willing to forgive them all the same - and I'm just a man. God's got far more reason to be irritated than I did - and yet it turns out his far more gracious than me as well.
God created a universe with the potential for sin, because it is impossible to create a world that has free will without having the potential for sin built in. God cannot do what is logically impossible - he can't create a square circle.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
We don't have any small dinosaurs running around today
Yes we do, millions of them. They are therapod dinosaurs, otherwise known as birds.
Epicurus naively thought that taking evil from the world was possible.
Even a God cannot fix the statement "This statement is false." (The liar paradox - Eubulides of Miletus. Oddly enough, around the same time period. Also a version of the proof of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem.)
Human language is insufficient to create a consistent framework. Our concept of omnipotence must necessarily limit itself to power that exists within a consistent framework.
You apparently didn't read Epicurus enough. He didn't state there are no gods - he stated there are no "Epicurean omnipotent" gods, where Epicurean omnipotence clearly included powers that exceed a consistent framework. In other words, his concept of omnipotence could not exist by simple construction.
His definition of omnipotent was poor. Instead of "unlimited power" it should've been "all power that is possible." In that case, his answer was incomplete - the third option was "or, a world without evil is impossible."
Incidentally, this solution to the problem of evil is most of the time overlooked. People have long since acknowledged that a simple solution to the question of whether or not God is all knowing is that "God knows all that is knowable", but apparently "God is capable of all that is capable" was outside of their ability.
"Accelerator" is actually not a bad name for the gas pedal. We call it that exclusively in Aust.
;-)!
The "accelerator" pedal isn't just for getting faster, but for controlling speed (not velocity, of course, you need to add in the steering wheel for that). You use the "accelerator" pedal to slow down too -- by releasing the pressure on it. The brake is only for fast reductions in speed. Anyone using the brake for *all* their slowing down is driving with VERY bad fuel efficiency (and excessive brake pad wear; and risk of brake failure from overheating
My sister had a lot of trouble with getting mum's car to coast smoothly when first learning to drive until she grasped the idea that the "accelerator" pedal is for controlling speed, not just increasing it. Now she, like you and I, just does it without thinking about it.
The man with no surname and a silly hat
On the universe: It's bunk.
micro-evolution: no such thing. Evolution is evolution.
Mechanism:
Population A. Has concentration of genes characterized by X. A force is applied to the populace, Gene diversity shifts to patter Y.
Over time this shifting cause significant changes to species. Nothign NEW come out of evolution, just the choice of one trait over another. Point mutation, mistranslation, and a whoel range of DNA errors is the mechanism for new traits. Vast majority are lethal and instantly remove that individual (and mutation) from the populace. Some are benign, neither helpign or hurting (ie eye color). or not enough to affect their concentration in the populace. At some points speciation happens and this divides the species into two or more distince populations.
Repeat the above for 2.4 billion years.
(evidence, in a few short millenia we made a proto wolf into a shitzu. Guess what God can do with 2 billion years).
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
micro-evolution: no such thing. Evolution is evolution.
Huh? I would ask you to look up the difference between say C. lupus baileyi and C. lupus, once you find the difference look up the mechanism of that differences origin and you will find that C. lupus baileyi is a subspecies of wolf (C. lpus) specifically found around Mexico. Just because a term is not in your Bio 101 book and is rarely used on Animal planet does not cancel it out of the literature. Even a google search could have helped you.
BTW, nice that you start by claiming micro-evolution does not exist and close with a micro-evolutionary example.
The distinction is made because men have at least some ability to predict the consequences of actions, while natural selection is (quite correctly) characterized as the blind watchmaker in Dawkins' metaphor. You seem to be regarding human ability to anticipate the consequences of actions as not only limited and imperfect, but effectively nonexistant. Frankly, if I thought that human foresight had absolutely no effect on the human contribution to processes of nature, I would not have a "not so humble opinion" on anything whatsoever, but would express all my opinions with the utmost humility, as i would be absolutely unable to anticipate whether they would work any good or ill in the expression.
Who is John Cabal?
micro-evolutionary
In bio 101, 102, 201, 207, 270, 265
Genetics 270, 275, 301, 304, 340
Zoo 235, 265.
I have never heard the term "micro-evolution". Speciation, trait selection and evolution have been discussed but "micro-evolution" isn't a term scientists use. IT's a term you might use but it's not a "term" for academics. There is nothign "micro" about evolution. Because evolution happens in populations not individuals. Exstinction is selection.
The terms are only relavant in the context of Cretionist arguements.
Macro vs Micro
It isn't a scientific term.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
The terms are only relavant in the context of Cretionist arguements.
The term was coined by darwin it is used in the context of islands and other small populations (remember Darwin and Islands?). The distinction in island species, such as finches from one to the next, is said to be a micro evolution because of the individual adaptations that animals made to their unique islands.Islands are micro populations because of isolation, I NEVER said that evolution occurs in an individual. Your Bio 101 Prof did you a sad disservice by not requiring you to read Darwin.
I assure you that my arguments lend no credence nor give respect to "cretionists"
is said to be a micro evolution because of the individual adaptations that animals made to their unique islands
To clarify that is adaptations that the individual written sentence. islands populations made. I apologize for the poorly
Darwins Evolution isn't the entirty of the current theory. Only the baseline. Why would I be required to read a interesting but out dated book. As well. It is only used int he context of creationist arguements. Evolution is the whole system. Isolation of this to micro and macro are entirly a Creationist structure.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
Darwins Evolution isn't the entirty of the current theory. Only the baseline.
Good first point. However, if it is the 'baseline' or perhaps you meant 'basis' of the theory why would you be confused as to wether or not it should be read? Also, I do not understand why you say it is "used in the context of creationist arguments". That sounds backwards to me, please explain. Isolation to Micro populations is extremely useful in terms of seeing how effective different pressures were at influencing population change or evolution.
Microevolution
It's a term introduced by creationists. To me, it's simply selection and speciation. to them is a "de-evolution". Selection and speciation are scientific terms to cover the definition of micro-evolution. Macro evolution is use to seperate the two since you cannot deny one. It's a linguistic trick. If you have to debate soemthing, and it has strong suport, split the issue into topics which can be better fought by your side. Like make a accomadation that yes in fct my comapny kills millions of people, but split the issue and say "it was their choice".
Macro-evolution isn't anything more then the re-application of micro evolution, thus it's another name for evolution since it's simply the iteration of selection/mutation and they introduce it to try and seperate the issue. The one they cannot deny and the one they wish to deny. Notice many of the debatign tricks used in the arguement of creationsist, liek confusing the subject with special terms. Making great leaps of logic saying Evolution is not disporvable therefore invalid. Using the idea of "Consperacies" to re-enforce their point and minimize evidence that are couter examples to their point. Using emotional arguements with no proof. Even look in my own post log and see some of the responses to my arguements. Also thy use sources from their own side as reliable sources while at the same tiem belittling sources from the other side.
I use some of the same tricks. But the evidence is on my side. The very counter example of "light and the universe" is enough to defeat most simpel creationists arguments while a more sophisticated creationist arguement doesn't agree with the reason why creationism still exsist, namly fundementalism.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."