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Astrologer Sues NASA Over Comet Probe
0110011001110101 writes "NASA's mission that sent a space probe smashing into a comet raised more than cosmic dust -- it also brought a lawsuit from a Russian astrologer. 'Bai is seeking damages totaling $300 million -- the approximate equivalent of the mission's cost -- for her "moral sufferings," Izvestia said, citing her lawyer Alexander Molokhov. She earlier told the paper that the experiment would "deform her horoscope." ' "
Oh, and she didn't see this coming?
>> "What would the robut do? Frame someone!"
I wish NASA would be as cynical as I am in their response. "Are you going to cry about it?" Then proceed to blow chunks out of 10 or 15 more comets, to show them who is boss.
Home of the midwest loser - www.say-10.net
That settles it! I'm going ahead with my lawsuit against slashdot. I've never gotten a first post, and its fucked up my chi.
.
A few years ago a psychic in florida sued a MRI facility. Her claim was that the MRI had robbed her of her psychic abilities.
You may be persecuted by American space agencies today, dear Libra. However, despite your "moral sufferings" you will be able to gain great fortune from friends, family, and coworkers. Embrace your lawyers, Libra, for they will save you from the unnatural entropy of the universe caused by space probe crashes!
Right, because "inane, utterly frivolous lawsuits" never EVER happened in the US so far. Ever.
Je n'ai pas d'avenir Je n'ai qu'un destin Celui de n'être qu'un souvenir C'est pour demain
Of course, if this suit is allowed to proceed, doesn't that also open her up to suits by her clients for all the predictions she made that didn't work out perfectly? 3oo million probably won't be enough for her to pay all the suits she'll lose if the courts determine astrology is legally valid and binding.
In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.
Yeah, the next thing you know a bunch of fundamentalist christians will be trying to force through laws to push their form of creationism into public classrooms.
Greedy parasitism isn't democr... oh.
Power to the Peaceful
The REAL reason they popped that comet, was to improve the Feng-shui of the local celestial neighborhood.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Nope - but telling people in AIDS-stricken regions that using condoms is a sin... not so cool.
Education is the silver bullet.
Heres a hint. Making up numbers does not legitimize your point. In my experience, but then im from northern florida, the vast majority of the time its someone trying their best to convince me that I am going to hell because im an athiest. IF it were just a matter of "live and let live", that would be FINE. However, the religious zealots are most of the problem (again, from MY experience). I cant remember ever hearing of atheists assaulting religous people's person or property because they had a god sticker on it. However, I see and hear the reverse all the time. Happened to my wife (back when she was just my girlfriend). She had a pro Wicca bumper sticker and some god nut busted her windshield and wrote nasty stuff on her car with a magic marker, stuff along the lines that they should bring back witch burning. Kind and wonderful people, they are.
I've seen astrolgers that don't know me but have written up complete reports about who I am and what I feel, think, and believe -- without ever having met me.
James Randi did an experiment where he handed out horoscopes to a class of (college) students and had them rate how closely they matched reality. Most of the students said the horoscopes were accurate. He then had them swap horoscopes, and they found out that they all had the exact same horoscope. Now, how could ONE horoscope match everyone? Because it was filled with generalities and vague statements, that's how. The students themselves filled in the details where they were missing, and sub-consciously remembered the 'hits' more than the 'misses'.
Now, without knowing the exact circumstances behind your case, I can't tell you for sure that's what happened. Only you can, if you choose to look at what happened objectively.
I've seen people healed by faith healers,
Really? If you can prove that, you might win $1,000,000! Go to www.randi.org for details.
I've met psychics who can vividly describe situations and people that later become part of my life.
I sense a... man, or maybe a woman. He is tall, maybe short. BLond hair, maybe brown or black. You'll like this person, or maybe hate them.
How'd I do??
And before you start talking about "cold reading", I have a solid background in psychology, and did not give these people a chance to meet me or be exposed to me to cold read me.
You may "have a solid background in psychology", but you don't understand what 'cold reading' is. Cold reading does NOT depend on meeting the victim before hand, or even knowing anything about them before hand. That would be 'hot reading'.
From Wikipedia: "Generally, the cold reader will make a series of vague statements, will observe the subject's reactions, and then will refine the original statements according to those reactions"..."even without prior knowledge of a person, a psychic could still obtain a great deal of his subject's history by carefully analysing his or her look and other background information, such as gender, religion, race, education level and place of origin."
So, let's apply Occams Razor. Either there are people in this world who can 'speak to spirits', 'read minds', and have other paranormal powers (but choose to eke out a living reading palms instead of, say, getting the winnign lottery numbers). OR, there are people in this world who are frauds. Fakers. Con men.
WHich is more likely?
>> if the courts determine astrology is legally valid
;-)
I predict great disapointment in her future
http://request-header.info
Today's Sesame Street was brought to you by the number e.
Surrounded by atheist barbarians who want to force their children into gay marriages, perform mandatory abortions on their pregnant daughters and burn all bibles in the libraries. You can never stop watching for those barbarians, else you will wake up to find 24 hours porn programming on all TV stations. With a bare-breasted Janet Jackson doing the weather.
Ah, sort of like slashdotters ;-)
Loose lips lose spit.
Meanwhile, back in America, a Mr. Spackler of the entity Slashdot is suing some stupid Russian woman for $.65, which is the cost of the can of Pepsi I just spat out my nose.
ah.. a typical capitalist response!
So, on average each customer burned himself 70 times on the same cup of coffee? Damn...
^]:wq!^M
It is not banned in TX wholesale. My understanding, which is not complete as I don't have kids yet, is that each "ISD" (Independent School District?) has the power to set its own curriculum. Mine seems to teach both, I find this to be a horrible failure in society (that and the fact that PE is taught more rigorously than math, at least here). Creationism is not science, period.
I'm finding there are 2 types of Texans, one I dislike a lot, and the other I like a lot. The neo-con lunatic is the kind I can't abide, but I'm finding these are not natives, they seem to be imported. The other kind of Texan is the gun toting, fuck government, don't tax me, if-I-want-to-kill-myself-being-stupid-let-me kind. I like them a lot and I did not find this in either California or anywhere in the north east.
The sad thing about sick minds is that they can pervert any belief system. That's not the fault of the belief system, that's the fault of the minds.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
The coffee spilled while she was removing the lid, as a passenger in a stopped car, in an attempt to add cream and sugar -- something very common among coffee drinkers. While many jurors did not originally feel that the case was warranted, after seeing the evidence, they were particularly struck by McDonald's callousness in the case. The plaintiff received third-degree burns on 6% of her body as a consequence of the spilled coffee and initally requested compensation for her medical bills, which for such extensive burns are significant. McDonald's knew that the risk existed, as they served their coffee very hot. They'd seen cases of this happening before (from first to third degree burns), settling out of court but not changing their policies.
As a long-time coffee drinker, I frequently have a cup of coffee in the car. It spills. But third-degree burns are not part of any rational person's expectations of the consequences of spilled coffee. If you're going to serve something that carries that sort of danger -- one beyond normal expectations for the product -- to a place where it's well-known that spills will occur, at the very least there should be clear warnings. Maybe you disagree, but twelve people who actually listed to all the facts (and were not predisposed one way or the other) didn't.
Of course, now you often can't get McDonald's coffee that's hot enough and they put warnings on their cups, which isn't necessary (though to do otherwise may make them guilty of not protecting their stockholders). So it seems silly in retrospect, as the beverage is just as hot as you'd expect, but with warnings. Still, warnings never hurt anyone.