Slashdot Mirror
Discovery of Water In Moon May Alter Origin Theory
MarkWhittington writes "Scientists, working on a NASA grant, have made another startling discovery concerning water on the Moon. It seems that the interior of the Moon has far more water in it than previously thought — as much as the Earth does, apparently. Researchers made this discovery by examining samples of volcanic glass brought back to Earth by the Apollo 17 astronauts. These tiny beads of glass have about 750 parts per million of water in them: about the same amount as similar volcanic glass on Earth. It is postulated that more water than previously imagined exists deep below the lunar surface and was brought up and trapped in these crystalline beads by volcanic action billions of years ago." Phil Plait's original post adds more detail.
I am a FISH.
Since the accepted theory about the origin of the moon is that it is the result of a large body impacting Earth (I watch the Universe, no scientific background here at all), is it not possible that the samples that they're finding on the moon are part of the Earth transferred in the impact?
The Bible indicates that water was first and land formed from it. Its only natural to assume then that water would be a significant portion of any planet or moon.
Genesis 1:9
And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so.
Now we know why all the whalers went to the moon.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I say we sent a giant moon diaper up there to collect the water.
Just nuke the damn moon and let's get done with it.
Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.
Just proves we never went to the moon!!! Samples back from Nevada or even Kilimanjaro could have been 'obtained'.
Sometimes reading less books increases knowledge.
Next time I am lost in a desert I will suck on my glass bead. What a thirst quencher. AH.
Original and clever, here on Slashdot.
What you're referencing is generally concluded to be "allegory".
Apparently, per the article, the question of allegory-or-literal of "divided the waters from the waters" is now open, though.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
At least it's not an entry on the Fox News website.
Or best offer. No undercover agents, pls.
Not if you believe that the Bible is the literal Word of God.
The "allegory" defense is what happened when science started figuring things out and proved the Bible wrong. Nobody said it was allegory until then.
Plus, if the Bible was meant as "allegory" wouldn't it provide some clue within? And I don't mean "clue" as in "proven to be completely mythological".
You are welcome on my lawn.
"But when such technology is developed, lunar water could become the most valuable resource in the solar system, making the Moon the most desired real estate beyond the Earth."
Lunafina anyone?
Well, simply factually wrong history on your part. This has been held by many since the earliest years of Christianity.
We answered to the best of our ability this objection to God's "commanding this first, second, and third thing to be created," when we quoted the words, "He said, and it was done; He commanded, and all things stood fast;" remarking that the immediate Creator, and, as it were, very Maker of the world was the Word, the Son of God; while the Father of the Word, by commanding His own Son--the Word--to create the world, is primarily Creator. And with regard to the creation of the light upon the first day, and of the firmament upon the second, and of the gathering together of the waters that are under the heaven into their several reservoirs on the third (the earth thus causing to sprout forth those (fruits) which are under the control of nature alone, and of the (great) lights and stars upon the fourth, and of aquatic animals upon the fifth, and of land animals and man upon the sixth, we have treated to the best of our ability in our notes upon Genesis, as well as in the foregoing pages, when we found fault with those who, taking the words in their apparent signification, said that the time of six days was occupied in the creation of the world, and quoted the words: "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens."
--Origen of Alexandria
You take Dawkins' errors of history on far too much thoughtless faith, I think.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
This seems to be more evidence that water exists all over this part of the Solar System instead of Moon and Earth formed differently. In fact it would be kind of weird and probably be more supported of "separate formation" if we couldn't find water on the Moon.
Couldn't it be possible that the comet impacts created the water containing glass? A sufficiently large impact should melt some rock that may look lite it was brought up from inside the moon. The current theory is that water is deposited by comets; why not the glass too?
Chandramaava apaam pushpam... ... ..
Chandramaava apaam aayatam...
Aapovai Chandramasa aayatam.
Moon is the flower of water... ... ... ...
Water comes from the Moon..
And Moon comes from water...
I am a man of science but this one shloka blows my mind.
Am I wrong to be depressed that people so quickly accept that some math and after-the-fact observations can "prove" something but will utterly deny the possibility that a written record of an account handed down by the first man created by God could possibly true?
I'm not saying I can dig Adam up and ask him if God really told him what happened. I'm just saying I can't help but be sad that people expect so little from one "proof" but so much from another just because it's easier to agree with.
The direct parent I'm replying to was my comment. Didn't notice I was AC.
From TFA:
Lunar water can be mined then refined into liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. After that, it can be shot into space by a lunar-based rail gun to a fuel depot at one of the Lagrange points, where the gravity of the Moon and the Earth cancel one another out. A spacecraft headed, say, for Mars would not have to carry all the fuel it needs to get to Mars from the Earth, but rather stop at one of these fuel depots, top off its tanks, and proceed on.
Well, first we have to build a moon base from which to do the mining...
Aside from that, let's say you've escaped Earth's gravity well -- wouldn't it be better to not burn lots of fuel firing retro-rockets to stop and fill back up, and re-accelerate? What if the space base on the Moon used it's rail gun to launch the fuel on an intercept course -- you know, like when someone asks for some gas money for their car, and you toss them a Molotov cocktail and say "catch".
I'm sorry, what I mean to say is -- If we have Oxygen and Water refineries on the Moon Base, why not just launch the rocket from there (with their rail-gun) then fire thrusters and not have to stop at all?
Seriously though, at this far out point in our make-believe space future we're just one hypothetical step from having a clone farm manning the Moon base (cheaper than droids), but if the we don't get Kevin Spacey's voice samples for the robotic assistants, it just won't work.
I'm sorry, what I mean to say is -- Let's just start with getting people back to the Moon, or to Mars, an asteroid, hell anywhere other than our own orbit -- that's so routine that a space launch is about 20 seconds of local news. If you want space funding, you need to excite the general public about space.
Couldn't this be interpreted as additional evidence for the theory that the moon formed in a collision between earth and another object, in the sense that the moon once where part of earth and some water where transfered during the collision?
Rapture happened in 1981.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Yeah, you can't, because Adam is a character from a fantasy book.
Because that is utterly ridiculous.
Do you acknowledge the possibility that Greek mythology is historically accurate? I don't.
To be exact: If you believe that the bible is the literal word of god, and that god told the humans the exact truth about everything, instead of stories which keep them happy.
Just imagine the situation:
Moses: OK, so how did it all start? ... ... ...
God: Well, in the beginning I created space, time and matter in a big bang
Moses: In a what?
God: In a big bang. All of space and all the matter was concentrated in a point
Moses: Where was this point?
God: Everywhere.
Moses: But that doesn't make sense.
God: It makes perfect sense. You just don't understand it.
Moses: Nor will the other people. I need something I can tell them and which they will understand!
God: But it's exactly what I did!
Moses: But the people don't care if that is so. They want something they can understand, even if it is wrong!
God: sigh Well, then, what about that: In the beginning I created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Any chance of terrestrial contamination? Seems possible that over the last 4 years in storage, at some point the moon rocks in question could have been exposed to moisture from the Earth.
I fear there may be more to this story than meets the eye
http://www.weebls-stuff.com/onthemoon/On+The+Moon+ep.20/
By your logic, we should be viewing and judging Islamic history based on the beliefs of the Bahai, or something. You're quoting the writings of a Christian philosopher who was working before the Nicene Creed even existed. Many of his beliefs were declared anathema even before the Great Schism.
So you are cherry picking something which proves no more than a few people in the early church believed some of the Bible to be allegorical (people who were unsurprisingly less religious and more philosophical, even materialistic, as one of the anathemas of Origen was having denied the real and lasting resurrection of the body). The historical fact that you are trying to obscure is that this in no way reflected the views of orthodox Christianity as practiced by the majority of Christians in that time or the centuries that followed. This is ignorance at best and disingenuity at its highest at the worst.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
so why does that mean there is that much water is on the moon now?
Is that the source of these volcanic beads was near a particularly large( for the moon) source of water. I am not an expert but this seems like a more reasonable guess than there is as much water on the moon as on earth. At least to a laymen
While i'm more an atheist then religious, i always find it funny people fighting over the 6 day creation thing. A day (for earth) is when it rotates one full rotation, in the bible, they never stated what "day" means (since the earth was in the middle of creation, was it still earth day, some other planet day?). You fools fought over the wrong thing! It should have been over what "day" means!
Mwhahahahahha, third party swoops in for the win!
6001. You said it was 6000 years old last year.
Have gnu, will travel.
You're following a fallacious premise in-line with your predispostion to address Christianity exclusively by forming a Straw Man Fallacy regarding it.
It makes not the slightest difference to the correctness of a position how many people can be named historically to have held an erroneous opinion about some aspect of it. Literally no field of study could pass this criteria--and shouldn't, because it's merely an intentionally-impossible criterion to meet, to attempt to insure for oneself that they won't need to address a particular topic on the proponderance of good argument for it.
This is what is "disingenuous" here, specifically your approach to the subject as is in-line with the majority of atheistic "argument". What matters to any intellectually-honest person is whether a particular position is -viable at it's best-, not how many instances there were that some student or follower of the overarching topic held an erroneous view. This is the very definition of a Straw Man Fallacy.
Anyway, provide your counterexamples. I've demonstrated the views of one of those considered a "church Father", which, is essentially the -very definition- of early Christianity. You've provided nothing. As of today, the preponderance of support for the YEC/six-day-creation is originating specifically from the Evangelical movement, whereas what could be the "orthodox" you reference, the Catholic Church, currently acknowledged evolution, and Origen is fully considered foundational by the actual Orthodox Church.
So, gain a margin of backing of your position by posting some actual evidence of your stance, or using terminology meaningfully. Feel free to start on either one.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
It's turtles _most_ of the way down.
Frankly, I don't get it either. When encountering this stance from a literal-interpretation YEC, I want to ask if they think anyone, at any point in history from the moment it was written by the author himself, thought that a -literal- seven-headed, ten-horned dragon was going to chase around a pregnant woman during "the end" as described in Revelation--rather than it clearly being a moral/political allegory.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Apollo 17 took place in 1972. Now please tell how come it took almost years to discover water? I mean, really, the thing was dripping close to 40 years and some Scientist (no doubt having many important degrees) claims that wet stuff is water. I believe if you ask the janitors who had to mop the wet floors could have told you that almost 40 years ago.
Disclaimer: I'm a Christian (not a young-Earther)
In the original Hebrew, the word used is yom which can be translated to mean anything from a day to a year or an undetermined length of time (Sorry, source is evidently biased. I'd heard it before and this was the best Google could turn up). As it is, the whole argument over young earth/generally accepted age is stupid. If your a Christian and the age of the Earth is that important to you, then you're doing it wrong.
Our culture doesn't get smarter, it just finds new ways of being retarded.
I wish I had mod points. Thanks for the chuckle
Our culture doesn't get smarter, it just finds new ways of being retarded.
Ok, this was a shock too me when I first read this because there was huge amounts and still is of Lunar research going on and I can see the moon having some water tucked away in an impact crater...here and there in the shadows.
But the moon has the same amount of water content as the earth?
That is a _huge_ amount of water to miss for the pass 50 plus years of research.
It is a gigantic amount of water. They have done TONS of seismic studies of the moon and how is it possible that this has been missed?
WTF?
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
I'm not the OP, but I gotta say, putting atheist "arguments" in scare quotes pretty much sums up how much of a thoughtful discussion you are able to have.
Hey guys, we found another one.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Moses: OK. Hope you had a nice day off after all that. But I want to be 100% sure about this. I have to cut my what off?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
To add a point to this, we should note that people at the time -could not possibly have comprehended- a non-allegorical presentation. To do so would have required a "Foreword" consisting of an encyclopedia worth of Physics, Chemistry, Biology, etc.
Of which no reader of the time could have gleaned meaning, even if it were relevant to the intended purpose, as the precursor understanding would be too great for someone of that time period. Genesis was written to convey that God created everything, and we have a certain relationship to Him. That's it.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
I don't mind you directly obviously lying about the quality of discussion in this case or others, because you have no worthwhile response, but I do worry about my grammar being criticized. :p
It's in quotes because a fallacious argument likely should not be considered an actual "argument", much "not-X", where "X" is anything, is nothing specific at all.
Like "a-theism". See the "Reification Fallacy".
Okay, admitted. I like my double-quotes.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
If the Christian god existed and wanted us to have knowledge about something, he wouldn't need anyone to write it down. We could just become aware of the facts through an act of a god. Yet, it seems he insists on only informing us about the fact of his existence in ways which are consistent with there being no God at all. I guess all the gods that people believe in are trickster gods. The only conclusion I can see is that if the Christian god exists, he does not want rational people to believe in him. So either way I've got it right.
is it enough and easy enough to get to to make colonisation somewhat practical?
Except God is an infinite being of infinite powers and with a wave of his magic deity wand could make Moses understand anything.
The Genesis cosmography is a myth, largely ripped off from the Sumerians via the Akkadians, and qualitatively no better than the Greek cosmography or the Zoroastrian cosmography, or any other. They weren't simplified allegorical retellings for pre-scientific peoples, they were the inventions of pre-scientific peoples.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
...and if He did, he would make Moses irrelevant to his own existence, in terms of personally contributing to learning any of his own understanding. This would be a greater loss than a gain, therefore not a positive. I understand you'd insist on looking at it from a secular perspective though, so in that case, it would be a greater loss than a gain, therefore not a positive action.
Just saving time by indicating the more-common forms of double-standards your positions have between "religion" and "absolutely any other topic I discuss".
As for your further point, feel free to start the discussion with quoting your primary source documents that you feel demonstrate some kind of plagiarism, beyond the vague correlations like "people thought there were gods" that would demonstrate, well, nothing whatsoever.
Both of these are -always- a necessity for claims like yours, like simple citation, but go ahead and catch up on the requirements of baseline honesty in argument. Without those, your argument is just hot air.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
I guess the Saturday morning cartoons were not correct.
no comment
Billions of year ago? How can that be? The earth is only 6000 years old, everyone knows that. DUH!
You do realize that the noisy people that annoy you by being noisy become more noisy when you make noise like this, right?
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
The cosmography invokes the crystal dome (the firmament) which was straight out Sumerian cosmological myth (the sun, moon and planets embedded in the dome), as is the notion of a worldwide primordial ocean. Let's not even get into the second creation myth in Genesis, which is clearly polytheistic in origin.
I'm sorry you're touchy that your religion's creation myth was cribbed from other sources, but you shouldn't be surprised, considering that the Semitic peoples of eastern Mediterranean were in constant contact with their cousins in Mesopotomia, and the Sumero-Akkadian mythos held a similar position in the pre-Hellenic world as Hellenic civilization did a thousand years later.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
This strange world view is held by lots of people, and I've never quite understood why.
First of all, the 'written record' has been translated at least twice before you've heard it, and not even between contemporary languages, but across a vast gulf of time which has resulted in many subtle changes of meaning that are lost of modern translators. Second, the old testament also suffers from the ambiguity of written Hebrew, which omits the vowels from words.
This is all after things have been written down, but it was much worse when only an oral tradition existed.
Have you ever played Chinese whispers? The error rate with even a trivial sentence is enormous, even if the experiment is performed in seconds, so that everyone's memory of the phrase is fresh. Now try to imagine how this would go across 1000 generations of people, each one waiting 3-20 years to pass on some knowledge to their descendants. Factor in the slowly changing nature of language, errors in memory, embellishments to make stories sound more interesting, individuals adding their own personal opinion, deliberate dissent from the status quo, or whatever...
Even if somehow, magically, some facts were correctly passed down for thousands of years, across many generations, languages, places, and peoples... you'd have no way of knowing that the process was successful! You couldn't tell which fact was still true, and what had become distorted, or embellished, or plain false. There is absolutely no way to differentiate between lies and truth based on age or authority alone.
For comparison, the science and facts you denigrate has dragged us out of the dark ages, and made it possible to bring people back from the dead, grant sight to the blind, and cure leprosy.
Primary. Source. Documents.
Without those, you are giving neither me nor the general reader any opportunity to evaluate for themselves what they'd consider "coincidental" versus "correlation but not causation" versus real "plagiarism".
Since you haven't, I have to assume that's exactly what you intend to do.
People used to have ideas related to Physics in the distant past. Does this mean there is no accurate Physics? Ah, no.
This is really a very common argument, and I've seen it stretched to absurdity--one such web page ended up saying Jesus was exactly like Thor--which is simply absurd on its face for anyone knowing anything about Judeo-Christianity or Asatru.
That's why your intimation that elements were copied (before we even get to the fact that, like Physics, it would matter not in the least anyway) needs to be backed. They only way to back your argument is through...
Primary. Source. Documents.
That's how we differentiate plausible historical claims of this type from people making stuff up and putting it on their MySpace page.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Seems to me, we should maybe go back to the moon.
I know Mars seem so much more interesting, but it's obvious we have a shit load more of learn from the moon, not to mention, if it has water inside, and it's easy to get at, would make colonies on the moon (for blasting off to mars and other locations) a lot more promising.
Be seeing you...
http://www.ping.de/sites/systemcoder/necro/info/sumerfaq.htm
With references. Eat your heart out. Your religion absorbed akkado-Sumerian elements. Get over it. You didn't actually seriously think that Genesis was the first religious document ever written, ddid you?
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
And the Wikipedia article on Sumerian religion also has citations:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumerian_religion
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
And this:
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Ninhursag
Even the Eve myth was taken from the Sumerian.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
At least it's not an entry on the Fox News website.
Oh, yes, at least. Better that we wait a year for some other news source to pick up the story!
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
Nice handwaving. I thought maybe -you- were going to make a real argument, showing a strong direct plagiarism, along with the actual documents that -prove- that writing from the other mythos preceded historically. I'm not going to do your work for you by hunting through a link. Yeah, I know, Post Hoc Propter Hoc, but I'm trying to give your argument at least a hearing before crushing it by calling out all your logical fallacies. That Genesis wasn't the first account of human origins matters not even in the slightest, most vague way to the question of its validity. Einstein's Theory of Relativity wasn't the first writing in physics, either. Yay. That can't be all you've got here.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Amazing. I'm halfway down the page (reading at -1) and this is the first comment rated higher than a 3. It really has nothing to do with the article, is only barely on-topic because the GPP decided it was an opportunity to bash religion, and it doesn't make any point other than validate a bunch of people's biases.
Bible hate is popular here!
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
Where did I use the word "plagiarism". Does that even make sense in comparitive mythology (that's right my overly religious severely ignorant friend, there's a whole field of study tracing the similarities between mythologies). The Sumerians, via the Akkadians, laid the ground work for a considerable amount of later Middle Eastern and Western culture; writing, mythical and religious motifs (including the cosmography, the Hero and the Flood and so forth), codified laws, heck, even timekeeping and unit measures.
Why are you so shocked by this? Did you think somehow the Semitic peoples of Canaan wouldn't be heavily influenced by the Sumero-Akkadian religion just as they were in many respects by the Egyptian civilization? The ol' Promised Land sat on top of one of the most important trading routes even in prehistoric times, and it was heavily influenced by not just goods but ideas. A thousand years later the descendants of those ancient Canaanite tribes would again be influenced by Hellenistic thought, and from that was born modern Judaism, Christianity, and eventually Islam.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
So consider the big story of Genesis. Two conflicting stories with details such as talking serpents, fruit trees that grant knowledge when eaten, and a woman made from a rib taken from a man, aren't meant to be allegorical? I wager all of the above are very blatant clues that parts of the Bible were meant to be allegorical.
So, overestimating to the advantage of your position, about 1% similar concepts, 99% totally different.
You can't be serious that a mention of a rib, somewhere in all the writings describing these hundreds of utterly different aspects to all these "gods", with that rib -not even related to humans-, means Genesis was "stolen" from this, can you?
In that case, Moby Dick was clearly plagiarized. There are millions of earlier writings that use the word "whale" somewhere.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
Because that is utterly ridiculous.
Do you acknowledge the possibility that Greek mythology is historically accurate? I don't.
There is very little in Greek mythology that describes historical events - all I can think of off-hand is the Iliad, which certainly described a historical even (the Trojan War), but in fanciful detail. As it turns out, many of the "non-magical" descriptions, once thought to be total fiction, have turned out to be closer to the truth when studied by archeologists.
But what's valuable about the Greek myths, especially stories of the gods, was not historical significance but rather their very insightful commentary on various aspects of human nature. We still use their names to describe these traits - Narcissus, Oedipus, Aphrodite and other Greek gods are still in our vocabulary because they described through story things that we see in society today.
This is not dissimilar than the vast collection of human wisdom contained in the Bible. Most of the stories are not literal descriptions of events - those that are have probably been embellished beyond recognition from centuries of verbal tradition before being recorded. So there is a lot of stuff in there, but none of it should be taken literally without understanding the origins of the stories, but neither should the entire thing be dismissed as pure fantasy, either.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
I am afraid you are horribly mistaken and woefully ignorant. Allegory is one of the four classical modes of biblical interpretation dating from antiquity, and was employed by the Church Fathers (such as St Augustine in the IV century).
The real issue is when Protestantism arose, and in order to discredit the teaching authority of a continuing, hierarchical Church turned the Bible into a book that dropped out of heaven and had to be understood literally by anyone who could read.
Since America is the first (and only) nation in the world to have been Protestant from the beginning (rather than Catholic/Orthodox and then becoming Protestant) your cultural assumptions about the treatment of Scripture are so out of whack with the rest of the world.
I'm stuck on the glass part of the article. It is pieces of glass, right? Pieces of what glass? Who's glass was it and what kind of glass was it? Hell, what kind of water was it? I'm mean was Neil having a spritz of water with a good bourbon or was it a gin and tonic. They need to be specific about these things. This is science they are talking about.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
If it has the same ppm of water in the samples, then the amount of water in the moon would (theoretically) be proportional to the amount of water on the earth. Unless the moon is over half water, there is no way there is as much water as on earth. I'm not trying to be a pedant, but it seems like these articles are starting to spin out a bit.
Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
I thought that the accepted* origin of the moon was that it was created in 4004BC along with the earth.
(*) in the USA at least
The fact that it requires "interpretation" is the admission of it's status as myth.
Or did your god intend that the man he made in his image need clerical intermediaries to understand his word?
My "cultural assumptions" about Scripture begin and end with it being a tool used by elites to keep the rabble in bondage. And that includes the fellow from Hippo's assertions about "belief and authority".
It is still used for that purpose, by papist and protestant alike. You need only look to the way it is now targeted mainly to the third world for evidence of the ongoing agenda.
You are welcome on my lawn.
When talking about what you would refer to as "faith" it makes all the difference in the world.
It only took 'em 2,000 years. I guess they're slow learners.
And if they are now acknowledging evolution, why doesn't it appear anywhere in Scripture? Why would the heavenly author leave out of the creation myth the actual way man arrived? And, as Dawkins (someone I do not care for and have not read) has been said to have asked, why is there no mention of dinosaurs in the Bible?
Oh, it's that allegory thing again, isn't it? It's the "get out of jail free" card of Christian apologia. That, and "His ways are not our ways". You can explain away anything in scripture with those two.
"Why would God's Word have an incorrect description of Creation?" Oh, it's allegory.
"Why would a "loving God" allow the suffering of innocents?" His ways are not our ways.
See how neat that works?
You are welcome on my lawn.
NASA wants another "big" mission. A moon without recoverable water is a moon that will not support a moon base. NASA is eager to find water on the moon. They even crashed a large projectile into it a while back hoping to find evidence of water.
My what a big cultural chauvinism you have.
God would not have had to go into genetics to have told the truth in scripture. It would have been enough to have said, "Simple creatures became more complicated creatures over a long, long period of time." You really believe the intellectual capacity and ability to reason in the age of the Pharaohs was so much less than it is today? You're really saying that because science hadn't been invented, He had to make up a ridiculous story? You think allegory is easier to understand than simple, declarative statements about what really happened?
Now it's time for you to say, "His ways are not our ways."
You are welcome on my lawn.
If there is reason to believe that the water was trapped as a result of volcanic activity, should we be looking for geodes under the surface?
You've gone from merely displaying arrogant ignorance to abject bigotry. At least, if you are willing to accept "irrational hostility to a group or individual on the basis of ignorance" as a valid definition of bigotry.
That aside, Slashdot is not the place to explain that everything ever written, built or said is subject to interpretation, nor that an "image" is utterly different to a clone (unless your mirror produces a fully functional copy of you every morning while you shave), or even that your refusal to admit any cultural assumption is evidence of those cultural assumptions (ie refusal to recognise that you are a man formed by your times).
Then there's the fact that your last claim is dismissed by anyone who has seen Pope Benedict on television in the UK last year, or Australia and before that the US in 2008, or all over continental Europe - and he was only elected in 2005. If anything, one could construct a comparable argument about the "first world" powers (such as the US and the European Union) wielding science as a "tool... to keep the [third world] rabble in bondage"... but that would be too far off topic.
This is always the punchline to every discussion with a believer.
Why do you even bother with all the other huffing and puffing? Why not just jump to "That's it! La la la!"?
You don't need an encyclopedia or foreword to explain the simple facts of little bitty simple creatures becoming mammals and man over a long long period of time. Is that so much harder to understand than taking Adam's rib and forming it into a woman? Is the supernatural so much easier to grasp than the natural, even for the people who lived at the time of the Pharaohs? They could figure out astronomy and enough physics to build the pyramids, I think they could have handled the simple truth without the need for a whacky creation myth.
You are welcome on my lawn.
What is clear to me is that the moon was placed where it is, orbiting the Earth like every other body we can identify in space, around 6000 years ago.
The sooner you scientists accept that, the sooner you can begin solving the really pressing problems facing us at the moment.
This is the release on NASA website: http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2011/may/HQ_11-171_Moon_Water.html
And here's the paper (requires subscription): http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2011/05/25/science.1204626.full.pdf
If nasa says, wanted, 50000 people for a moon city.
Then im sure a lot of people would apply to work on the moon.
Re apollo, people still cared, millions still watched the launches.
Its just NIXON was a fuked up retart who stopped it because the bankers fuked up usa due to inflation.
And if no one cares, then tuff titties, usa can go down inflames. And the moon will be one big china town.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
The truth can be conveyed to even the thickest of morons (who are willing to listen) by a skilled and patient enough teacher. If there were a God, surely he would be skilled and patient enough. I can give your version a simple improvement right here:
God: I created time, at the first moment in time, I created one single point of space. And everything in the universe was crammed together there, formless and void. Then I created more a lot more space, and that formless ball of everything exploded, and there was light.
God: Over a very long time I shaped that formless stuff into the stars. One of those stars is the sun. Near that star, the sun, I made the Earth, and the moon, and all the planets, and set them all in their cycles, and there was day and night and seasons and such. On Earth I gathered all the waters into their places and let there be dry land elsewhere.
God: Over another very long time I created plants, and creepy bugs, and fish, and land animals, and eventually humans like you. You're the first things I've created that I can actually talk to like this, and that's pretty cool, so I'm gonna trust you guys to take care of things down there on Earth, and I'll be keeping an eye out for you, k? Be cool, peace out.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
You'd expect more of a open minded positive response and discussion from Slashdot on a story like this. Instead it seems like the lowest moderated article here comment wise as far as insightful comments.
Many have theorized the moon has much more life on the inside than the outside. This is huge news and almost a guarantee that there's life on the moon.
Yes I know that NASA has known this for years. Yes I know there's a secret space program and intelligence the government has about the true nature of reality. But if you've noticed lately, more and more news is slipping out to the mainstream media confirming life beyond Earth in the universe.
Hello Slashdot,
Yes its me again, periodically I say this on this august forum, but none seems to take heed.
Instead of dragging the rocket fuel up out of the earth's gravity well to reach escape velocity, set a plant up on the moon, to separate the water there into hydrogen and oxygen.
Fly a rocket from the earth to the moon, controlled from the earth, fuel the rocket from the moon.
Launch the moon fuelled rocket to towards the earth, start decelerating the rocket once it nears the earth
Fly something akin to Rutan's 'Spaceship one' to the vacuum of space carrying some very fragile and valuable human beings.
Hook the SS1 to the moon tug, light the blue touch paper and accelerate SS1 to escape velocity in the safety of the space vacuum 'coz relying on bathroom tiles is bad design.
Do it for Christa McAuliffe.
It's called an elephant's trunk whereas it is in fact, an elephant's nose, a nose by any other name would smell as sweet
Surely this is just pointless hand-waving unless you provide direct links to: Primary. Source.Documents. And no I won't accept links to secondary sources which cite primary sources, why should I have to sift through them all myself?!
The fallacy of religion is in its genesis, as it were. My own view is that it may have served a purpose for Mitochondrial Eve or her antecedents -- a practical purpose of unity, extending the in-group psychologically as a blind mechanism on its own. Beyond that, today it carries the same kind of detritus behind it that causes someone in rural Iowa to fear violent, occasional terrorism over the financial kind.
As for delving into the particulars, it could be worth doing for certain reasons. Let's say, 5% of the time there is some legitimate inquiry (like with my first paragraph). That leaves 95% being a brain churning away at a set of ends that it is susceptible to, going down one attentional foxhole after another, trying to play on the ground of the already seeded and established.
Also, time to fix your post:
You're following a fallacious premise in-line with your predispostion to address Pedophilia exclusively by forming a Straw Man Fallacy regarding it.
It makes not the slightest difference to the correctness of a position how many people can be named historically to have held an erroneous opinion about some aspect of it. Literally no field of study could pass this criteria--and shouldn't, because it's merely an intentionally-impossible criterion to meet, to attempt to insure for oneself that they won't need to address a particular topic on the proponderance of good argument for it.
This is what is "disingenuous" here, specifically your approach to the subject as is in-line with the majority of apedophilic "argument". What matters to any intellectually-honest person is whether a particular position is -viable at it's best-, not how many instances there were that some student or follower of the overarching topic held an erroneous view. This is the very definition of a Straw Man Fallacy.
[...]
So, gain a margin of backing of your position by posting some actual evidence of your stance, or using terminology meaningfully. Feel free to start on either one.
Why do you assume "irrational" and "ignorance"?
Do you assume that everyone who sees the Church as an oppressive institution is "irrational" and "ignorant"?
That's very convenient for you, I imagine.
You are welcome on my lawn.
That's because you are rational. The supernatural does not deal in the rational.
Do you also believe the whole "changing bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ" is allegorical? I think our Catholic friends here would strongly disagree.
Organized religion is designed to defy rational examination. That is what separates it from philosophy.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I take such opportunities where I can, thank you very much. I consider it my ministry.
Since when is rational evaluation "hate"?
You are welcome on my lawn.
Why do you assume "irrational" and "ignorance"?
I made no assumptions, your claims conclusively demonstrate ignorance of the subject matter, and your hostility is objectively based on this ignorance.
Do you assume that everyone who sees the Church as an oppressive institution is "irrational" and "ignorant"?
No, only those who demonstrate their ignorance and irrationality, as you have.
I sincerely encourage you, purely in the interest of holding an informed opinion, to look again at your claims. In Science we are expected to assess a suspect theory from an objective basis, which includes considering arguments in the context of the advocate's stated premises. Why should our opinions in any other field be handled differently? If you want to use history as a stick with which to beat Christianity then you need to make sure you're using solid, objective history (and not just the one-sided ramblings of a historian with pre-determined outcomes).
Do you also believe the whole "changing bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ" is allegorical? I think our Catholic friends here would strongly disagree.
Why don't you ask them? I'm sure that the majority of them think it's just allegory.
I don't dispute that there are biblical literalists and the like who take biblical tales way too literally. But I doubt the Eden stories were ever considered anything other than allegory by most of the people who told them.
There is water at the bottom of the ocean. Under the water, carry the water. On the moon.
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
I was raised a Catholic and educated by Jesuits.
Catholics most certainly do not believe that "bread into flesh, wine into blood" is an allegory. It is a miraculous event that occurs during the celebration of the Eucharist in their belief.
You are welcome on my lawn.
That's funny, but I don't think you're giving the people of Moses' era enough credit. These were not cave men, their intellectual capacity was not so different from the people of today.
Oh. I guess that doesn't really help my argument. Never mind...
You are welcome on my lawn.
I absolutely agree. The Bible is no less or more "true" than Greek Mythology.
The fact that there is "wisdom" within is not in dispute. The dispute lies in our views of Genesis as factual in any sense. And, I suspect in our views of the ongoing benefit of the associated institutions to mankind.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I was raised a Catholic and educated by Jesuits.
Catholics most certainly do not believe that "bread into flesh, wine into blood" is an allegory. It is a miraculous event that occurs during the celebration of the Eucharist in their belief.
It puzzles me how you could be raised as a Catholic and not actually understand Catholics. Oh well, maybe it didn't really happen.
Ok, I think I was too mean in my other post. I'll just say that I think your reality is too filtered. I've run into a number of Catholics who simply don't believe the above and some that do.
Moses: OK. Hope you had a nice day off after all that. But I want to be 100% sure about this. I have to cut my what off?
Cute. But that was pre-Moses. You're looking for Abraham in Genesis 17.
I don't mind you directly obviously lying about the quality of discussion in this case or others, because you have no worthwhile response, but I do worry about my grammar being criticized. :p
I didn't criticize your grammar, but thanks for illustrating my point.
The moon is made of cheese, as it is.
Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, START
The dispute lies in our views of Genesis as factual in any sense.
I doubt there is really any significant dispute there.
And, I suspect in our views of the ongoing benefit of the associated institutions to mankind.
That depends on what "associated institutions" you are referring to, but I would probably have very little argument with you there, either.
Probably the only major point of dispute would be that I feel strongly that students in school should have a certain amount of exposure to the texts. That's not that any sort of religious doctrine should be taught as right or factual (it shouldn't), but only that the oldest and most widely-distributed collection of literature known to man should not be subject to an outright ban in institutions of learning.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
Sorry you didn't enjoy my Reductio Ad Absurdum. Maybe next time.
~ Whence do you come, slayer of men, or where are you going, conqueror of space?
>It only took 'em 2,000 years. I guess they're slow learners.
Really? Gosh, I didn't know Darwin published "The Origin of Species" while Jesus was still a teenager.
Water estimated on moon. It's also known the moon is hollow, as demonstrated when astronauts set up geophones and explosive detonators, establishing that the moon "rang like a bell" for hours after the explosion. At least two separate sample experiments were conducted, both agreeing. So, what's the likelihood there's a deep underground body of water on the moon? And is that where the dolphins went after they said thanks for all the fish? Also where the lunar Nazi colony gets its water? And was H.G Wells right? Boy, this is fun.
You lost the thread. We were talking about God's authorship of the Book of Genesis. If we assume He is the Creator, then we must also assume that he was aware of Evolution, since He was there as it was happening and He is omniscient. He would also have been aware of the dinosaurs.
Since evolution and dinosaurs are not described in the Bible, we have to assume that the real author(s) was not omniscient, which would indicate that it is not the Word of God. If the Author had been aware of Evolution and dinosaurs, why would he make up a fairy story instead of the former, and leave the latter out completely?
You are welcome on my lawn.
Who's glass was it and what kind of glass was it?
It was half empty and full of radioactive sludge. Brain the size of a planet and they leave me parking cars for a million years. Life, don't talk to me about life.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
Of course he was raised as a Catholic! One look at his Facebook page should tell you that!
He's what you might call a Kosher Katholic.
Ummm... is it just me, or what the heck does the linked story have to do with the origins of life, other than the imagination of the author of this (slashdot) report of on it? Just sayin'... Here is a little clue: water != life... it is just one of the MANY thing necessary (like hundreds of criteria).
Then the tread had been been already lost, because the "It only took 'em 2,000 years" doesn't fit into that premise either. ;-P
It amazes me that so many allegedly “educated” people have fallen so quickly and so hard for a fraudulent fabrication of such laughable proportions. The very idea that a gigantic ball of rock happens to orbit our planet, showing itself in neat, four-week cycles—with the same side facing us all the time—is ludicrous. Furthermore, it is an insult to common sense and a damnable affront to intellectual honesty and integrity. That people actually believe it is evidence that the liberals have wrested the last vestiges of control of our public school system from decent, God-fearing Americans (as if any further evidence was needed! Daddy’s Roommate? God Almighty!)
Documentaries such as Enemy of the State have accurately portrayed the elaborate, byzantine network of surveillance satellites that the liberals have sent into space to spy on law-abiding Americans. Equipped with technology developed by Handgun Control, Inc., these satellites have the ability to detect firearms from hundreds of kilometers up. That’s right, neighbors .. the next time you’re out in the backyard exercising your Second Amendment rights, the liberals will see it! These satellites are sensitive enough to tell the difference between a Colt .45 and a .38 Special! And when they detect you with a firearm, their computers cross-reference the address to figure out your name, and then an enormous database housed at Berkeley is updated with information about you.
Of course, this all works fine during the day, but what about at night? Even the liberals can’t control the rotation of the Earth to prevent nightfall from setting in (only Joshua was able to ask for that particular favor!) That’s where the “moon” comes in. Powered by nuclear reactors, the “moon” is nothing more than an enormous balloon, emitting trillions of candlepower of gun-revealing light. Piloted by key members of the liberal community, the “moon” is strategically moved across the country, pointing out those who dare to make use of their God-given rights at night!
Yes, I know this probably sounds paranoid and preposterous, but consider this. Despite what the revisionist historians tell you, there is no mention of the “moon” anywhere in literature or historical documents—anywhere—before 1950. That is when it was initially launched. When President Josef Kennedy, at the State of the Union address, proclaimed “We choose to go to the moon”, he may as well have said “We choose to go to the weather balloon.” The subsequent faking of a “moon” landing on national TV was the first step in a long history of the erosion of our constitutional rights by leftists in this country. No longer can we hide from our government when the sun goes down.