But it's different, because he advocates one singular bit of good netiquette. He's like a serial killer whose kind enough to sterilize the knife between each stabbing.
I'd like to introduce to my new car. It's almost awesome; except when the engine stalls, or the accelerator sticks at maximum revs, or the doors won't open or the wheels sometimes fly off when I'm going 60mph. But other than that, it's a dream!
I get so tired of these accusations of conspiracy, when a fair chunk of the information is out there on the Internet, available for the price of having to read it (as in, its free other than in time taken to read and understand). Yes, some is behind a paywall, which sucks, whatever the particular scientific discipline, but plenty is freely available.
No, I tend to look at what climatologists say. You know, sort of how if I was wondering about quantum mechanics, I'd probably prefer to read what a particle physicist had to say, rather than what Archimedes Plutonium had to say.
I'm not sure how many farmers in the midwest and southwest are going to be thrilled when the boon in the northern areas of North America are permanently coupled with decreases in arable land in their part of the world.
But being a Canadian, I think it's great news. The longer the pseudoskeptics funded by the Kochs keep folks blinded, the more likely in a hundred years or so Canada will own the US's ass because we'll be planting grain in the Northwest Territories.
When the overwhelming majority of scientists working in fields related to climatology say "AGW is real", and even the very small number of researchers working in fields related to climatology who are publicly skeptical rarely if ever actually publish papers in journals backing up their skepticism, I have to say, seeing some random AC on/. posting links to notorious denier sites doesn't exactly convince me that said AC actually a. knows what the fuck he's talking about, b. cares about what the fuck he's talking about, or c. is ever going to be willing to even consider really actually fucking learning a fucking thing about what he's talking about.
Do you actually think theories like plate tectonics or Proto-Indo European were developed at the margins? They may have initially been developed by researchers who, by the mere fact that they posited theories, were in the minority, but their success didn't come because the researchers dared to develop a new model, but because ultimately their models best explained observation, and just as critically, made further predictions as to what we ought to find if we went looking.
There's this great myth in science, perhaps promulgated by the likes of Popper, that science is a series of revolutions terminating periods of retrenchment and even inactivity. But an actual analysis of science demonstrates that for every "eureka!" moment, there are probably a hundred slow steady research programs that work towards modest goals, and its the sum of those programs' (successes and failures) that builds towards new understanding.
I frankly don't think the history of science is littered with those sorts of things. I can only think of a small handful of actual scientific theories being outright rejected (and no, pseudo-scientific nonsense like phrenology and Victorian racial "theory" were never science). The ones I can think of are theories like phlogiston, pre-tectonic geological theories, some other models for the universe (ie. steady state theory). The latter is an example of a theory that ultimately didn't completely collapse until the 1960s, though it had been delivered its mortal blow decades earlier by Hubble's observations. In the end, Big Bang cosmology won out because it explained observation in the most parsimonious way.
This idea that vast cabals of scientists disinterested in anything but propping up their own theories is pure rubbish. That was more the product of the pre-scientific age, when someone like Galileo could be imprisoned for questioning the Ptolemaic model, which was horribly wretched and really couldn't even explain observations at all.
I'm not clear. Where in abiogenesis theory does it say only one type of life evolved? All we can say for certain is that only one kind of life survived.
You fail right at the beginning, because you yourself are taking a literalist view of Genesis and insisting that the creative order itself is not metaphorical. In short, you're inventing a position that a theistic evolutionist will not likely have. You may not agree with their interpretation of Genesis, just as, I'm fairly sure, you're average subscriber to Answers In Genesis does not.
Do you see the irony on essentially siding with Biblical literalists on the interpretation of Genesis?
Calling something "provisionally true" is hardly a trap. It recognizes the high degree of certainty while still suggesting that it, like any "fact", can be altered by future evidence.
Simply put, some things are known with a such a high degree of certainty that it would be all but impossible that it would be outright overthrown. We know, as much as ever can be known, that stars are fueled by fusion reactions. That's not to say that the picture is completely clear, or that as-of-yet unobserved phenomena are not at play, but the theory is so well grounded in our understanding of physics and in observation that we do not expect it to be ever overthrown. Enlarged, yes, perhaps even subsumed into some new theory of matter/energy interactions, quite likely.
It's rather like Newtonian mechanics. It would be incorrect to call them outright wrong, since, for most non-relativistic calculations (like, say, putting a probe in orbit around Jupiter), they work very very well. While certainly supplanted by GR, they remain a useful simplification for most real world applications.
Damned few scientific theories have been outright overthrown. I suppose a few, like alternative theories of continent formation and movement, have been pretty much eliminated by the theory of continental drift, but generally a theory is the product of a considerable amount of effort to explain the data by numerous researchers, sometimes in different fields. Thus a theory is almost always fairly rigorously built, debated and modified. It may ultimately be "wrong" in the same way that Newtonian mechanics is technically wrong, but in that case it is almost always subsumed into a larger theory.
I would put Linnaean taxonomy in the same category. It clearly is an antecedent, probably the major antecedent, to Common Descent, but in and of itself, isn't always strictly "right" (look at the debates of how many hominid species there might have been), but is still a useful taxonomical system, and has readily been adapted and altered by new evidence from extant and extinct species.
Some things can be accepted with a high degree of certainty. It strikes me that it is almost certain that all life evolved from a common ancestor. It also strikes me as almost certain that the Earth and the other planets condensed out of a cloud of gas and material orbiting the young Sun. It also strikes me as certain that the observable universe was once very hot and very dense and began to expand and cool about 13.5 to 13.7 billion years ago.
There is not Truth in science, but there is something like provisional truth.
A *literal* interpretation of Genesis conflicts explicitly with the science. I think it's important to point out that the poster you're responding to clearly does not interpret Genesis literally.
I have absolutely no debate, save perhaps on philosophical grounds, with a Christian who accepts the age of the universe, the Earth and with evolution. Obviously any kind of theistic evolutionist is going to assert that God guides the process to one degree or another, but providing they're not claiming there is scientific evidence to that effect, then really, they accept as I do that humans, and indeed all life evolved from a common ancestor.
Short answer... They don't, not directly anyways. What they do use is techniques like comparative anatomy to determine if a substantial morphological differentiation in existing closely related species similar to those found in fossils represent two different species. But really, the idea of species is somewhat a convenience even in extant populations.
The issues is also whether there is in fact any split at all. So far as we know, there have been damned few hominid species who have been truly isolated. Gene flow may have been fairly small, but it seems likely that even with H. erectus in Eurasia, there must have been some small amount of gene flow. We even have some evidence from nuclear DNA studies that there was possibly interbreeding between Neandertals and Moderns. Where even a relatively low level of gene flow is maintained, there is a fairly good chance that speciation will not occur.
That is not the true definition of species. Wolves and coyotes can interbreed, but are still considered two different species by almost all taxonomists. At the same time Great Danes and Chihuahuas cannot directly interbreed, and yet are both simply considered subspecies of C. lupis.
The notion of "species" is largely a human construct; an idea of convenience. Once you get to the Genus level, things start getting very muddied.
I don't agree with this at all. Even where a population never diverges, almost certainly speciation can and does occur, if you at least invoke simplistic (and obviously not entirely correct) notions like interfertility.
Attempting to tie Obamacare to raising the debt ceiling... Yes, I'm afraid that is the Tea Party's fault, and in their religious zeal to destroy government, all they're doing is fucking up the GOP.
I can't imagine the House Republicans wanting to go through this again. Everyone has taken a beating, but while the Democrats might be battered and bruised, the Republicans have hemorrhaged support. For some time, moderate Republican incumbents have lived in fear of the Tea Party smashing them in the primaries, but now the choice between accommodating wingnuts and winning in 2014 has become very very clear.
I'm sure Cruz and his ilk will want to pick another fight in January, but even he seems to realize the Tea Party has been damaged by this, and his actions and the actions of his compatriots in the House are threatening to bring down a civil war on the GOP.
Why did you think that? They knew the moderate Republicans in the House would eventually force Boehner's hand. Even Boehner knew it, but this little dance had to go all the way because the moderate Republicans are as terrified of the Tea Party as they are of voters.
Obama and Congressional Democrats have seen this growing weakness in the GOP since 2008, and have been waiting for a chance to humiliate Boehner. Now they'll sit back and watch the civil war in the Republican ranks make the Republicans' dominance of the house become an empty accomplishment.
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But it's different, because he advocates one singular bit of good netiquette. He's like a serial killer whose kind enough to sterilize the knife between each stabbing.
I'd like to introduce to my new car. It's almost awesome; except when the engine stalls, or the accelerator sticks at maximum revs, or the doors won't open or the wheels sometimes fly off when I'm going 60mph. But other than that, it's a dream!
Or perhaps I'm just seriously mad!
I get so tired of these accusations of conspiracy, when a fair chunk of the information is out there on the Internet, available for the price of having to read it (as in, its free other than in time taken to read and understand). Yes, some is behind a paywall, which sucks, whatever the particular scientific discipline, but plenty is freely available.
No, I tend to look at what climatologists say. You know, sort of how if I was wondering about quantum mechanics, I'd probably prefer to read what a particle physicist had to say, rather than what Archimedes Plutonium had to say.
Make what the fuck public? Jesus, fucktard, the evidence, the models, all of it out there.
How about you actually go look, instead of hiding up your own ass and only visiting denier sites that function as you're echo chamber.
You have absolutely no fucking idea what you're talking about, and worst of all, you think that's a good thing.
I'm not sure how many farmers in the midwest and southwest are going to be thrilled when the boon in the northern areas of North America are permanently coupled with decreases in arable land in their part of the world.
But being a Canadian, I think it's great news. The longer the pseudoskeptics funded by the Kochs keep folks blinded, the more likely in a hundred years or so Canada will own the US's ass because we'll be planting grain in the Northwest Territories.
When the overwhelming majority of scientists working in fields related to climatology say "AGW is real", and even the very small number of researchers working in fields related to climatology who are publicly skeptical rarely if ever actually publish papers in journals backing up their skepticism, I have to say, seeing some random AC on /. posting links to notorious denier sites doesn't exactly convince me that said AC actually a. knows what the fuck he's talking about, b. cares about what the fuck he's talking about, or c. is ever going to be willing to even consider really actually fucking learning a fucking thing about what he's talking about.
Is that you, Bobby Jindal?
1. Find receipt.
2. Return to store where it was purchased.
3. Demand refund.
4. Buy iPad or Android tablet.
I think Microsoft's may be tiring of products that stay in the loss leader category for years at a time.
Do you actually think theories like plate tectonics or Proto-Indo European were developed at the margins? They may have initially been developed by researchers who, by the mere fact that they posited theories, were in the minority, but their success didn't come because the researchers dared to develop a new model, but because ultimately their models best explained observation, and just as critically, made further predictions as to what we ought to find if we went looking.
There's this great myth in science, perhaps promulgated by the likes of Popper, that science is a series of revolutions terminating periods of retrenchment and even inactivity. But an actual analysis of science demonstrates that for every "eureka!" moment, there are probably a hundred slow steady research programs that work towards modest goals, and its the sum of those programs' (successes and failures) that builds towards new understanding.
I frankly don't think the history of science is littered with those sorts of things. I can only think of a small handful of actual scientific theories being outright rejected (and no, pseudo-scientific nonsense like phrenology and Victorian racial "theory" were never science). The ones I can think of are theories like phlogiston, pre-tectonic geological theories, some other models for the universe (ie. steady state theory). The latter is an example of a theory that ultimately didn't completely collapse until the 1960s, though it had been delivered its mortal blow decades earlier by Hubble's observations. In the end, Big Bang cosmology won out because it explained observation in the most parsimonious way.
This idea that vast cabals of scientists disinterested in anything but propping up their own theories is pure rubbish. That was more the product of the pre-scientific age, when someone like Galileo could be imprisoned for questioning the Ptolemaic model, which was horribly wretched and really couldn't even explain observations at all.
I'm not clear. Where in abiogenesis theory does it say only one type of life evolved? All we can say for certain is that only one kind of life survived.
You fail right at the beginning, because you yourself are taking a literalist view of Genesis and insisting that the creative order itself is not metaphorical. In short, you're inventing a position that a theistic evolutionist will not likely have. You may not agree with their interpretation of Genesis, just as, I'm fairly sure, you're average subscriber to Answers In Genesis does not.
Do you see the irony on essentially siding with Biblical literalists on the interpretation of Genesis?
They aren't separate species because 1. Interbreeding produces fertile healthy young, 2 the genetic distance between human populations is very small.
Calling something "provisionally true" is hardly a trap. It recognizes the high degree of certainty while still suggesting that it, like any "fact", can be altered by future evidence.
Simply put, some things are known with a such a high degree of certainty that it would be all but impossible that it would be outright overthrown. We know, as much as ever can be known, that stars are fueled by fusion reactions. That's not to say that the picture is completely clear, or that as-of-yet unobserved phenomena are not at play, but the theory is so well grounded in our understanding of physics and in observation that we do not expect it to be ever overthrown. Enlarged, yes, perhaps even subsumed into some new theory of matter/energy interactions, quite likely.
It's rather like Newtonian mechanics. It would be incorrect to call them outright wrong, since, for most non-relativistic calculations (like, say, putting a probe in orbit around Jupiter), they work very very well. While certainly supplanted by GR, they remain a useful simplification for most real world applications.
Damned few scientific theories have been outright overthrown. I suppose a few, like alternative theories of continent formation and movement, have been pretty much eliminated by the theory of continental drift, but generally a theory is the product of a considerable amount of effort to explain the data by numerous researchers, sometimes in different fields. Thus a theory is almost always fairly rigorously built, debated and modified. It may ultimately be "wrong" in the same way that Newtonian mechanics is technically wrong, but in that case it is almost always subsumed into a larger theory.
I would put Linnaean taxonomy in the same category. It clearly is an antecedent, probably the major antecedent, to Common Descent, but in and of itself, isn't always strictly "right" (look at the debates of how many hominid species there might have been), but is still a useful taxonomical system, and has readily been adapted and altered by new evidence from extant and extinct species.
Some things can be accepted with a high degree of certainty. It strikes me that it is almost certain that all life evolved from a common ancestor. It also strikes me as almost certain that the Earth and the other planets condensed out of a cloud of gas and material orbiting the young Sun. It also strikes me as certain that the observable universe was once very hot and very dense and began to expand and cool about 13.5 to 13.7 billion years ago.
There is not Truth in science, but there is something like provisional truth.
A *literal* interpretation of Genesis conflicts explicitly with the science. I think it's important to point out that the poster you're responding to clearly does not interpret Genesis literally.
I have absolutely no debate, save perhaps on philosophical grounds, with a Christian who accepts the age of the universe, the Earth and with evolution. Obviously any kind of theistic evolutionist is going to assert that God guides the process to one degree or another, but providing they're not claiming there is scientific evidence to that effect, then really, they accept as I do that humans, and indeed all life evolved from a common ancestor.
Short answer... They don't, not directly anyways. What they do use is techniques like comparative anatomy to determine if a substantial morphological differentiation in existing closely related species similar to those found in fossils represent two different species. But really, the idea of species is somewhat a convenience even in extant populations.
The issues is also whether there is in fact any split at all. So far as we know, there have been damned few hominid species who have been truly isolated. Gene flow may have been fairly small, but it seems likely that even with H. erectus in Eurasia, there must have been some small amount of gene flow. We even have some evidence from nuclear DNA studies that there was possibly interbreeding between Neandertals and Moderns. Where even a relatively low level of gene flow is maintained, there is a fairly good chance that speciation will not occur.
That is not the true definition of species. Wolves and coyotes can interbreed, but are still considered two different species by almost all taxonomists. At the same time Great Danes and Chihuahuas cannot directly interbreed, and yet are both simply considered subspecies of C. lupis.
The notion of "species" is largely a human construct; an idea of convenience. Once you get to the Genus level, things start getting very muddied.
I don't agree with this at all. Even where a population never diverges, almost certainly speciation can and does occur, if you at least invoke simplistic (and obviously not entirely correct) notions like interfertility.
Attempting to tie Obamacare to raising the debt ceiling... Yes, I'm afraid that is the Tea Party's fault, and in their religious zeal to destroy government, all they're doing is fucking up the GOP.
I can't imagine the House Republicans wanting to go through this again. Everyone has taken a beating, but while the Democrats might be battered and bruised, the Republicans have hemorrhaged support. For some time, moderate Republican incumbents have lived in fear of the Tea Party smashing them in the primaries, but now the choice between accommodating wingnuts and winning in 2014 has become very very clear.
I'm sure Cruz and his ilk will want to pick another fight in January, but even he seems to realize the Tea Party has been damaged by this, and his actions and the actions of his compatriots in the House are threatening to bring down a civil war on the GOP.
Why did you think that? They knew the moderate Republicans in the House would eventually force Boehner's hand. Even Boehner knew it, but this little dance had to go all the way because the moderate Republicans are as terrified of the Tea Party as they are of voters.
Obama and Congressional Democrats have seen this growing weakness in the GOP since 2008, and have been waiting for a chance to humiliate Boehner. Now they'll sit back and watch the civil war in the Republican ranks make the Republicans' dominance of the house become an empty accomplishment.