Having a living wage gives everyone the ability to express their
natural creativity + interests and hence realize their full potential.
Inspiration from the works of others includes using their works to
create, adapt, and even inspire others.
Aquiring copyright makes it illegal for others to appreciate the
creativity of others by way of the above.
This is true of technology as well. Innovation (building a better,
more efficient light bulb) becomes a legal issue instead of a logical
one. If your company itself cannot patent a new better bulb, it will
inspire others to outdo you instead of stopping their breaks because
everyone has to deal with you. Without copyright, we are guaranteed
yet another fearless company will come into the fray and do even better.
So copyright really is a mechanism for the old boys club to profit
for the longest time and to slow down real global progress. Our civilization
is walking in the increasingly muckier mud of copyright. It really is
stopping the collective whole from contributing, from creating the
world-wide encyclopedia of all our experiences.
Intuition tell us that something is wrong with this. The youth
are not stealing, they are defiantly reminding the older "wiser"
crowd that change should come.
We live in the modern dark ages. One day, we will afford to
ignore all copyright. The Pirate Bay "youtube", if it
can be sustainable, should start to do that. Every technology
and innovation on earth should be used to encourage and protect the sharing, morphing, and creation of culture.
Innovation itself is at risk because of this stifling stranglehold.
This is why the pirates mock the legal warnings of microsofts and
the RIAA.
Remember that the press itself is never completely accurate when dealing with a
complicated situation or science (I know this from frustrating experience).
The Jurors themselves will be identified. If the results are completely
negative, the results will have to be published.
So far they have carried themselves well. I am not sold either; I am waiting for the jury
process to end, and then, and only then I will be able to afford skepticism. The
process at hand has been selected because it will (assuming it's real) result in shorter
time to market. Steorn has publicly stated that my contact's lab (although not a juror)
has signed an NDA (because I know that they are in touch with another lab
that IS a juror and wishes to collaborate) but Steorn has explicitly stated that this
does not mean this contact gives them any stamp of approval. That is a sign of integrity
and for the following reasons, we should be patient:
1) there is no doubt that there are landmark discoveries to be made in the future
that will challenge current conservative, scientific dogma. There is no mechanism
in place to protect/encourage the future Einsteins. Indeed it took one of the greatest
scientists of Einstein's time to realize the brilliance of his relativity work before
other physicists stopped laughing at his suppositions. Steorn has selected their
unorthodox approach because they are trying to avoid the Pons and Fleischman witch-hunt
of the 80s. The DOE outright rejected Cold Fusion then and decades later has softened
its view because of the intriguing CF work of U.S. Naval Research (among many
others). If Steorn truly believe it's real, then it would make sense that they don't want
to wait decades for the scientific community to begin to look at something that works. They
need the support of science to get investor interest in a technology that the world really
needs. Anyway, they know that they cannot tamper with the results or it would look bad for
them and defeats the purpose of the process.
2) they have spent 8 million pounds on R&D. Yes, THEY claim this, but when you look at how much
they must have paid on the full-page ad on the economist and world-wide patent applications,
you will see that they are either the best cons ever or the most credible "free energy"
claim in history. Or it could be the most amazing misunderstanding.
But we owe it to ourselves to be patient otherwise we are stating that there is no place
for ANY breakthrough innovation which would radically change our understanding of physics.
We already know that there are problems in current models of the universe. With global
warming at our heels, we cannot afford to toss out ideas.
Here we go again with a douche bag who hasn't does his homework. They claim that they DID approach
a university that tested it for three years. After all of that, they refused to put their signature on
it because they felt that it would kill them, even though that university felt it was the real deal.
Realizing that they could not even get a university to give them the stamp of approval, they knew they would
have to go for the jugular and demand that the scientific world test their technology.
There has not been a SINGLE attempt to solicit or call for investors since they began this
process in August of last year. In fact, they have made a point that they are not accepting any
money until the jury has accepted and publish their results. These are not small-time
labs. These are well-known and respected scientists and labs who are under contractual obligation
to publish their results. I have been in contact with a respected scientist (since before this
Steorn thing) who has confirmed to me that he has colleagues who compose one of the jurors. They
are no small operation and they simply want a piece of history if this is real.
So stop bickering about how the earth is flat and open your mind a little.
You're basically implying that anything that seems to good to be true
means that it's chief proponent is a con artist. It's no wonder
innovation and gobs of new revolutionary technologies have been
far and few between since the 50s.
In a matter of a year or so, we'll see who the suckers are.
The jurors who are currently looking at the technology (and
that means being able to build it from scratch) are not small-time
scientists. I've been in correspondence (since before the Steorn
claim) with a respected scientist who has published in many of the
top peer-reviewed physics journals and he has at least one colleague
who is a juror in the process. They are world-re-knowned and
respected. They (and 21 other labs/scientists) are under contractual
obligation to publish their findings (whether
yay or nay and all of the details).
So this will be quite interesting----hoax, misunderstanding, or
real.
A. "convergent evolution". Why do sharks and dolphins look alike (when one is a mammal while the
other is a fish and as stated they aren't even slightly related)? Properties of oceans made
them the way they are. The laws of physics and geology are not supposed to be different on
other planets in our universe. So one would imagine that another planet with an ocean and
a "correct" mass would yield similar shaped organisms.
Q. Why would aliens from across the galaxy come here?
A. Who said they would come from far away? They could be from around the corner (within only a
couple of light years). Also, the Fermi Paradox points out that "they" should have already been here.
See Journal of the British Interplanetary Society article http://www.ufoskeptic.org/JBIS.pdf .
Yet professionals refuse to look at the highest quality UFO sightings and encounters from
an aviation safety perspective let alone a scientific study one. Good recent examples:
O'hare UFO incident, Guernsey Sighting http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/guernsey/6591365 .stm
Q. Why would it crash?
A. there was an electrical storm and as others have stated, no technology is perfect
Q. Wasn't the affidavit from someone who started the Roswell Museum?
A. Let's assume that what he said was true. Now, being a witness to such
an important historical event, wouldn't YOU want to make sure that
the historical details were accurate and that the world would need to
know about the truth as much as possible? Why did he not say it while alive?
As a serving officer, he is sworn to secrecy specifically about his involvement
or the reality of the event. He could have been imprisoned.
Giving Harper a majority is like letting George Bush stay on for another term.
Do we really want that?
He had to fire his old environment minister because she represented clearly and
strongly his government's stance on the environment. Having a new face on the
floor as environment minister doesn't change anything.
It continues along with his games of pretending to evoke change when he's really
walking around a revolving door never ever getting out.
The population and the other parties are demanding that he do something substantial
on issues like the environment. But to no avail. He's too busy looking over Hollywood
drafted bills. Giving him a majority would a nightmare. Protest voting should
go only so far.
Actually the Bono comment was a joke, but I guess you didn't get that.
But it is for sure that Bono talking to leaders keeps the youth
aware of poverty in the developing world. You can't really deny that.
Photo-ops are a good thing. Because they will underscore the hypocrisy
of our leaders to youth when election time comes around
and they have nothing to show for it.
So what Harper said by not seeing him was: I am not really interested in
helping Africa. I am telling you that right now so that you can boot
me out sooner. I will make more false promises, but at least I am a man
of integrity by telling you this.
So maybe you're right, he should be respected for telling the truth about
his plans.
First, it was his words of admiration for the Republican party ,
then is was the "normalizing" of relations with the Bush administration
after he got elected. Prime Minister Stephen Harper supported
everything Bush did: from dodging climate change responsibilities to
supporting what remains of cowboy diplomacy. And just last week,
he ticked off Bono at the G8!
Now, he is a friend to Hollywood executives by taking their drafts
and passing them as Canadian law.
Judging from the the previous post of the potential dangers
of WiFi networks, I think it's good that they're getting nowhere
fast.
The wireless industry has worked very hard to inundate us with
these technologies so that it would seem ludicrous to question them
once they became mainstream. Because after all, once everyone has
WIFI, the general population snuggles into the idea that they
must be safe if they are everywhere----because otherwise, the
government would have stopped their proliferation. Right.
I'm actually looking for Coffee shops with a LAN connection, not a
wireless one. And they DO seem to be popping where I live. So
yeah, wireless is losing its steam.
The alternate solution is published in the British Journal of
Interplanetary Science and states that the galaxy sure may be teeming with life
and that "they" may already be in the neighbourhood.
Check it out here:
http://www.ufoskeptic.org/JBIS.pdf
If FOI in the UK is any indication, the top topic of requests will be regarding UFOs. We should expect a lot of revelations on this in the New Year (Kecksburg to name one...)
This fact about the way Peta is organized is very well known. They are in fact marketing
geniuses for the most part. Part of the reason is that they have access to (from what
I recall) some top corporate advertising experts.
On that note, I find it quite interesting that PETA draws so much more ire than some of the most awful corporations out there
Peta is no different from any other organization with a progressive message in
that they are targetted by corporation-funded special interest groups (sometimes posing
as small-time critics---or even better, members of the population: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=2273111&page=1) .
In this manner, lobbyists have made it fashionable for a gullible portion of the population
to criticize such groups.
Why doesn't the population criticize [worse] corporations? Public relations companies
are masters when it comes to building an image. When I was admining the website of a
major national campaign concerning GE foods, we were visited by the likes of Reuters and Monsanto.
But what struck me was the sheer number of unique public relations companies hits we were
receiving. They outnumbered the corporate site hits by quite a factor. One would have imagined
that some scientists at Monsanto were jumping to correct any perceived inaccuries in our
fact sheets. But instead, they sent in the public relations companies.
You can't just devise a computer program to simulate an animal
that is not what I am talking about. The full body of hard objective data gathered from
all animals research can be extracted (obviously making sure that they are gathered according
to the needs of specific areas of research), and there is no doubt that mounds and mounds of
useful data can be extracted this way. This kind of research is already done, but only
on small sets of data sources.
But, making the generalisation that all animal research is pointless because most of it seems to end up in private archives, well, thats going a bit far.
Actually, not at all. What one organization can do with such information is limited by the number of people that
exists in those departments and continuity. Neither is stable. So it amounts to useable information being developed
very very slowly.
Sigh, I guess somehow free thought (of an idea that cannot cannot be
unequivocally ruled out) is a problem for you. I understand, being somehow
knowledgeable about science makes you the expert. But
clearly, your mind can't move beyond your prejudices. That is precisely
the problem with science. The real scientific mind should be able to thinking
critically of all established (and not just new) ideas.
Otherwise, it's nothing more than pompous zealotry posing as logic.
...was a rehash of an idea which has already been proposed and rejected, without adding anything original to it. If you're going to say something so contentious in public
Contentious? I thought this was slashdot---not a refereed journal. Anyway, thanks to the question,
some people scored the thread as informative. Thanks to you, now more people know about Lamarckism,
something that is more intuitive (at least in some respects) and therefore cannot be ruled out. This
single-celled organism is able to change itself depending on it's outside environment. Why can this
not happen (albeit slowly over generations) at the macro level? The onus is on you, the "expert" to
explain that.
You're now trying to turn a debate about that particular comment into a debate on the workings of science.
Well, your attitude on the matter is certainly a product of those inner workings (i am questioning the parameters of the "debate"). It's not a debate about sound ideas. It's a debate between open-mindednes and zealotry. One can really advance science, while the other
keeps academics full of themselves.
It's easy to rail about The System which is keeping good scientists down, and far harder to come up with original, rigourous thought.
Not all good ideas come from original thought (the parameters of which seem to be defined
by you oh revered savant). Why, that would invalidate the word research itself.
Curious, you seem to be obsessed with the notion that you thought I came up with an idea that was new (LOL!). It was actually meant to attract the insight of others--which it did! But I guess you felt that you had to insult someone who didn't already know what you knew (usually a sign of pompousness).
From the link you posted:
Galilei's conjecture [on friction being the cause of body motion slowdown as opposed to some innate property of the body] was merely that -- a conjecture. So was Kepler's cosmology [elliptical orbits--not circular ones!]. But each conjecture increased the credibility of the other, and together, they changed the prevailing perceptions of the scientific community. Later, Newton showed that Kepler's three laws could all be derived from a single theory of motion and planetary motion. Newton solidified and unified the paradigm shift that Galilei and Kepler had initiated.
So as you can see, unpopular ideas (or just any sound idea for that matter) need to be expressed if we are to
make any eventual, real progress.
I do believe Kuhn has it right as he doesn't (as you are doing here) romanticise scientific endeavour and portray the only good scientist as a paradigm-smashing iconclast.
Au contraire: there are good scientists everywhere. What I am saying is that the majority of important scientific/technological
discoveries (the ones that define the spaces in which all other discoveries can be made) were met with
ridicule. The same conditions (could be testosterone-laden leadership) that existed hundreds of years ago to elicit such ridicule exist today. I believe that the best scientists are the ones who go where their research takes them. If they are iconoclasts (a word only of use to the establishment) then so be it.
If the totality of all animal research was put together now and was shared, we would
probably be able to devise computer programs that would collected far (far!!) more useful
information that we will with the way animal research is done right now. So yes, any insight provided
by animal research actually is a cry in the forest... since no one will hear it---not because
we don't want to hear it, but because the very institutions that are reliant on animal
research have everything to lose by sharing it. So yes, animal research is a HUGE waste of
time since anything that CAN be learned, is thrown away in a filing cabinet, never to be seen
by anyone unless someone with brilliance (which is far and few between) comes along... in
the same company... notice the diminishing chances here ?
Although I do not agree with all of their methods,
Peta is quite effective at promoting vegetarianism. It's
no different from the tactics used by regular corporations in their
marketing strategies. If it works for them, why not!
So I guess you're one of those conservative scientists.
Even someone claiming to believe in
science can be a flat-earther at the end of the day.
Not willing to keep an open mind is
not what science is about. It took the attention of one of the leading minds in physics
to take the work of Albert Einstein seriously. You are effectively suggesting that
popular discourse somehow inherently implies that unpopular discourse has fairly, and
adequately been tested. When in reality, for the most part, adequate testing of theories
usually meant a bunch of egotistical old white men laughing like school-yard bullies
at creative thought. I.e. science has been turned into a popularity contest, where
good ideas are shunned not because of lack of merit, but by what other researchers
think without (very often) reading publications in full. I have seen this first
hand from youg physicists at CERN. I did not mention that the papers in questions
were funded by NASA. But somehow, for whatever reason, their credibility screen was not
good enough for NASA.
So frankly, your analysis is nothing more than window dressing of conservative, narrow-minded,
thinking that is in desperate need of some fresh ideas. It's rather amusing to see you
argue that Darwin was once an underdog worthy of a good listen, and in the same breath relegate
a former competing theory (Lamarckism) to creationist-like stature in order to secure the
new dogma as sound to the exclusion of all others. Obviously evolution is
real, but there have been studies clearly showing that rate of adaptive evolution has been great
for a segment of time in some species. It begs the question of whether Passive natural selection
can account for that alone. Ignoring the question to satisfy your threats of ridicule (which you
have so eloquently made clear) is hardly science.
Wait a minute here. What relevance is who the messenger is or who its affiliates are? Your argument relies on reader shock value. Vegetarianism is not a political philosophy. It is a health issue. Why does it take people to hit 60 to realize this?
Animal rights on the other hand is a political philosophy, but one that is very sound in the face of the non-political health implications, environmental impact realities, etc..
In addition to many studies, I know many adult vegans, vegetarians who are in incredible health, and rarely get sick. The two tallest, strongest children in my son's kindergarten are vegetarian. I guess intelligence is subjective or could be a result of having more concerned parents, but most vegetarian kids I know are also quite bright.
Put all of this together, and you have a lot less tax payer money/subsidizing being put into medical treatments. It's basically preventive medecine. The vast majority of taxing ailments are preventable.
Just because a discovery or field doesn't have an immediate payoff is no reason to write it off completely
I completely agree with you. The timeline should be noted historically so that professionals
could get an estimate on how many people died before anything of substance came to fruition.
That should give us an idea of just how much money, resources, and time, was wasted. That's hardly
efficient.
On pig insulin, we do not really know that we would have actually found a cure had we concentrated
on other aspects of understanding diabetes or technological development. For all we know, current
animals studies may be hindering radical progress. Research tends to be closed and private. For the
financial good of corporations. People don't seem to understand that pharmaceuticals want and need to
make pills. If they find something that would definitively cure diabetes, it would kill their business.
From a business perspective, it does not make any sense. The process has to be free, open, and
fully integrated with the entire academic research community.
Animal testing is certainly good for securing research funds. Otherwise "what are they be doing?" the public would
wonder. It's a form of ritualistic sacrifice.
So long as the public knows that they are testing on animals, it means that they are somehow controlling
the bad weather... when they are at best able to make shelters.
By the way, something similar to the aether model is being developed in physics. Einstein's
theories may not be completely correct. Einstein merely replaced the dogma of the
day (no pun intended). Same goes for Michelson-Morely. What they may have seen is "refraction in
the Polarizeable Vacuum." . So it is also possible to take the wrong turn in discovery. To quote
you "their reasoning was that nearly everything in Physics had been explained away ". But maybe not.
That link indicates that Darwin published a popular book that trumped Lamarckism.
It's not possible to disprove Lamarckism from Darwin's book.
It's strange that a more intuitive idea is rarely talked about
because of the tradition of accepting Darwin's theory to the
fullest. Anyway, see the referenced link regarding prion research.
The best answers [eventually] come from questioning popular
answers. I do think that the pace of technological or scientific
progress is severely limited by conservative dogma in existing
scientific bodies.
Purely conjecture, but I've often been suspicious of the notion that Natural Selection
is the main reason why evolution happens. What if on some level, our cells construct egg/sperm cells based
on macroscopic-level environmental conditions?
The single celled organism (with its own swiss army knife) would be a simple version
that reacts to its immediate chemical environment. But could multicelluar organisms be doing
the same, but using some as-of-yet-unknown sensory/communications mechanism?
Its internal complexity and DNA richness also leads one to wonder whether complex,
multi-cellular life forms are somehow an aim of nature, and not some cumalative thing
that may or may not lead to more complex life.
You are correct, the removing the pancreas from dogs was the
reason. That was done in 1889. But it took almost 33 years
for the first insulin treatment.
It would appear that animal testing in that cases did not
play much of a role in expediting a treatment.
Now, back to the more relevant present. I suggest that developments
in other techologies: nanotechnology, information technology, etc.
will likely produce the best results.
Slashdot Mirror
Finally, someone who gets it.
Having a living wage gives everyone the ability to express their natural creativity + interests and hence realize their full potential. Inspiration from the works of others includes using their works to create, adapt, and even inspire others.
Aquiring copyright makes it illegal for others to appreciate the creativity of others by way of the above.
This is true of technology as well. Innovation (building a better, more efficient light bulb) becomes a legal issue instead of a logical one. If your company itself cannot patent a new better bulb, it will inspire others to outdo you instead of stopping their breaks because everyone has to deal with you. Without copyright, we are guaranteed yet another fearless company will come into the fray and do even better.
So copyright really is a mechanism for the old boys club to profit for the longest time and to slow down real global progress. Our civilization is walking in the increasingly muckier mud of copyright. It really is stopping the collective whole from contributing, from creating the world-wide encyclopedia of all our experiences.
Intuition tell us that something is wrong with this. The youth are not stealing, they are defiantly reminding the older "wiser" crowd that change should come.
And we MUST make it happen, stop the madness!
We live in the modern dark ages. One day, we will afford to ignore all copyright. The Pirate Bay "youtube", if it can be sustainable, should start to do that. Every technology and innovation on earth should be used to encourage and protect the sharing, morphing, and creation of culture.
Innovation itself is at risk because of this stifling stranglehold. This is why the pirates mock the legal warnings of microsofts and the RIAA.
Remember that the press itself is never completely accurate when dealing with a complicated situation or science (I know this from frustrating experience).
The Jurors themselves will be identified. If the results are completely negative, the results will have to be published.
So far they have carried themselves well. I am not sold either; I am waiting for the jury process to end, and then, and only then I will be able to afford skepticism. The process at hand has been selected because it will (assuming it's real) result in shorter time to market. Steorn has publicly stated that my contact's lab (although not a juror) has signed an NDA (because I know that they are in touch with another lab that IS a juror and wishes to collaborate) but Steorn has explicitly stated that this does not mean this contact gives them any stamp of approval. That is a sign of integrity and for the following reasons, we should be patient:
1) there is no doubt that there are landmark discoveries to be made in the future that will challenge current conservative, scientific dogma. There is no mechanism in place to protect/encourage the future Einsteins. Indeed it took one of the greatest scientists of Einstein's time to realize the brilliance of his relativity work before other physicists stopped laughing at his suppositions. Steorn has selected their unorthodox approach because they are trying to avoid the Pons and Fleischman witch-hunt of the 80s. The DOE outright rejected Cold Fusion then and decades later has softened its view because of the intriguing CF work of U.S. Naval Research (among many others). If Steorn truly believe it's real, then it would make sense that they don't want to wait decades for the scientific community to begin to look at something that works. They need the support of science to get investor interest in a technology that the world really needs. Anyway, they know that they cannot tamper with the results or it would look bad for them and defeats the purpose of the process.
2) they have spent 8 million pounds on R&D. Yes, THEY claim this, but when you look at how much they must have paid on the full-page ad on the economist and world-wide patent applications, you will see that they are either the best cons ever or the most credible "free energy" claim in history. Or it could be the most amazing misunderstanding.
But we owe it to ourselves to be patient otherwise we are stating that there is no place for ANY breakthrough innovation which would radically change our understanding of physics. We already know that there are problems in current models of the universe. With global warming at our heels, we cannot afford to toss out ideas.
Here we go again with a douche bag who hasn't does his homework. They claim that they DID approach a university that tested it for three years. After all of that, they refused to put their signature on it because they felt that it would kill them, even though that university felt it was the real deal.
Realizing that they could not even get a university to give them the stamp of approval, they knew they would have to go for the jugular and demand that the scientific world test their technology.
There has not been a SINGLE attempt to solicit or call for investors since they began this process in August of last year. In fact, they have made a point that they are not accepting any money until the jury has accepted and publish their results. These are not small-time labs. These are well-known and respected scientists and labs who are under contractual obligation to publish their results. I have been in contact with a respected scientist (since before this Steorn thing) who has confirmed to me that he has colleagues who compose one of the jurors. They are no small operation and they simply want a piece of history if this is real.
So stop bickering about how the earth is flat and open your mind a little.
You're basically implying that anything that seems to good to be true means that it's chief proponent is a con artist. It's no wonder innovation and gobs of new revolutionary technologies have been far and few between since the 50s.
In a matter of a year or so, we'll see who the suckers are. The jurors who are currently looking at the technology (and that means being able to build it from scratch) are not small-time scientists. I've been in correspondence (since before the Steorn claim) with a respected scientist who has published in many of the top peer-reviewed physics journals and he has at least one colleague who is a juror in the process. They are world-re-knowned and respected. They (and 21 other labs/scientists) are under contractual obligation to publish their findings (whether yay or nay and all of the details).
So this will be quite interesting----hoax, misunderstanding, or real.
Q. Why do they look like us?
5 .stm
A. "convergent evolution". Why do sharks and dolphins look alike (when one is a mammal while the other is a fish and as stated they aren't even slightly related)? Properties of oceans made them the way they are. The laws of physics and geology are not supposed to be different on other planets in our universe. So one would imagine that another planet with an ocean and a "correct" mass would yield similar shaped organisms.
Q. Why would aliens from across the galaxy come here?
A. Who said they would come from far away? They could be from around the corner (within only a couple of light years). Also, the Fermi Paradox points out that "they" should have already been here. See Journal of the British Interplanetary Society article http://www.ufoskeptic.org/JBIS.pdf . Yet professionals refuse to look at the highest quality UFO sightings and encounters from an aviation safety perspective let alone a scientific study one. Good recent examples: O'hare UFO incident, Guernsey Sighting http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/guernsey/659136
Q. Why would it crash?
A. there was an electrical storm and as others have stated, no technology is perfect
Q. Wasn't the affidavit from someone who started the Roswell Museum?
A. Let's assume that what he said was true. Now, being a witness to such an important historical event, wouldn't YOU want to make sure that the historical details were accurate and that the world would need to know about the truth as much as possible? Why did he not say it while alive? As a serving officer, he is sworn to secrecy specifically about his involvement or the reality of the event. He could have been imprisoned.
Giving Harper a majority is like letting George Bush stay on for another term.
Do we really want that?
He had to fire his old environment minister because she represented clearly and
strongly his government's stance on the environment. Having a new face on the
floor as environment minister doesn't change anything.
It continues along with his games of pretending to evoke change when he's really
walking around a revolving door never ever getting out.
The population and the other parties are demanding that he do something substantial
on issues like the environment. But to no avail. He's too busy looking over Hollywood
drafted bills. Giving him a majority would a nightmare. Protest voting should
go only so far.
Actually the Bono comment was a joke, but I guess you didn't get that.
But it is for sure that Bono talking to leaders keeps the youth
aware of poverty in the developing world. You can't really deny that.
Photo-ops are a good thing. Because they will underscore the hypocrisy
of our leaders to youth when election time comes around
and they have nothing to show for it.
So what Harper said by not seeing him was: I am not really interested in
helping Africa. I am telling you that right now so that you can boot
me out sooner. I will make more false promises, but at least I am a man
of integrity by telling you this. So maybe you're right, he should be respected
for telling the truth about his plans.
First, it was his words of admiration for the Republican party , then is was the "normalizing" of relations with the Bush administration after he got elected. Prime Minister Stephen Harper supported everything Bush did: from dodging climate change responsibilities to supporting what remains of cowboy diplomacy. And just last week, he ticked off Bono at the G8!
Now, he is a friend to Hollywood executives by taking their drafts and passing them as Canadian law.
When will this guy stop embarrassing Canada?
Judging from the the previous post of the potential dangers of WiFi networks, I think it's good that they're getting nowhere fast.
The wireless industry has worked very hard to inundate us with these technologies so that it would seem ludicrous to question them once they became mainstream. Because after all, once everyone has WIFI, the general population snuggles into the idea that they must be safe if they are everywhere----because otherwise, the government would have stopped their proliferation. Right.
I'm actually looking for Coffee shops with a LAN connection, not a wireless one. And they DO seem to be popping where I live. So yeah, wireless is losing its steam.
Here's an analysis makes the same suggestion as you have: http://www.ufoskeptic.org/JBIS.pdf
The alternate solution is published in the British Journal of Interplanetary Science and states that the galaxy sure may be teeming with life and that "they" may already be in the neighbourhood. Check it out here: http://www.ufoskeptic.org/JBIS.pdf
If FOI in the UK is any indication, the top topic of requests will be
regarding UFOs. We should expect a lot of revelations on this in the New Year
(Kecksburg to name one...)
Peta is no different from any other organization with a progressive message in that they are targetted by corporation-funded special interest groups (sometimes posing as small-time critics---or even better, members of the population: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=2273111&page=1
In this manner, lobbyists have made it fashionable for a gullible portion of the population to criticize such groups.
Why doesn't the population criticize [worse] corporations? Public relations companies are masters when it comes to building an image. When I was admining the website of a major national campaign concerning GE foods, we were visited by the likes of Reuters and Monsanto. But what struck me was the sheer number of unique public relations companies hits we were receiving. They outnumbered the corporate site hits by quite a factor. One would have imagined that some scientists at Monsanto were jumping to correct any perceived inaccuries in our fact sheets. But instead, they sent in the public relations companies.
Food for thought...
that is not what I am talking about. The full body of hard objective data gathered from all animals research can be extracted (obviously making sure that they are gathered according to the needs of specific areas of research), and there is no doubt that mounds and mounds of useful data can be extracted this way. This kind of research is already done, but only on small sets of data sources.
Actually, not at all. What one organization can do with such information is limited by the number of people that exists in those departments and continuity. Neither is stable. So it amounts to useable information being developed very very slowly.
Contentious? I thought this was slashdot---not a refereed journal. Anyway, thanks to the question, some people scored the thread as informative. Thanks to you, now more people know about Lamarckism, something that is more intuitive (at least in some respects) and therefore cannot be ruled out. This single-celled organism is able to change itself depending on it's outside environment. Why can this not happen (albeit slowly over generations) at the macro level? The onus is on you, the "expert" to explain that.
Well, your attitude on the matter is certainly a product of those inner workings (i am questioning the parameters of the "debate"). It's not a debate about sound ideas. It's a debate between open-mindednes and zealotry. One can really advance science, while the other keeps academics full of themselves.
Not all good ideas come from original thought (the parameters of which seem to be defined by you oh revered savant). Why, that would invalidate the word research itself.
Curious, you seem to be obsessed with the notion that you thought I came up with an idea that was new (LOL!). It was actually meant to attract the insight of others--which it did! But I guess you felt that you had to insult someone who didn't already know what you knew (usually a sign of pompousness).
From the link you posted:
Galilei's conjecture [on friction being the cause of body motion slowdown as opposed to some innate property of the body] was merely that -- a conjecture. So was Kepler's cosmology [elliptical orbits--not circular ones!]. But each conjecture increased the credibility of the other, and together, they changed the prevailing perceptions of the scientific community. Later, Newton showed that Kepler's three laws could all be derived from a single theory of motion and planetary motion. Newton solidified and unified the paradigm shift that Galilei and Kepler had initiated.
So as you can see, unpopular ideas (or just any sound idea for that matter) need to be expressed if we are to make any eventual, real progress.
Au contraire: there are good scientists everywhere. What I am saying is that the majority of important scientific/technological discoveries (the ones that define the spaces in which all other discoveries can be made) were met with ridicule. The same conditions (could be testosterone-laden leadership) that existed hundreds of years ago to elicit such ridicule exist today. I believe that the best scientists are the ones who go where their research takes them. If they are iconoclasts (a word only of use to the establishment) then so be it.
If the totality of all animal research was put together now and was shared, we would probably be able to devise computer programs that would collected far (far!!) more useful information that we will with the way animal research is done right now. So yes, any insight provided by animal research actually is a cry in the forest... since no one will hear it---not because we don't want to hear it, but because the very institutions that are reliant on animal research have everything to lose by sharing it. So yes, animal research is a HUGE waste of time since anything that CAN be learned, is thrown away in a filing cabinet, never to be seen by anyone unless someone with brilliance (which is far and few between) comes along... in the same company... notice the diminishing chances here ?
Although I do not agree with all of their methods, Peta is quite effective at promoting vegetarianism. It's no different from the tactics used by regular corporations in their marketing strategies. If it works for them, why not!
So I guess you're one of those conservative scientists.
Even someone claiming to believe in science can be a flat-earther at the end of the day.
Not willing to keep an open mind is not what science is about. It took the attention of one of the leading minds in physics to take the work of Albert Einstein seriously. You are effectively suggesting that popular discourse somehow inherently implies that unpopular discourse has fairly, and adequately been tested. When in reality, for the most part, adequate testing of theories usually meant a bunch of egotistical old white men laughing like school-yard bullies at creative thought. I.e. science has been turned into a popularity contest, where good ideas are shunned not because of lack of merit, but by what other researchers think without (very often) reading publications in full. I have seen this first hand from youg physicists at CERN. I did not mention that the papers in questions were funded by NASA. But somehow, for whatever reason, their credibility screen was not good enough for NASA.
So frankly, your analysis is nothing more than window dressing of conservative, narrow-minded, thinking that is in desperate need of some fresh ideas. It's rather amusing to see you argue that Darwin was once an underdog worthy of a good listen, and in the same breath relegate a former competing theory (Lamarckism) to creationist-like stature in order to secure the new dogma as sound to the exclusion of all others. Obviously evolution is real, but there have been studies clearly showing that rate of adaptive evolution has been great for a segment of time in some species. It begs the question of whether Passive natural selection can account for that alone. Ignoring the question to satisfy your threats of ridicule (which you have so eloquently made clear) is hardly science.
Wait a minute here. What relevance is who the messenger is or who its affiliates are?
Your argument relies on reader shock value. Vegetarianism is not a political philosophy.
It is a health issue. Why does it take people to hit 60 to realize this?
Animal rights on the other hand is a political philosophy, but one that is very sound
in the face of the non-political health implications, environmental impact realities,
etc..
In addition to many studies, I know many adult vegans, vegetarians who are in incredible
health, and rarely get sick. The two tallest, strongest children in my son's kindergarten
are vegetarian. I guess intelligence is subjective or could be a result of having more
concerned parents, but most vegetarian kids I know are also quite bright.
Put all of this together, and you have a lot less tax payer money/subsidizing being put
into medical treatments. It's basically preventive medecine. The vast majority of taxing
ailments are preventable.
Just because a discovery or field doesn't have an immediate payoff is no reason to write it off completely
I completely agree with you. The timeline should be noted historically so that professionals could get an estimate on how many people died before anything of substance came to fruition.
That should give us an idea of just how much money, resources, and time, was wasted. That's hardly efficient.
On pig insulin, we do not really know that we would have actually found a cure had we concentrated on other aspects of understanding diabetes or technological development. For all we know, current animals studies may be hindering radical progress. Research tends to be closed and private. For the financial good of corporations. People don't seem to understand that pharmaceuticals want and need to make pills. If they find something that would definitively cure diabetes, it would kill their business. From a business perspective, it does not make any sense. The process has to be free, open, and fully integrated with the entire academic research community.
Animal testing is certainly good for securing research funds. Otherwise "what are they be doing?" the public would wonder. It's a form of ritualistic sacrifice. So long as the public knows that they are testing on animals, it means that they are somehow controlling the bad weather... when they are at best able to make shelters.
By the way, something similar to the aether model is being developed in physics. Einstein's theories may not be completely correct. Einstein merely replaced the dogma of the day (no pun intended). Same goes for Michelson-Morely. What they may have seen is "refraction in the Polarizeable Vacuum." . So it is also possible to take the wrong turn in discovery. To quote you "their reasoning was that nearly everything in Physics had been explained away ". But maybe not.
That link indicates that Darwin published a popular book that trumped Lamarckism. It's not possible to disprove Lamarckism from Darwin's book. It's strange that a more intuitive idea is rarely talked about because of the tradition of accepting Darwin's theory to the fullest. Anyway, see the referenced link regarding prion research.
The best answers [eventually] come from questioning popular answers. I do think that the pace of technological or scientific progress is severely limited by conservative dogma in existing scientific bodies.
Purely conjecture, but I've often been suspicious of the notion that Natural Selection is the main reason why evolution happens. What if on some level, our cells construct egg/sperm cells based on macroscopic-level environmental conditions?
The single celled organism (with its own swiss army knife) would be a simple version that reacts to its immediate chemical environment. But could multicelluar organisms be doing the same, but using some as-of-yet-unknown sensory/communications mechanism?
Its internal complexity and DNA richness also leads one to wonder whether complex, multi-cellular life forms are somehow an aim of nature, and not some cumalative thing that may or may not lead to more complex life.
You are correct, the removing the pancreas from dogs was the reason. That was done in 1889. But it took almost 33 years for the first insulin treatment.
It would appear that animal testing in that cases did not play much of a role in expediting a treatment.
Now, back to the more relevant present. I suggest that developments in other techologies: nanotechnology, information technology, etc. will likely produce the best results.
Yes, but if we exterminate non vegans first, you wouldn't need to bother. In addition, you'd make great compost for our vegetable gardens ;-) .