Creationism is based on faith, not arguments. Mountains of proof are enough to convince those who believe in what they wish were true, rather in what the evidence suggests.
The name wasn't changed, it was retired. There's no such thing as a Brontosaurus. The scientist who named it mistakenly put the head of a Brachiosaurus on the body of an Apatosaurus and thought he had a new species.
There are actually scanned letters from Randi showing how he totally loses his cool and calls people names when they approach him about his challenge. One fellow claimed that he could stop eating for a year and wanted to take the challenge, but rather than Randi positing tests or asking questions as any reasonable person might be expected to do given that his challenge is supposedly designed to test exactly these kinds of claims, he instead wrote back calling the man a liar and then proceeded to tell him where to go in rather colorful language.
Randi will not make a test which can cause physical harm. Liability. If you claim you can survive a jump out of an airplane without a parachute, you will not be tested. Similar if you claim that you don't need food to live. Presumably the test would involve 24/7 supervision for a month to make sure the claimant doesn't eat. After they starve, Randi is held responsible. He reserves the colorful language for these so called Bretharians since some naive people who actually followed these diets (unlike the charlatans that preach them and have been caught in Wendys) have died of starvation.
Randi will handle all kinds of weird claims without getting mad. Last week he tested a woman that claimed she can cause anyone to urinate against their will "through the power of Jesus". http://www.randi.org/joom/content/view/125/1/
James Randi set up an elaborate and fair (agreed by both parties) test of the most famous dowsers in Australia. This is really worth a look. The results were predictable - no better than chance. Ah, but you see, there was interference from sun spots and "negative vibrations"...
A couple of dozen is enough. These are the most famous dowsers down under. People who make a living solely from this stuff. If polling hundreds or thousands of people out of millions on general issues is enough for statistics, than testing a dozen "top" dowsers is good enough here.
It has been said before but obviously still bears repeating. If someone can consistently beat the odds with dowsing let them step forward. Randi has a $1,000,000 carrot to make these people come out. He has said many times that he wants to see a paranormal phenomenon (such as dowsing). He's not out to disprove those who make the claims, he just provides objective, scientific, double-blind tests. He's not even the one who makes the decision about the results, that is done by a third party that both Randi and the claimant agree to so there's no chance of bias.
If you buy a Honda in the states, they will not honor your warranty in Canada. Free trade only applies when the corporations benefit, not the consumer.
Fear is a useful biological mechanism, I would expect that soldiers without fear would not be, on the whole, as good as soldiers without it.
Here's a simple example. How many times do you "die" during a Counter Strike match? I bet you would think again about rushing your opponent's position/rounding the corner/etc. if you were actually afraid of death.
America, nor its allies entered the war because the Germans were doing horrible things to the jews and other "undesirables". England entered the war after the invasion of Poland which broke the condition of the Franco-English ultimatum to Germany. America only entered the war 4 years later after HITLER DECLARED WAR ON AMERICA. Before Hitler commited this disasterous mistake (to show his solidarity with Japan after Pearl Harbor), the American sentiment was that they have their own war in the Pacific and they should leave Europe to the Europeans. Remember, boatloads of German Jewish refugees were refused entry to the US (and Canada and others) when they were still able to get out.
Morality is never the reason for war. It is only a marketing jingle used to get the support of the masses.
The plot sounds very similar to Operation Bojinka - a large scale attack on US bound airliners financed by Osama bin Laden in 1995. Luckilly this was thwarted as well; with pre-9/11 security and civil liberties in place mind you.
Ken Lay was the CEO of a corporation that defrauded its employees and investors. He was Chiefly responsible for all Executive decisions. If he did not know what was going on in his own company under his watch, than he still defrauded the investors by drawing a salary and stock options while clearly being incompetent at his job.
Self terminating mines already exist in a much simpler version - a timed deactivation mechanism preset for the estimated end of conflict. The problem is that the failure rate, i.e., the failure to deactivate, is around 5%-10%. This makes it almost as good as nothing - would you want to plow a field knowing that "only" 10% of the original mines are still active? Cluster bomb bomblets, basically small touch-sensitive tactical mines, are even worse with an estimated failure-to-explode rate around 25%-30%. The only safe minefield is a non-existant one.
Still, my hat is off for Warren Buffet. He himself has campaigned for a tax code that shifts the majority of the tax burden to the corporations and the rich, and away from the middle class. But if the second richest man in the world can't afford the lobbyists to push that idea through, what hope is there?
Slashdot Mirror
DeCaptcher CAPTCHA solving is processed by humans. So the accuracy is way more better than an automated capctha solver ones.
How will a different format solve anything?
Creationism is based on faith, not arguments. Mountains of proof are enough to convince those who believe in what they wish were true, rather in what the evidence suggests.
The original Blackberries, the Mobitex 850s, were bricks. Back at RIM we used to drop-kick them across the office for testing.
A man who says that "yes, AIDS is bad, but condoms are worse" does not have a moral leg to stand on. As far as I'm concerned, to hell with the pope.
John Paul II said the church was wrong about Galileo - because God's wisdom was speaking through Galileo's lips. Now would be a good time to vomit.
The name wasn't changed, it was retired. There's no such thing as a Brontosaurus. The scientist who named it mistakenly put the head of a Brachiosaurus on the body of an Apatosaurus and thought he had a new species.
Randi will handle all kinds of weird claims without getting mad. Last week he tested a woman that claimed she can cause anyone to urinate against their will "through the power of Jesus". http://www.randi.org/joom/content/view/125/1/
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7461912885649996034
James Randi set up an elaborate and fair (agreed by both parties) test of the most famous dowsers in Australia. This is really worth a look. The results were predictable - no better than chance. Ah, but you see, there was interference from sun spots and "negative vibrations"...
A couple of dozen is enough. These are the most famous dowsers down under. People who make a living solely from this stuff. If polling hundreds or thousands of people out of millions on general issues is enough for statistics, than testing a dozen "top" dowsers is good enough here.
It has been said before but obviously still bears repeating. If someone can consistently beat the odds with dowsing let them step forward. Randi has a $1,000,000 carrot to make these people come out. He has said many times that he wants to see a paranormal phenomenon (such as dowsing). He's not out to disprove those who make the claims, he just provides objective, scientific, double-blind tests. He's not even the one who makes the decision about the results, that is done by a third party that both Randi and the claimant agree to so there's no chance of bias.
... promised cake but that turned out to be a lie.
Wrong. Scaly skin impressions have been found as far back as 1908.
Most Dromaeosauridae dinosaurs are suspected to have had feathers.
If you buy a Honda in the states, they will not honor your warranty in Canada. Free trade only applies when the corporations benefit, not the consumer.
But in another more accurate way, Barney is the winner.
"Don't answer the question you were asked. Answer the question you wish you were asked."
America, nor its allies entered the war because the Germans were doing horrible things to the jews and other "undesirables". England entered the war after the invasion of Poland which broke the condition of the Franco-English ultimatum to Germany. America only entered the war 4 years later after HITLER DECLARED WAR ON AMERICA. Before Hitler commited this disasterous mistake (to show his solidarity with Japan after Pearl Harbor), the American sentiment was that they have their own war in the Pacific and they should leave Europe to the Europeans. Remember, boatloads of German Jewish refugees were refused entry to the US (and Canada and others) when they were still able to get out.
Morality is never the reason for war. It is only a marketing jingle used to get the support of the masses.
The plot sounds very similar to Operation Bojinka - a large scale attack on US bound airliners financed by Osama bin Laden in 1995. Luckilly this was thwarted as well; with pre-9/11 security and civil liberties in place mind you.
Ken Lay was the CEO of a corporation that defrauded its employees and investors. He was Chiefly responsible for all Executive decisions. If he did not know what was going on in his own company under his watch, than he still defrauded the investors by drawing a salary and stock options while clearly being incompetent at his job.
Self terminating mines already exist in a much simpler version - a timed deactivation mechanism preset for the estimated end of conflict. The problem is that the failure rate, i.e., the failure to deactivate, is around 5%-10%. This makes it almost as good as nothing - would you want to plow a field knowing that "only" 10% of the original mines are still active? Cluster bomb bomblets, basically small touch-sensitive tactical mines, are even worse with an estimated failure-to-explode rate around 25%-30%. The only safe minefield is a non-existant one.
"The rise of democracy was driven by the citizens' desire to escape from the paternalistic and arbitrary charity of those with money. They accomplished this by replacing charity with a fair, balanced, arm's-length system of public obligation. The principle tool of that obligation was taxation." ... [charity] ..., they can afford the taxes which would ensure that we do not slip into a society of noblesse oblige in which those with get to chose who and how to help those without."
"... if they can afford
- John Ralston Saul
Still, my hat is off for Warren Buffet. He himself has campaigned for a tax code that shifts the majority of the tax burden to the corporations and the rich, and away from the middle class. But if the second richest man in the world can't afford the lobbyists to push that idea through, what hope is there?