In anthropological etymology, it's common for the first two words for color in a language to represent warmer colors (reddish) and cooler colors (bluish or greenish, although which one of these comes first is split somewhat) How the heck would you know which color words in a language were "first"? Given that languages more or less "evolve" how could you ever define the "first" of any type of word in "a language".
As the owner of a slightly defective valve, I feel encouraged that when the time comes, I'll have my own supply of spare parts. I wonder what the chances are that if you have a defective valve, any valves created from your stem cells would also be defective. Has there been a sci-fi movie about growing full clones for "spare" organs?
Incidentally, these findings seem to be an additional point of evidence against the common creationist argument that you can't add information to the genome through any known naturalistic mechanism
That is interesting, but despite the researcher's optimism...
Werren and Clark are now looking further into the huge insert found in the fruitfly, and whether it is providing a benefit. "The chance that a chunk of DNA of this magnitude is totally neutral, I think, is pretty small, so the implication is that it has imparted of some selective advantage to the host," says Werren. "The question is, are these foreign genes providing new functions for the host? This is something we need to figure out."
...insertion of bacteria DNA as a mechanism for evolution is a pretty weak theory. You would have to show some likelihood of that gene insertion conferring some advantage or contributing toward some significant change. It will be interesting to see what they find.
first Canadian to have an artificial heart removed after her own heart healed itself. Not that this isn't great and interesting news, but the Berlin Heart is a "ventricular assist device", and not actually a heart replacement. Just reading the quote above, I was actually wondering if they removed the original heart and healed it in a test tube or something like that.
If DNA worked the way you seem to think it does, then you must either accept that mutations do not occur, or that all life on earth counts as being part of the same species. You make a very good point. Taking mutations into account, I may have to admit that the "domain of possible human DNA" is probably unbounded. But that brings me back to the "baseball tunneling through a wall" argument. It's theoretically possible a baseball thrown at a wall could "tunnel" through without damaging the wall. It's also theoretically possible that 2 humans could mate and the woman could give birth to an octopus (DNA is DNA, right? And mutations can happen, right?) But I don't think ANYONE would suggest that that has ever happened, or will ever happen. If you make the argument that it happens mostly through small, incremental changes, I don't think that helps much. If one step of evolution (one odd mutation being beneficial and therefore becoming a dominant trait) has a somewhat low chance of happening, then the chance of many such steps happening is going to very quickly approach zero.
If that were the case...People would adjust their benchmarks to reflect reality. Since they have not, you are wrong. Look at Tom's Hardware. They often test products against both "synthetic" benchmarks and "real" off-the-shelf programs. Over the years, I've noticed tests where a product will perform consistently better on the "synthetic" tests while another scores consistently better on the "real" ones. I wouldn't say that makes the benchmarks "wrong", it just means they may not always tell you which product would perform better on a specific program.
Despite this, Eggebrecht encouraged his fellow developers to continue pushing against the boundaries of what was acceptable in order to establish games as an artform. He concluded: "I hope that we actually can prove that this is an artform. Show me something that proves on all levels that games are indeed an artform - push the violence, but also push the sex, and push it in an artistic way where it's not really gratuitous, but where it gets my thinking brain going."
So why does more violence and sex make it more of an art form? How about more of a plot? More character development? I can understand about artists wanting no boundaries and not wanting their creativity stifled in any way, but I don't think boundaries are always bad. Eggebrecht draws a parallel with movies and complains about how much movies can get away with compared to video games. Well, let's look at movies in the old days, where they had to work around more limits. In a way that gave them the opportunity to be MORE creative, because they had to SUGGEST more than they could display. Hitchcock movies are VERY suspenseful, even though the violence and gore were pretty tame by today's standards.
You will always have ratings boards or something similar because some consumers WANT them. One person's "art" may offend someone else, so people want to know what they're getting into when they watch a movie or play a game. You may have the right to create whatever content you want, but you can't force me to watch it, and you can't force ESRB or anyone else to give it an "E for everyone" rating.
Great, I get to correct myself!
Maybe I missed something... Okay, the article projects the "age" of the tail as 30,000 years, so that's where the 30,000 came from.
[sarcasm] PFFFT!!..Everyone knows this is impossible, how can a star have a tail 30,000 light years in length when the whole of the Universe is only 10,000 years old [/sarcasm] Maybe I missed something, but... FTA:
This artist's animation illustrates a star flying through our galaxy at supersonic speeds, leaving a 13-light-year-long trail of glowing material in its wake. I'm not sure where you got 30,000 light years.
I don't want to sound like I personally was offended or shocked by anything. Why the heck not? I'm somewhat shocked and offended just hearing about it! Thanks for the warning!
If you believe in genetics (inheritance and mutation) and that a population can change over time (with traits that make an organism more likely to reproduce becoming more prevalent), and if you believe that a population can be divided into more than one population by migration or physical barriers, then given enough generations how does that NOT add up to the creation of new species, as diverse as dogs and lobsters, with functioning eyeballs? In the same way that I don't think my descendants will be 12 feet tall or have purple hair or 3 legs or any such thing as that. I think within a species there is only so much possible variation. If you could map all the possible human DNA sequences, I think you would find them all clustered together and very divided from the clusters of any other species. Now you take an isolated population of humans and subject them to some "evolutionary pressure" and observe them over "millions of years". What is not obvious to me is that the isolated could ever leave that cluster of data. They might tread some previously rare areas of the cluster, the center of the cluster might move away from the original center, but I question how likely it is that even after a billion years the population as a whole will have developed any traits that are completely outside the original domain of possible traits.
And if you really want to know my biases, I was raised Christian and taught to believe in the literal truth of Genesis, so that is my bias. My beliefs today are the result of critical thinking that led me to discard that bias. While we're on the subject I'm a little tired in general of people declaring each other "biased" if they have already reached a conclusion on some particular subject. To be biased is to be predisposed to a particular conclusion. Having thought about the issue and arrived at one is not a bias. And I was raised to believe in evolution and changed my mind based on my experiences and observations. Bias need not be a pejorative term (though it is most often used that way these days). I recognize (at least some of) my own biases, and I think that is a good thing. It makes me more more open to hear and consider others' views.
Long before microbiology was anywhere near advanced enough to find it, evolutionary theory predicted that there would be found a biological mechanism for passing traits between parents and offspring through reproductive cells. Are you sure that "a mechanism for passing physical traits between parents" wasn't suspected before evolutionary theory? I agree the mechanism is NECESSARY for evolution, but I question you're claim that it was PREDICTED by it.
Do you believe it is impossible for any series of changes, no matter how many millions of years it took for them to occur, could possibly change Species A enough that you would no longer recognize it as being Species A? And do you believe it is impossible for any such series of changes to cause two sub-groups of Species A separated by geography to no longer be able to interbreed? I'm not saying it is IMPOSSIBLE from either a scientific or a faith standpoint. We may someday be able to prove that it's impossible, but I'm not making that claim now. But I think both of those scenarios are unlikely.
Based on quantum physics, it's POSSIBLE I could throw a baseball at the wall and it would "tunnel" through to the other side. I think the "millions of years" argument is a cop out when you haven't quantified the odds. If every person on the face of the earth threw baseballs at walls for the next million years, I still don't think we'd get one case of one tunneling through.
Besides, where did Archaeopteryx even come from then if it's impossible for any species to change into something so radically different? Where did mammals come from? "God" being both a theologically accurate but scientifically inadequate answer. Where did any animals come from? Now we're back to my original point. If you don't invoke a "creator" or "designer", then all you have is natural processes, and if we have to come up with a theory for the origins of life based on natural processes alone, evolution is the best we have (and probably as good as any). But I disagree that invoking a creator is "scientifically inadequate". If science is really about finding the TRUTH, you can't just ignore the possibility of God, because he MIGHT be REAL. And if he is, then the theories you made were based on a FALSE ASSUMPTION.
I believe that you can add 1 and 1 together and get 2. And that you can add 1 to that result to get three, and so on. What I'm skeptical of is that those minor changes could ever add up to a million, or to integers as diverse as 32 and 13429, or a prime number. I just doubt that math has that great a range of potential change. To me, you are just reinforcing my original point about bias. You think you have made a clever analogy even though adding numbers and adding genetic traits are very unlike things. The reason you thought it was clever was that you think evolution is as obviously correct as adding 1+1 and getting 2. You have a bias to believe in it. I am 3 inches taller than my father and he is about 3 inches taller than his father, and my children MAY grow to be 3 inches taller than me, but it is not reasonable to think that in 24 generations (say, around 600 years?) my descendants will be 12 feet tall.
Opening sentences FTA:
Themis Computer has developed a breakthrough in distributed computing for mission-critical systems. By functionally disaggregating commercial computing resources and housing them in a standardized footprint, purpose-built enclosure, the Themis Slice Architecture provides resilience with superior thermal and kinetic management. This open and modular design allows for spiral technology refresh, extending computing infrastructure investments for complete lifecycle management. I admit this article is probably just over my head technically, but did anyone else read this and think of ROOTER? I mean, what is "kinetic management" in a computer? Maybe they spin the CPUs through the air instead of blowing air over them. That might explain "spiral refresh technology" as well.
China's "one child" policy is about the only thing their government got right. Human overpopulation is the elephant in the room, and I actually applaud them for standing up and doing something to stop it there. That is an opinion. We have survived many doomsday predictions in the past. You might want to consider that before applauding measures that infringe on rights as basic as a couple's right to have children.
Oh, and then there's the strong likelihood that they'll spend much more time at Johnny's because his parents aren't so "lame." Then how do you police them? You're welcome to feel pity or whatever you want. And seeing as I posted to a public forum, I've invited the world to critique my parenting style. I agree you make a valid point. Obviously, I can't watch them all the time, but I think the rules you set (or don't set) send a message to your kids about your values. I'm certainly not going to water down my message to get my kids to think I'm "cool".
As someone who does believe both, you're wrong. The only thing I'm am completely sure of and believe absolutely, as a matter of faith, is that God created the Universe. What I'm not so sure about is how He did this, and how exactly this universe He created works. I can respect that view. My own view has changed over the years, and I used to think that same way.
However there is a very solid scientific foundation for evolution -- I think your view assumes that it isn't, but there are few theories as well tested as evolution, in fact you probably hear about one of the greatest predictive successes of evolution on a daily basis, which is DNA. Is it possible that evolutionary theory is wrong, and not just inaccurate and in need of tweaking but completely, utterly wrong? Sure. I welcome any proof anyone may have that this is the case, though just like proving Relativity is completely wrong that doesn't seem very likely. In any case, the theory is well tested and until such time as it fails testing I'm going to go with it. I would like to see any examples of predictions based on evolution. I've actually grown more skeptical of it the more I study about it. To be clear: I'm not saying I don't believe in DNA or inherited traits (that would seem crazy - even to me). I even believe in natural selection changing traits of a population over time. What I am increasingly skeptical of is those minor changes ever adding up to an entirely new species, or leading to things as diverse as a dog and a lobster, or the first functioning eyeball. I just doubt that a species has that great a "range" of potential change.
It's misconceptions like these that make it easier for cranky American Protestants to think of 'Evolutionism' as just another faith. It's not that it's a "faith", per se. It's just that it's a theory based on the NON-existence of a creator. If you don't believe in a creator, you can I can look at the same data all day, and come to different conclusions. The non-believers, or course, claim to have the "unbiased" view, but there's really no such thing. You might say, "ID is stupid when there's this perfectly good scientific explanation". Well, if you regard invoking a creator as "stupid", then you've shown that you're biased against that idea, just as I am biased against the idea that the universe "just happened" without a purposeful, creative agent behind it. And yes, I realize there are a lot of people who believe both -- the "God created the mechanism of evolution" view. That's fine, but for me I think that view assumes a solider scientific foundation for evolution than actually exists.
... Only 20% said they'd seen "inappropriate" pictures on social networking sites in the last 3 months. (And only 11% of parents concur, even for the last 6 months.)...
...In fact, after surveying 1,277 students, the researchers found exactly one who reported they'd actually met a person from the internet without their parents' permission...
So this is good news why? Because not ALL of the kids saw inappropriate pictures? Because LOTS of kids aren't secretly meeting people they met on the internet? And did anything bad happen to that kid as a result? (the details might cast a whole new light on this story). Hey, I just did a study and found out guns aren't as dangerous as we thought. Very few kids are killed by guns in school, so let's get rid of the metal detectors.
As a parent I was very frustrated about internet access in school. At home, we basically don't let them on the internet at all unsupervised, but now it's harder to enforce. "Well, we use the internet at school! It's okay! We're old enough!" Then they tell me about the funny stuff on youtube they've seen at school, or the sites that have java-based games. Okay, that might actually help prepare them for an IT career (joke), but it really makes me wonder how closely they are being watched while they're online.
Okay, I'm using a PS/2 optical mouse right now at wor... I mean at home. Are you telling me there's a battery in there? I had always assumed it was powered through the PS/2 cable. Or is wireless the assumed standard now?
FPS is a poor measure of the feel of a game. I know it's what all the graphics card benchmarks use, and it does do a good job of measuring the total processor and video card throughput, but that's not the most important thing. I disagree. Responsiveness is important, but I've never encountered a situation where the frame rate was good and the machine couldn't read my keyboard clicks fast enough.
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That is interesting, but despite the researcher's optimism...
Werren and Clark are now looking further into the huge insert found in the fruitfly, and whether it is providing a benefit. "The chance that a chunk of DNA of this magnitude is totally neutral, I think, is pretty small, so the implication is that it has imparted of some selective advantage to the host," says Werren. "The question is, are these foreign genes providing new functions for the host? This is something we need to figure out."...insertion of bacteria DNA as a mechanism for evolution is a pretty weak theory. You would have to show some likelihood of that gene insertion conferring some advantage or contributing toward some significant change. It will be interesting to see what they find.
They're already regulating births in China, this is just a little more preemptive. Regulating belief is nothing new for them, either.
So why does more violence and sex make it more of an art form? How about more of a plot? More character development? I can understand about artists wanting no boundaries and not wanting their creativity stifled in any way, but I don't think boundaries are always bad. Eggebrecht draws a parallel with movies and complains about how much movies can get away with compared to video games. Well, let's look at movies in the old days, where they had to work around more limits. In a way that gave them the opportunity to be MORE creative, because they had to SUGGEST more than they could display. Hitchcock movies are VERY suspenseful, even though the violence and gore were pretty tame by today's standards.
You will always have ratings boards or something similar because some consumers WANT them. One person's "art" may offend someone else, so people want to know what they're getting into when they watch a movie or play a game. You may have the right to create whatever content you want, but you can't force me to watch it, and you can't force ESRB or anyone else to give it an "E for everyone" rating.
So did Deep Impact find any deep-fried space critters?
Mod parent up! A picture is worth a thousand words.
Based on quantum physics, it's POSSIBLE I could throw a baseball at the wall and it would "tunnel" through to the other side. I think the "millions of years" argument is a cop out when you haven't quantified the odds. If every person on the face of the earth threw baseballs at walls for the next million years, I still don't think we'd get one case of one tunneling through.
Besides, where did Archaeopteryx even come from then if it's impossible for any species to change into something so radically different? Where did mammals come from? "God" being both a theologically accurate but scientifically inadequate answer. Where did any animals come from? Now we're back to my original point. If you don't invoke a "creator" or "designer", then all you have is natural processes, and if we have to come up with a theory for the origins of life based on natural processes alone, evolution is the best we have (and probably as good as any). But I disagree that invoking a creator is "scientifically inadequate". If science is really about finding the TRUTH, you can't just ignore the possibility of God, because he MIGHT be REAL. And if he is, then the theories you made were based on a FALSE ASSUMPTION.
... Only 20% said they'd seen "inappropriate" pictures on social networking sites in the last 3 months. (And only 11% of parents concur, even for the last 6 months.)...
...In fact, after surveying 1,277 students, the researchers found exactly one who reported they'd actually met a person from the internet without their parents' permission...So this is good news why? Because not ALL of the kids saw inappropriate pictures? Because LOTS of kids aren't secretly meeting people they met on the internet? And did anything bad happen to that kid as a result? (the details might cast a whole new light on this story). Hey, I just did a study and found out guns aren't as dangerous as we thought. Very few kids are killed by guns in school, so let's get rid of the metal detectors.
As a parent I was very frustrated about internet access in school. At home, we basically don't let them on the internet at all unsupervised, but now it's harder to enforce. "Well, we use the internet at school! It's okay! We're old enough!" Then they tell me about the funny stuff on youtube they've seen at school, or the sites that have java-based games. Okay, that might actually help prepare them for an IT career (joke), but it really makes me wonder how closely they are being watched while they're online.
Okay, I'm using a PS/2 optical mouse right now at wor ... I mean at home. Are you telling me there's a battery in there? I had always assumed it was powered through the PS/2 cable. Or is wireless the assumed standard now?