WOF: Three or four things that Are on my mind.

[WinterPalm]

Claims of probability are not the same as claims of truth. Science, in stepping away from religion, posits claims to probability and what will most likely occur, not the truth.
Bad science and the media make claims to the truth.

[golden arhat]

Way off topic

Three or four things that Are on my mind.



1) Everything Al Gore said was a lie. F_cking hippie drama queens

I saw yet another reference to this recently. Yes the earth is warming, at least in the northern hemisphere. In the southern hemisphere it's actually cooling down. The warming of the earth is a natural phenomena that we have no control of.

Of the trace green house gases CO2 is indeed currently the most abundant in our atmosphere. However this is through no fault of our own. Compared to natural production of green house gases by volcanoes, tree, forest fires, and evaporation of sea water, the CO2 we produce is but a drop in a very large bucket.

Water vapor in the atmosphere is way more abundant that CO2 and far more conducive to the green house effect. Hydrogen cars don't sound like such a good idea now, do they?

The increase of CO2 in the atmosphere happened after the earth started to heat up, not before. There is a lot of CO2 locked in the ocean, when that water evaporates as the earth heats up, naturally more CO2 would be released into the atmosphere. Forest fires are more common in a hot climate producing more CO2, and trees and veggies like the heat, crops yield more in a warm climate and produce more CO2.

We are just getting over the Little Ice Age which lasted from the 16Th to mid 19Th century. During the middle ages (800-1300AD) the earth was warmer than it is now.

The sun is producing more heat, as clearly demonstrated by the rise is temperature of other plants like Mars.

Ice makes heat. Large sheets of ice reflect light and heat back into the atmosphere. The earth warms up, the ice melts. The increase in moister causes increased cloud coverage which blocks the suns rays. The earth cools down. rinse repeat.

A scientific consensus my A$$!

http://www.iceagenow.com/
http://www.stopdumbingdown.com/

I'm all for the environment, but many of the so called alternative fuels will likely be just as hazardous to the environment if not more so. We should be growing food not alternative cash crops for energy consumption.

Control through fear

totally agree

in fact how much more rainforest would we have to cut down to make these bio crops ?

[golden arhat]

2) Christianity the Cult of Evil

GOD is an as$hole. He doesn't display any characteristics that I find virtuous. He is a vain, ego maniacal bully. Outside of what ever feel good sermons they give on Sunday, the bible is full of God advocating, if not out right participating in Murder, rape, slavery, and human sacrifice. All things generally consider pretty freaking evil by today's standards. But I guess it's OK if God says so right?

[/B]

true i agree
but god i think is an @ss hole only in most monotheistic senses

i see god (or whatever u want to call him) as a the only probable explanaition for the universes creation


but not in any kind of adam and eve type sense

[golden arhat]

SaintSage



Then he should have figured out a better way to express himself, because the bible sucks.

he(not gender specific) expresses himself very well
he expresses himself

as you

as me

as everything

contradictory and complimentary

the creator and the expression


only your exptression of what god is is limited


what god is is unlimited

[SanHeChuan]

golden arhat

I specifically talking about the God of the Old testament and the Religions that sprang from it.

If you take that away and just talk about a God as an Idea, I'm OK with that. I'm not denying the existence of God, just the truth of the Christan, Jewish, Islam perspective of God.

Shaolin Wookie

Truth claims do exist in science.

The Scientific community is currently willing to accept that they could be wrong about anything. Maybe not individually but collectively. I like that.

I do find it very uncomfortable that the healthiness of my ***** determines just how much God likes me.

What Jesus Loves the D!ckless

"For there are eunuchs, that were so born from their mother's womb: and there are eunuchs, that were made eunuchs by men: and there are eunuchs, that made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it." (Matthew 19:12 ASV)

One of many many contrad!ckshions.

[Shaolin Wookie]

[B]

"For there are eunuchs, that were so born from their mother's womb: and there are eunuchs, that were made eunuchs by men: and there are eunuchs, that made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it." (Matthew 19:12 ASV)

See? That's what I'm talking about. What's a sentence like that doing in a paragraph on a subject like this. Friggin' context, dude. It's just plain silly.

[SanHeChuan]

Shaolin Wookie

I'm not a die hard global warming guy, and I do understand the validity of every point you brought up, but they still don't negate the fact that our earth has a delicate balance of gases in the atmosphere that keeps us from becoming, say, Mars or Venus, and developed into the greenhouses effect---a balance we can help tip rapidly and irrevocably.

The earth is not so fragile. Mars and Venus do NOT have oceans to absorb the excess C02. The complex organisms on earth are far more fragile. I believe that we are capable of destroying our selves, and many other large lifeforms with us, But we can't destroy all life on earth. IMO as long as there is life on earth then the earth is just as good as it ever was.

I am all for the responsible and judicious use of the environment for our own safety. But no matter what we do we WILL have an impact on our environment. Their are people out there who will always believe that any impact is a negative one, so we are screwed no matter what.

I don't think we should make a change just for the sake of change. Especially when the impact of human produced C02 is not as catastrophic as the people pushing for change would have us believe. The alternatives might not be as benign.

The problem is everyday people want to make a difference, and the only place they can see themselves reasonable making that difference is through automobiles. Cars being the most Iconic public image of our fossil fuel consumption.

They don't think about or care how much oil it took to make the batteries of their new electric car, or how much of the rain forest was cut down to grow ethanol crops in Brazil, or how many people in third world countries starved to death because their governments grew Biodiesel's instead of something people could eat. Most people don't think about these consequences, they just want change, they just want to win, to make a difference. They don't want to hear reason.

[SanHeChuan]

Ben Gash

As a point of historical accuracy I should point out that the first two Crusades were DEFENSIVE on the part of the europeans. The arabs attacked them and they retaliated.

I will highly disagree with that. The Crusades were a solution to internal socioeconomic problems within Europe and fighting Islam was the outlet. And even if it was defensive it still doesn't explain all the many many Jews and Orthodox christains they killed along the way. Especially if their motive was the defensive of the byzantine empire, why kill the people you came to protect?

People complain about Christians affecting there freedoms, and then proceed to criticise every aspect of Christian life

When killing weeds you got to get the root.

[NJM]

Global warming is real and influenced by man to a point where it is already causing damage. Deal with it.

[SanHeChuan]

Bwahahaha

NJM

Global warming is real and influenced by man to a point where it is already causing damage. Deal with it.

It is real. The results are unknowable, some think it might lead to a new ice age.
Man influence is debatable.
It is causing Change.
It has been both hotter and cooler in Mans life time.
It is niether the end of the earth or us.
So what?

[DPL]

1) Global warming is a religious argument. You either believe, don't believe, or choose not to participate. There are very compelling statistics that go both ways. The truth, like in all religious arguments, is that no one knows the truth.

2) Christian religious arguments are even more fruitless and frustrating than arguments about Shaolin-Do, or whether rich people should pay more taxes.

3) Expanding earth theory. Wow. First time I'd heard of this but he makes a pretty convincing case. He needs someone to edit his writing so he sounds a little less, well, religious about the whole thing, but it's a pretty convincing case. The continental drift theory has always seemed a bit buggy anyways...

[YMC]

There are very compelling statistics that go both ways.

Where are the countervaling statistics that are so compelling? I don't mean what you'd find on the general internet, I mean in peer-reviewed journals. Although, to be fair, I'd doubt I'd be able to critically analyze the methods sections if I were to read them.

Actually, all this going back and forth about differing models etc kind of reminds me of something I do know about. Back in the dark ages of neuroscience, oh, a few decades ago, two groups argued back and forth about the mechanisms that underlied something called neuronal long term potentiation (LTP), which is believed, at least currently, to be how memories are formed. One group publishes one mechanism, another group publishes another; it's a real war, trust me, nothing like a bunch of know-it-alls fighting over who is right. And, it turns out they were both right. The two camps used different types of neurons. BUT, one group was more right than the other in the OVERALL picture because their mechanism is how 90% of the rest of brain generates LTPs. This isn't to say that the other mechanism isn't important.....

[DPL]

Where are the countervaling statistics that are so compelling? I don't mean what you'd find on the general internet, I mean in peer-reviewed journals. Although, to be fair, I'd doubt I'd be able to critically analyze the methods sections if I were to read them.

Can you confirm that by 'countervaling statistics' you mean statistics that throw more support to a natural, cyclical warming theory as opposed to the man-caused, unnatural warming theory? I assume that's what you mean but you're not clear.

And since I'm not a professional scientist, I pretty much have no option except to present stats that have been released in more public forums after they've been published in peer review journals, seeing as how I don't subscribe to the peer review journals, so it looks like I'll automatically fail your test no matter what...

[TaiChiBob]

Greetings..

Global Warming? whether it is as described or as criticized.. we can only improve our living conditions and our environment by addressing it as if it is very real..

Those that choose to do nothing, assumimg global warming to be a conspiracy, are gambling with their children's future.. forget the arguement of "real or not", just work to improve the only planet we have.. time spent arguing and criticizing is better spent doing something beneficial..

Be well..

[SevenStar]

Ezekiel 4:12-13 KJV

"And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with dung that cometh out of man, in their sight. And the LORD said, Even thus shall the children of Israel eat their defiled bread among the Gentiles, whither I will drive them."
God actually tells the Jews to eat shit, and they do.....
Question: when your bread's baked with poo, does it rise?

misinterpretation. This was a punishment - defling the food they ate. However, they were not EATING the dung, they were cooking with it - dung fueled the fire they cooked with. This was considered defiling the food.

However, it is no secret that God used very cruel punishments, from destroynig the world to having the firstborn killed. The moral of the story? Don't disobey.