Denali Expedition 2008 - Looking for 10-12 member

[Bug]

But you cannot explain this to the masses over eons and have it comfort and trigger emotions in predictable ways.

 

Oh wait. So your holy books contain LIES?

It contains all of the elements of humanity. It is sad when people place too much emphasis on it in their lives but it is sadder still when it is not a part of someone's life. It contains thousands of years of wisdom gathered by many brilliant people who debated the same issues we struggle with. Its style and tone are from another time. But we can still learn from their mistakes. And from their successes.

 

How can you tell which parts are true and which parts are not?

That is the hard part. It creates deep rifts in our society that will not heal in our lifetime.

Is it the same way you can tell that the voices in your head telling you to go on a shooting spree are angels and not hallucinations?

Actually, I have been attacked by my x-wife's ex who was/is a paranoid schizophrenic. The voices were telling him to kill his own son. He tried to break into our house and with a gun in my hand I had to make the decision whether or not to kill him in front of his son. I did not. He still wanders the streets with no recollection of who he once was. But in his own way, he seems happy and non-violent. Schizophrenia is a degenerative disease or process. It affects about 10% of the population. The violent period varies in intensity depending on the individual and their circumstance. It is not well understood. I am definately not schizophrenic.

 

[kevbone]

“The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist!”

[ivan]

needing scientific proof for the existence of evolution is like needing scientific proof to say that "smoking tobacco is unhealthy" - sure, you can dot the t's and cross the i's by doing your exhaustive, peer-reviewed research over decades - or you can just take a look around and pull you head out of your ass and see that it is obviously the case.

 

don't know if it was mentioned a few pages back when that fellow was pointing out the classic con argument against evolution, that we don't have any evidence of "transitional forms" - jayb, you seem far more erudite w/ the word-thang - wanna explain gould's "punctuated equilibrium" to the masses so that i don't have to? there's even some nice pictures w/ circle's n' arrow's online that oughta at least amuse, if not edify, the israelites

[Seahawks]

Better question is how does something come from nothing??? It can't. Basic law of the universe. So explain that evolution boy.

 

That's a very good question, but making up something all powerful, calling it God, and claiming you've answered it seems like cheating on the test, don't you think? I prefer the "we don't know yet, and we might never know, but we're trying to find out" answer. Just a little more honest.

 

And BTW, how do you know there was nothing before there was something? Seems like a pretty unsubstantiated claim to me.

 

So making something up like evolution and shaking in a few million years to create life is better?? Come on, it just as much if not more of a farce. The more honest answer is that something can't come from nothing.

 

 

Well, Darwin didn't just make up the theory of evolution. He discovered a bunch of new birds in the Galapagos that seemed to fill every evolutionary nitch: seed eaters, insect eaters, even blood eaters. Strangely, they all turned out to be various species of finches. This observation, or 'fact', led to a question: how is it that there can be so many forms of the same type of bird, each ideally suited for its environment? To answer this question, Darwin came up with a very simple but powerful idea:

 

1) Random mutations occur over time. Most, but not all, mutations are harmful to the organism. Even the Biblical literalists don't dispute this observable fact.

 

2) Beneficial mutations that help the organism survive better will, well, help the organism survive better, so that mutation is more likely to be passed on. This is 'natural selection'.

 

3) Over time, lots of little mutations can eventually lead to substantial changes in the organism. On ancestral species of finch eventually winds up being several species with with nutcracking beaks, insect eating beaks, and blood sucking beaks. Over longer periods of time, when more mutations are involved, dinosaurs can become birds, amphibians can become reptiles, etc.

 

It's a common misconception that evolution cannot be observed in a lab. In fact, it's observed all the time. Virus's mutate and evolve into drug resistant strains very quickly, in a matter of days and weeks, as any AIDS researcher can tell you. The non-drug resistant strain is killed by the drug, the drug resistant strain populates to take it's place. Classic natural selection/evolution at work. Anti viral drug research would not even be possible without taking into account the tendency for viruses to evolve quickly into drug resistant strains.

 

A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that:

. . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1

 

 

1,2 and 3 are micro show me Macro... you crasp at straws and conclusion with these.

Edited December 20, 2007 by Seahawks

[ivan]

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist!

"if god is our father, than satan must be our uncle"

[tvashtarkatena]

 

A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that:

. . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1

 

Again, not true, and without a citation and link, I seriously doubt that Schwarz, who specializes in the evolution of humans and apes, ever made this claim. Evolution of new species of anolis lizards in the Caribbean has been directly observed over the past several decades as these lizards spread northward through the island chain. Just one of many examples. Look it up.

 

 

Edited December 20, 2007 by tvashtarkatena

[ivan]

. . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1

so do you see 4 or 5, senor hawks? what the hell does it matter if you directly observe speciation (which is a somewhat fuzzy concept, the lines to be drawn between species being somewhat subjective and resting ultimately on the inability of one creature to screw another and have a progeny that can do the same)

 

is it your claim that god made every species on earth all in one big all-nighter? how come we can't find the fossil of a horse in rocks that date to a billion years ago, but there's plenty of other bones from that time period we can't find today? how come when we first start finding fossils that look like horses, they're so much smaller and have very different feet? is it your claim that god just occasinally gets off the couch ever few eons and cooks up a new critter and plops it down? what do you make of darwin's finches? the panda's thumb? if god empowered creatures to make even small modifications, as w/ the viruses in the test-tube, why in the fuck wouldn't he give them the power to keep going and become entirely different creatures from what they began as?

[Bug]

bug... what bile are speaking of. i have tried to keep my demeanor relatively respectful of the opposing view of this. disagreeing is not the written equivalent of bile.

So you were treating me with tenderness and respect? Get real. I would be so dissappointed.

your characterization of my decision to move this to spray is just a pathetic attempt to ignore the fact that you accused the mods of making VH a sacrificial lamb in a non spray forum and we didn't. bait switch.

Did I use the term "sacrificial lamb"? Dang. That would have been good. But no that is not what I intended. What I did intend was for you and us to look at what we/you DID do. Are there any parrallels off line that you can think of?

Seriously, I would like to know what you think.

This guy posted on a forum that says "No Spray" and gets sprayed on. Do you/we uphold your advertised rules? Well sortof, that's where it gets interesting. Was it right or wrong? You "made the decision". It was what you usually do? Why? Who decided that? How does a person make sure they will not be subjected to this kind of abuse/spray? Do they have to completely stay off cc.com? Stay completely off line? What do you think Minx?

 

[kevbone]

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist!

"if god is our father, than satan must be our uncle"

 

 

If we were from the South…..would it be ok to call him Uncle dad?

[Bug]

I've deduced that trying to convince those who are automatically oppossed to it is much like trying to screw a brontosaurus - ill-advised, impossible, infuriating and, in all likilihood, incredibly dangerous.

 

I need to see your scientific proof.

Where is the reproducable experiment and results?

 

You are an infidel. A Darwinofile.

You beast!

[Seahawks]

 

A current leading evolutionist, Jeffrey Schwartz, professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh, has recently acknowledged that:

. . . it was and still is the case that, with the exception of Dobzhansky's claim about a new species of fruit fly, the formation of a new species, by any mechanism, has never been observed.1

 

Again, not true, and without a citation and link, I seriously doubt that Schwarz, who specializes in the evolution of humans and apes, ever made this claim. Evolution of new species of anolis lizards in the Caribbean has been directly observed over the past several decades as these lizards spread northward through the island chain. Just one of many examples. Look it up.

 

 

Jeffrey H. Schwartz, Sudden Origins (New York, John Wiley, 1999), p. 300.

[tvashtarkatena]

His actual quote, please? Not taken out of context this time.

 

Scharwz, given his work, obviously subscribes to the theory of evolution, so I'm not really sure what your point is here. His statement in no way refutes the theory.

 

Furthermore if, in fact, he did make this claim, he was obviously not aware of the anolis and other research, and therefore was in error. Scientists dissagreeing? Happens all the time.

 

Evolution: The Debate

 

Evolutionist "Mutations happen"

 

Creationist "Yeah, so what?"

 

Evolutionist "A bird born with a longer beak might be able to get more nector, survive better, and have chicks with longer beaks, too."

 

Creationist "Yawn. So what?"

 

Evolutionist "After many generations, the beaks of these birds might get so long that they can't mate with other birds that have shorter beaks because their beaks would get in the way".

 

Creationist "Makes sense. Big deal."

 

Evolutionist "The birds with longer beaks would constitute, by definition, a new species"

 

Creationist "NO FUCKING WAY! EVOLUTION IS A HOAX!"

[sexual_chocolate]

Tvash, (for example) argues and criticizes withoug being brutally abusive.

 

He's also way cooler, smarter, funnier, and better looking.

 

dude, you got bigger tits, that's all. don't let it go to your head.

 

Would you guys stop with the human tail and exploded babies photos already? Talk about a conversation killer. These kinds of birth defects don't even speak to the subject.

 

when someone speaks about intelligent design in a species-creationist sense, human tails and terrible birth defects are entirely germane.

as witnessed by the response i received. what does a fundamentalist do when faced with a question that so obviously, to a rational player, negates the existence of a compassionate caring design/build contractor? he resorts to the tidy little myth that he was (probably) forced to accept as a youngster: "gee billy, in the beginning everything was perfect. then a WOMAN ruined it all by not listening to god. Evil woman brings wrath upon all mankind forever, while compassionate male god witnesses birth defects and torture and etc etc blah blah blah.

 

yes i'll admit right away that this sort of childish interpretation of bible story myth frustrates me (i think there is much room to interpret this myth in an intelligent mature way). what frustrates me is the level of denial and hypocrisy that the believer needs to engage in. ok ok it's their choice yes, but it infects our society. it is an actual infection that threatens the well-being of each and every one of us because of its implications regarding public policy. the threat is very very real, from this arcane sense of justice that we have (death penalty) to misappropriation of public funds (religious schools), to war mongering, to many other negatives.

 

yes tails on humans and birth defects are very germane to this discussion, but, as usual, not the discussion you were having.

 

 

[Seahawks]

Darwin envisaged one species slowly changing into a new one, which then changed into another one, until finally not just new species belonging to the same genus were produced, but new genera, families, orders, classes, phyla, and ultimately kingdoms of organisms evolved. The fossil record demolishes this model of ‘phyletic gradualism’.

 

Stephen J. Gould has said that ‘[t]he fossil record with its abrupt transitions offers no support for gradual change’ and ‘[t]he extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology’.1 In his view, Darwin’s rationalization that the gaps were due to the ‘extreme imperfection’ of the fossil record is by now utterly untenable.

 

It is estimated that 20 to 30 million species are alive today, though fewer than 2 million have been documented in the professional literature. Over 99% of species that have ever lived are extinct – some 200 million of them. But only about 150,000 species of extinct organisms have so far been catalogued on the basis of fossil evidence.2 No one would deny that the fossil record is terribly incomplete: 90 to 99% of the sedimentary rocks in which fossils might once have been preserved have been destroyed by erosion. What’s more, we have barely scratched the surface of existing sedimentary rocks. If 100,000 palaeontologists were to work 8 hours a day, 365 days a year, it would take them 84 years to investigate just 1 cubic mile of rock. But the estimated volume of sedimentary rock deposits on the present continents is about 134 million cubic miles!3

 

There are therefore innumerable missing fossils, but there is no reason to suppose in advance that they would support the neodarwinian theory of evolution; in fact, judging by the known fossil record there is every reason to think they wouldn’t. The fossil species already found offer a good random sampling of all the creatures that have existed, and continuous fossil-bearing sedimentary sequences spanning over a million years have been discovered. But as Gould says, ‘when fossils are most common, evolution is most rarely observed’.4

 

If phyletic gradualism were true, species should be undergoing constant modifications, and we would expect to find fossils of at least some of the ‘inconceivably great’ number of transitional forms that Darwin admitted his theory required. But Niles Eldredge confesses:

 

No one has found any ‘in-between’ creatures: the fossil evidence has failed to turn up any ‘missing links’, and many scientists now share a growing conviction that these transitional forms never existed.’5

 

And Gould says:

 

the absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been a persistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution.6

 

If fish evolved into amphibians, for instance, we would expect to find intermediate forms showing the gradual transition of fins into legs and feet. Since the transition would have required many millions of years, during which many hundreds of millions of transitional forms must have lived and died, at least some of them should have been discovered in the fossil record. Similarly, if reptiles evolved into birds, we would expect to find fossils showing the gradual transition of the forelimbs of the ancestral reptile into the wings of a bird, and the gradual transition of scales into feathers, hind feet into perching feet, the reptilian skull into the birdlike skull, etc. But the fossil record provides no evidence that any such transitional species ever existed.

 

Gould says that the history of most fossil species includes two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism:

 

1. Stasis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; morphological change is usually limited and directionless.

2. Sudden appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and ‘fully formed.

 

[olyclimber]

[sexual_chocolate]

How does a person make sure they will not be subjected to this kind of abuse/spray? Do they have to completely stay off cc.com? Stay completely off line? What do you think Minx?

 

i think keeping the original post in its designated thread without spray was correct, as was throwing the predictable mutation into spray (he doesn't have to acknowledge the mutation, which would actually dovetail nicely with his fundie beliefs).

[lizard_brain]

Oh for christ's sake would you all just shut up.

[Seahawks]

Tvash, (for example) argues and criticizes withoug being brutally abusive.

 

He's also way cooler, smarter, funnier, and better looking.

 

dude, you got bigger tits, that's all. don't let it go to your head.

 

Would you guys stop with the human tail and exploded babies photos already? Talk about a conversation killer. These kinds of birth defects don't even speak to the subject.

 

when someone speaks about intelligent design in a species-creationist sense, human tails and terrible birth defects are entirely germane.

as witnessed by the response i received. what does a fundamentalist do when faced with a question that so obviously, to a rational player, negates the existence of a compassionate caring design/build contractor? he resorts to the tidy little myth that he was (probably) forced to accept as a youngster: "gee billy, in the beginning everything was perfect. then a WOMAN ruined it all by not listening to god. Evil woman brings wrath upon all mankind forever, while compassionate male god witnesses birth defects and torture and etc etc blah blah blah.

 

yes i'll admit right away that this sort of childish interpretation of bible story myth frustrates me (i think there is much room to interpret this myth in an intelligent mature way). what frustrates me is the level of denial and hypocrisy that the believer needs to engage in. ok ok it's their choice yes, but it infects our society. it is an actual infection that threatens the well-being of each and every one of us because of its implications regarding public policy. the threat is very very real, from this arcane sense of justice that we have (death penalty) to misappropriation of public funds (religious schools), to war mongering, to many other negatives.

 

yes tails on humans and birth defects are very germane to this discussion, but, as usual, not the discussion you were having.

 

 

Who said god is a man?? I personaly don't think he is either sex. And if I'm not mistaken wasn't there two who disobeyed?

[sexual_chocolate]

change those two facts if it pleases you. it doesn't change the argument.

[sexual_chocolate]

 

everybody cut and pastes in one sense or another.

[Bug]

How does a person make sure they will not be subjected to this kind of abuse/spray? Do they have to completely stay off cc.com? Stay completely off line? What do you think Minx?

 

i think keeping the original post in its designated thread without spray was correct, as was throwing the predictable mutation into spray (he doesn't have to acknowledge the mutation, which would actually dovetail nicely with his fundie beliefs).

So online it's OK to talk about some one behind their back?

Or anywhere?

[tvashtarkatena]

 

when someone speaks about intelligent design in a species-creationist sense, human tails and terrible birth defects are entirely germane.

as witnessed by the response i received. what does a fundamentalist do when faced with a question that so obviously, to a rational player, negates the existence of a compassionate caring design/build contractor?

 

Well, here's where your germane argument becomes extinct. VH and his brand of Biblical literalists DON'T believe in a compassionate or caring God. Their God fucks over all of humanity over all time because the the mistake of one couple, sends perfectly good humans to the firey lake because of one little sin, and doesn't give two shits about how you treat other people as long as you kiss His all powerful ass, even after a life full of fucking others over. "Oh, hey, I'm sorry about all that, Lord. Your my one, true Savior now". Their God is, as I've already stated, a complete and utter narcissistic, sadistic asshole.

 

So your baby was born without a brain? Blame Adam and Eve, bitch! Your whole city just got nuked? Blame Adam and Eve, bitch! You've got worms crawling out of your ass? BAAEB! Don't blame your Loving God, just because He made up all these fucked up rules that were destined to be broken right away and the draconian consequences that come with most minor infraction! Don't blame a God that requires only PERFECTION (nothing fucked up about that, no, nothing at all).

 

Of course, this fucked up religion's followers play the same 'blame somebody else' game. "Hey, I'm not discriminated against gays. Some of my best friends are 'struggling' with being gay. I'm not against science, but I'm not allowed to believe in it. I'm not against the Constitution, but I'm required to do everything I can to violate it. I respect you, but I'm required to impose my beliefs on you, because they're the only ones that are right. Got a problem with that? Blame God."

 

Yeah, OK. You could choose to subscribe to a more mellow form of Christianity; there are plenty of sects out there that don't discriminate against gays, and you can still get to Heaven without being a complete asshole...but you chose this one, fella.

 

So who's the asshole? God?

 

For an atheist, the answer here is self evident.

Edited December 20, 2007 by tvashtarkatena

[sirwoofalot]

Can I please have a summary?

 

1.) Native Americans.

2.) ACLU

3.) Boy Scouts

4.) Evolution

 

To the tune of the familiar Christmas (oh am I allowed to say that?) carol “Let It Snow”,

 

All together now please, and a one, and a two, Let it spray, let it spray, let it spray…..

 

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Well, here's where your germane argument become extinct. VH and his brand of Biblical literalists DON'T believe in a compassionate or caring God. Their God fucks over all of humanity over all time because the the mistake of one couple, sends perfectly good humans to the firey lake because of one little sin, and doesn't give two shits about how you treat other people as long as you kiss is all powerful ass. Their God is, as I've already stated, a complete and utter narcissistic, sadistic asshole.

 

See, I was right, you HATE God. Deny it all you want.

 

As for the last sentence - it describes YOU perfectly.

 

 

[tvashtarkatena]

 

See, I was right, you HATE God. Deny it all you want.

 

As for the last sentence - it describes YOU perfectly.

 

 

Can't hate what you don't believe in, amigo. Sorry to dissappoint.

 

Last sentence:

 

"For an atheist, the answer here is self-evident"

 

Hey, you're right for once!

 

Dumbass.