Off on holiday! Back in a week or so.
Archive for August, 2004
Cornwall!
Friday, August 27th, 2004Transitional forms
Friday, August 27th, 2004What is it with creationists and “transitional forms”? Why do they have to question every fossil that is transitional between two others and say they still need these magical “transitional forms” between that fossil and the others.
Give me the transitional number between 17 and 21!
Nonsense.
I contend that we are
Tuesday, August 10th, 2004I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours. – Stephen Roberts
We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further. – Richard Dawkins
Biblical quote
Tuesday, August 10th, 2004Could any of my loyal(ha!) readers(ha!) enlighten me please. Take this quote from the bible:
12 And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry:
13 And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet.
14 And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it.
The question I ask is… why did Jesus say noone should eat off the tree? Nothing says there was anything wrong with the tree, only that it was not in season (for the time of figs was not yet). Is this just a childish act because he was annoyed that the tree had no fruit to eat? Or is there something deeper?
Endless amusement
Friday, August 6th, 2004This discussion board post really made my day:
The dirty little secret of evolution as a theory of origins is that it cannot predict one-tenth of what we see in the world around us. This is especially true of astronomy, as report after report now shows.
Case in point: Comets are big snowballs that shoot out their tails when they get close to the sun, right? And if you hit one, it would just shatter, like any snowball when it crashes into a wall. Right?
Well, take a gander at this!
The article, from Voice of America, has an image taken from a NASA unmanned-probe flyby of a comet named Wild 2 (pronounced Vilt Two; it must be German or Dutch). Behold–a cratered comet! Evolutionary astronomy would never have predicted that.
But suppose that comets–and asteroids and meteoroids–were ejected Earth matter left over from the same event that produced the Flood of Noah?
Taken from a post by Temlakos at www.christian-underground.com
Could care less
Tuesday, August 3rd, 2004Recently this phrase has been coming up increasingly, possibly not because it is in more common use, maybe I’ve just been increasingly frequently places where it is common. As yet it has not been too common in the UK, but after reading a post on the BBC website where a Brit used it, maybe that will not be the case for much longer.
Wherever it is used, it’s nonsense. Do people not think about what they are saying before they speak? Think about it, break it down. What does “could care less” mean? Clearly it means “I could care less about this than I do currently”, which means you care about it, obviously. In no context where I have seen the phrase used was the implication any different from “I do not care”, so saying “I care” when you mean the opposite is, frankly, idiotic.
“Couldn’t care less”, people! “I could not care less”. You don’t care! That’s what you mean! Use it right, damnit.
Manhunt
Thursday, August 5th, 2004Recently in the UK there was a murder, and the “popular press” (read: Daily Mail – ah, familiar to you now in my writing I bet) concentrated on the claim that the violent computer game “Manhunt” was involved, and clearly this is why the murder happened, leading to front page headlines “Ban these evil games!”. That in itself was dubious, made moreso by the fact that the police reports had concluded that drugs and theft were involved, and most likely the reasons for the murder, at the very least the primary ones even if the game had something to do with increasing the of the murderer. Usually the Mail would be heavily into drugs stories, telling how bad drugs are, the usual, strange that this time they’re not… signs of opportunism on the part of the tabloids? They couldn’t possibly…
Now there is a new twist in the story, the game was found, not in the room of the murderer, but in fact that of the victim. Not that that necessarily means the murderer didn’t play it as well, of course, but as a source of Daily Mail articles… will they even mention it as part of their “news” reporting, I wonder.
Maybe Rockstar games should sue the Mail, maybe if enough people do their reporting might head towards fairness, though it’s doubtful.
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