warri0r45

We had nothing in terms of bowling attack today. South Africa deserved to win. I think we might need to replace Siddle and Krejza for Boxing Day.

Book of Silk by Tin Hat Trio (album). Has a certain charm and beauty to it. Loving it. :thumbup:

Things aren't wrong if they're not natural. If that were the case, then we would all have to revert to being cavemen for the sake of being moral. It's not like there's any chance of the human race being compromised by homosexuality, either. By and large we're biologically programmed to be attracted to the opposite sex, but in a minority of cases, that programming is somehow overridden or reversed. There's absolutely no reason to believe that this is going to change to the point that homosexuals jeopardise the continuation of the human race. I'm pretty sure I've said this before, but I don't see anything wrong with homosexuality at all. It's not a choice, and I think it's about time society left them to live their lives in peace.

Thanks for those adio. Currently listening to Bathory's Blood Fire Death. Sounds like it has rave reviews from fans, and I can hear why. :thumbup:

I've been way to wrapped up in death metal to give black metal a good listen, but I'm meaning to. So far I've only heard a few songs here and there. What do you guys think are some of the best black metal albums of all time?

Hmm, was that parenthesis necessary? He said that TalkOrigins is biased against religion when they only argue against creationism. Creationism is one aspect of one religion, not all of religion. He didn't specify, so I took him to task on it. And to saru, perhaps you just worded your original post incorrectly, and I'll forgive you for that, but in no way do I take "the site itself [TalkOrigins] IS bias against Religion" to mean that the site merely "has to do with" religion. Still, it has nothing to do with all religion, only one interpretation of one religion's creation story. Added, I'm not going to go back through the pages of this thread to make your argument for you. If you want to present a fact like I asked, by all means do so and we'll argue it. If not, fine. I really don't mind either way. I would just expect you, if so adamant that creationism is scientifically supportable, to remember one fact which backs it up. I'm confused now. Which religions don't have a story of their deity/deities creating the world? I thought that the basis of any religion was that something greater than humans put us here. Good point, and it does touch a bit on some other forms of creationism, but it focuses overwhelmingly on Christian creationism, i.e. the world was created 6000 years ago and there was a worldwide flood 4000 years ago, etc. My point was a simple one - the site doesn't argue against religion in general. It doesn't argue about Jesus, God, Allah, Buddha, Vishnu, etc, etc, etc. It argues against creationism and creationism =/= religion. Creationism is a part of religion.

The same for me, though with biology/chemistry, and I'm a guy. I think when mates ask me about what to do all the time, it's more to do with the fact that I like the experiments, not that I'll always have the right answers. I think they just assume I'll have the rights answers because of my obvious interest or something. I wouldn't call this my 'thing', though.

Too bad their drummer had a brain hemorrhage in 1999. I picked up a dual disk version of Necroticism: Descanting the Insalubrious (listening to it now) with a documentary on it and you can see how slow he's become with his speech, etc. As a result, he doesn't drum for them any more. As I understand it, he is working on getting back into the drumming, though.

I, Collossus by A Different Breed Of Killer (album). In a bit of a -core mood today. Edit: Moving on from the -core mood into some experimental brutal death/grind... Disintegration Of Thought Patterns During A Synthetic Mind Traveling Bliss by Dripping. Sounds like the mind of a madman. I love it. :thumbup:

Anyone watching Aus vs. South Africa in Perth? How good is Mitchell Johnson right now - 8/61 first innings bowling figures. Bloody brilliant. :thumbup: The commentators said it was something like the 6th best bowling performance by any Aussie in a test match innings.

Fixation On The Darkness by Killswitch Engage.

Unless I fight in a war or a life-threatening situation arises, no. I'm not a violent person at all.

[hide=] I grabbed a statistic off this site as well: http://www.earthtraces.com/godsodds.shtml The perpetuation of any theory along these lines seems insane to me. I just wanted to share these. I'm obviously not convincing you, and you are unable to convince me. I'm stepping out now, hopefully on friendly terms with you all. Thanks for all the time you dedicated. To further his point I would like to point out that the enzymes required for any functioning being to emerge would take exceedingly long times to form naturally. One of these enzymes is one that is needed for chlorophyll and it would have taken half the earths lifespan(including the years it was inhospitable) it have formed. [/hide] Your argument assumes there are no other catalysts which can do the job of making chlorophyll, which is questionable considering the apparent flexibility of the sequence of amino acids in an enzyme. It also assumes that life on earth has an absolute need for chlorophyll to make energy (via photosynthesis), yet there are bacteria (some of which lay the foundations to deep-sea hydrothermal vent ecosystems) which don't need photosynthesis to make energy. Using modern day enzymes, genes or genomes, etc, as a benchmark for what was required in early life forms is dubious at best and it's not what people in the relevant field consider the likely way life first evolved.

oh here we go again. everytime sxq posts a band i havent heard of i get way into them :mrgreen: And every time sxq posts I can't tell what the name of the artist is and what the song is called :? Gorguts - Waste Of Mortality Thanks for recommending them warri0r :P No worries. Glad you like them. :) They've got limited edition re-releases of both Considered Dead and The Erosion of Sanity out now. Limited to 2000 pieces each and with a few bonus demo tracks. Nice collectors item if you can get one. :D Currently listening to The Sound of Perseverance by Death (album).

Winds of Creation by Decapitated (album). A modern day classic. Man, I love this band so much.

Nihility by Decapitated (album).

Slumber of Sullen Eyes by Demigod (album). Finnish death metal at its finest.

I grabbed a statistic off this site as well: http://www.earthtraces.com/godsodds.shtml The perpetuation of any theory along these lines seems insane to me. I just wanted to share these. I'm obviously not convincing you, and you are unable to convince me. I'm stepping out now, hopefully on friendly terms with you all. Thanks for all the time you dedicated. No scientist in their right mind suggests that the genome of an E.coli bacterium (roughly 4.5 million base pairs in length from memory) formed spontaneously during one singular event. You're right to laugh at it, but this is a prime example of the misinformation and misrepresentation of abiogenesis by creationists. E.coli, as any other bacterium, is a modern organism that has been evolving for billions of years. As the theory goes, abiogenesis would first create simple self-replicating DNA or RNA molecules encased in a lipid membrane. Such molecules need to be only around 60bp in length. Even then, there's a whole lot of detail and other possibilities I'm leaving out. I wouldn't hold any confidence in the arguments of someone on yahoo answers, either. I'm not sure what exactly those probabilities refer to and I wouldn't be surprised if they have nothing to do with the current scientific hypothesis on how abiogenesis occurred. By the looks of one of them, it's arguing the odds of a modern protein being formed by chance from the assembly of amino acids, which again, isn't at all what abiogenesis suggests. I didn't suppose my argument about retrotransposons would have any impact either, but it's ok. Hopefully someone else found it interesting.

Yeah, because assumptions don't make up our entire world. The one part I don't find it logical is how it assumes bacteria sprung out of nowhere. How does life spring up out of nothing? I've never heard a logical explanation for why I should expect that bacteria popped out in the ocean with no help. After that, sure, I guess that makes sense. But that one point I just have heard people talk around. Why do you continually say they came from nothing? I've already tried to explain in another thread (or this one?) that the most likely explanation is the formation of simple self-replicating DNA or protein molecules, followed by encapsulation by a lipid membrane to form a proto-cell which would eventually form the first cell through natural selection. The progenitors of this process being nucleotides and amino acids, which can form naturally and polymerise naturally, under the right conditions. Let me put it to you this way: When you put two chemicals together in a chemistry class, they react to form a product. That's what they do. When you make certain small DNA/RNA or protein molecules, they catalyse their own self-replication. That's what they do. When you put nucleotides and amino acids on the right mineral surface, they polymerise. That's what they do. When you put ammonia, methane, hydrogen and water together with an energy source, they form the precursor molecules to life on earth. That's what they do. I'll try and find a link and edit in later. EDIT: This looks like a good summary of the current understanding of the formation of the first protocell, complete with animations and everything.

Where do you believe we humans originate? Surely not macroevolution, the lack of evidence for that theory is laughable at best. [hide=Disclaimer]I say macroevolution is laughable. Obviously microevolution exists, but I have yet to see a species transform into one that is completely different.[/hide] The prospect that species don't share common ancestry is laughable. In the DNA of just about all life forms, there are elements not dissimilar to genes called transposons. In mammals they make up a sizeable portion of the genome, somewhere in the order of 40%. Their trick is the ability to move around the genome by cutting themselves out and inserting elsewhere. A form of transposon, called a retrotransposon, does the same thing, but by forming a copy of the original and inserting the copy elsewhere. The result is the multiplication of the retrotransposable elelement throughout the genome over time. The insertion of the copies is largely random (though there are some insertion biases) such that the probability of the same element inserting in the same location along the genome in two separate species is miniscule. Taking humans and chimps as an example, there are multiple identical retrotransposons inserted in the same locations along each genome, the most prolific of which being the LINEs, such as L1, and the SINEs, such as Alu. The only probable explanation is common ancestry. Here's an example in the literature of common retrotransposon insertions between humans and non-human primates: If you expect one species to turn into another completely different species, you'll be waiting a long, long time. That's not to say we can't infer that it happened in the past. What I've given you is one such line of evidence to support that inference.

Well, if you agree that everything has to have a cause for it. Then you claim that the universe had to have been created by something. It then follows that everything needs to be caused, so that cause needs to have a cause. Then that cause needs a cause, ad infinitum. It's just infinite regression. If you argue that God isn't a part of this phenomenon, and doesn't need a cause, then that's special pleading, and destroys your argument that everything needs a cause. We could then easily argue that the Universe or the Big Bang or whatever didn't need a cause, it created itself or some other hogwash. Exactly, why should their ever be an end? The goal of science is to explain everything. Then it should be science's goal to explain why the universe exists. 'because' is not an acceptable answer from a scientist. The whole point of my argument is that I'm arguing from a scientific point of view,(or at least what I've been lead to believe a scientific view is) that science can explain everything. Because I don't feel that everything needs to proof I could potentially agree with you. But, if you hold that what science tells us is absolutely true, and that it's fundamental ideals are also true. Then wouldn't you be contradicting yourself. Scientists don't say that science can explain everything; an explanation is only scientific if it's testable, and we can only test things within the bounds of the natural universe. You can't form a scientific explanation for the ultimate question of why the universe exists. You asked the question of why the universe should be exempt from having a reasonable explanation to it's existence. I think I have an answer for you, but perhaps it's not the one you were looking for. At one point, at the very root of cause and effect, there can be no explanation. Originally we suppose there must be something from which everything else flows, and people may suppose that god has always been and made the universe, or, the universe has always been and it spawned everything we have today through natural means. You could question the unexplained existence of both progenitors equally; why does god exist or why does the universe exist (both for no reason). Some things no one can explain.

Except studying DNA is boring. As I put it this past semester as I was preparing for my Bioinformatics/Genomics Test, DNA makes too much sense to be interesting. And I wholeheartedly disagree with that quote. Trust me, I've perceived reality and I've found it lacking in many respects. (Go ahead, I give you my permission to flame me for the absurdity of that statement). Fairy tales and alternate realities give us something to strive for, to reach for the better, the hope to generally improve the reality we perceive. Hmmm... maybe I do agree with you, just not quite in the sense I think you think I should. "Delusions," as you (or Carl Sagan) call our fairy tales, have nothing to do with how we perceive reality. "Delusions" (as we see it)are only what is possible, not what is. We, or at least I, have no problem seeing reality as what it is, but we believe in the possible, that the reality we can strive to change our reality. So, in conclusion, I think I agree with the original poster. I think fairy tales can happen. Tell me, why is something boring if it makes sense (mind you, we still don't know a whole lot about the genome)? Although I don't think something is boring if we can make sense out of it, I do agree that the remaining mysteries of the universe are also fuel for wonder and interest. It looks like you're also saying that striving for a different reality is a good thing, and I agree. That's not to say any man's fairy tale will come true. I find a sense of realism to be a good thing as well as a healthy curious mind.

Completely agreed. People shouldn't need fairy tales or tall stories to find wonder and vibrancy in life when reality is so much more awesome. Learning about molecular biology, for example, is one of the most rewarding things I've ever done. The complex inner workings of the cells of all life forms sing one familiar song: their metabolism geared so efficiently towards the oxidation of various compounds to extract energy for the synthesis of proteins and the replication of DNA. That very DNA storing life's secrets of both present and past. That, to me, is incredible. There's nothing dull about nature and reality. As Carl Sagan put it: "It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is then to perist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring."

Great song, great album. Mer de Noms rocks. :thumbup: Currently listening to Necroticism - Descanting the Insalubrious by Carcass.

Hmm, was that parenthesis necessary? He said that TalkOrigins is biased against religion when they only argue against creationism. Creationism is one aspect of one religion, not all of religion. He didn't specify, so I took him to task on it. And to saru, perhaps you just worded your original post incorrectly, and I'll forgive you for that, but in no way do I take "the site itself [TalkOrigins] IS bias against Religion" to mean that the site merely "has to do with" religion. Still, it has nothing to do with all religion, only one interpretation of one religion's creation story. Added, I'm not going to go back through the pages of this thread to make your argument for you. If you want to present a fact like I asked, by all means do so and we'll argue it. If not, fine. I really don't mind either way. I would just expect you, if so adamant that creationism is scientifically supportable, to remember one fact which backs it up.