John Dub

Domestication is evolution. You can’t cross-breed if there isn’t DNA and inheritance. It’s as natural as plants evolving to attract bees.

I’m just finishing the DS9 series. There are a few good ones, but so much soap opera in between. At least it is ending with an 8 part finale.

The climate is what’s necessary to grow food. —

No kidding. The warmer the earth, the more food can be grown. The higher the CO2 levels, the more food production per acre. Simple facts. — Mike

Look at a map of Australia. There are a few cities along the coast and very little going on in the middle. Why is that? It’s warm. Very warm.

Images l…[Read more]

Widdershins, you keep assuming too much about what is going on in other people’s heads. I can talk to people and find that their fear of Islam is either rational or irrational. There is nothing intrinsic about a fear of something that would allow you to say it is one or the other without knowing why the person has that fear.

I didn’t expect CC to bring in another term, but I don’t think it changes anything. As long as you are saying that there is a natural, real, physical world and we can imagine things that don’t exist in that world. If you want to call those “supernatural” that’s fine, that is a word, a concept that we all know about. It’s still the same as I said…[Read more]

Are the ideas that result from neurons communicating via chemical reactions not physical?

The neurons communicating are physical, but the ideas and imagined images are not. The images don’t exist in the neurons, they are a result of those firings plus whatever else we use to get those images in our heads. I don’t know what neuroscientists say, I’m…[Read more]

My neighbor has a loud truck with lots of lights on it. It gets filtered through trees as he pulls out of his driveway. Freaks me out every time.

If you are going to call everything physical, how do you talk about the imagination?

To clarify:

“Islamophobia” should refer to an irrational fear of Islam, or Muslims. And there IS such a thing.

But the charge is usually leveled at the wrong people for the wrong reasons.

Thanks for saving me the trouble of typing. It probably would have taken me more words and not been as clear. I’m pretty sure that there were conservatives who…[Read more]

Matt Dillahunty has a story of a guy who saw him doing magic tricks and the guy asked him if he was doing “real” magic. He very calmly explained that there are only tricks. He told him to think about what he was seeing then he did his levitation trick. The guy thought Matt was really levitating. Then he showed him how the trick was done. It helped…[Read more]

Yeah Tee, don’t you get, if we just rebalanced our corrupt casks like the gyptians did we’d be good, like Mother Nature, who should not be fooled with. We’ve known this for 10,000 years, but people like you have kept it out of the mainstream because you’ve got that all clogged with your media bypass.

I’m not sure if you mean this sarcastically or seriously. It isn’t “my” chart. It is the QAnon conspiracy’s chart. And it is utterly insane.

That chart is a good depiction of what is going on inside Mike’s mind. It’s quite the labor of love. I’d love to meet whomever made it. Where did you find it?

What does the government spend on average, for each per person in the United States today by the spending divided by number of people. It is over 20K per person on the average, is that not correct. And people just want more.

I’m not sure I can convert that first sentence into an actual formula. Anyway, I’d like my check for 20K, if that’s what…[Read more]

That makes sense. Her parents probably encourage the environmentalism hoping it can be therapeutic.

That was exactly the answer I heard on Science Friday today, when they were talking about GW and someone asked what they should teach their kids. The scientist answered to teach them to love people and love their world, to appreciate everything they…[Read more]

Well it’s obvious to me. –TimB

So, let’s say tomorrow something new comes out, a book on the level of Frans de Waal’s work with bonobos or a new theory of something like pheromones. You have to adjust your understanding wouldn’t you?

I don’t think it’s mixing science and religion to say they are similar. It’s the same passion for knowing and the same tendency to look for causes. Science puts the discipline in it, the rigor.

That’s kind of what I said Tim. Except I didn’t go so far as to say that combining several complex disciplines is “obvious”.

Also backed by multimillion dollar PR campaign

Translation: PR = attempts at education, campaign = scientific consensus, multimillion dollar = the cost of learning how our planet works before we destroy it, backed by = she went to school and paid attention, she is a product of the system that our ancestors dreamed of where complex knowledge is…[Read more]

I’ll try to get to those when I get a chance. I think I was more worried about getting recruited, which may be what kept me out. I kind of look at everything as a cult, like political parties and economic systems. The book, “Mistakes Were Made but Not By Me” was the one that put it all together for me. Although I guess it’s kind of out of date…[Read more]

Hairsplitting is fine. I wrote this in response to the endless hairsplitting that goes on about where we came from and how we survived and why we are “good”. Not surprising that it didn’t end the debate. I don’t think it descends to the level of deepity though. It’s not ambiguous and it’s not obviously false. To make the case that there is lo…[Read more]