UK-Skeptics forum

A bit of misogyny from a BBC4 documentary

polomint38 — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 06:33:21 GMT

Not the views of the Beeb I'm sure but from the series In Their Own Words: British Novelists (episode 2)

Question: If women existed would they have souls :-X if souls existed would women have them.

The series is worth a watch

Black Cats?

Cat Man. — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 22:35:26 GMT

I live Sutherland in the north of Scotland and every so often the local newspaper publishes reports of a sighting of a big black cat that is often described as panther like, however recently on the regional TV news a report of a sighting was mentioned then on the local radio a report of a sighting closer to the area I live in was mention, and now in the last three day I’ve heard of four sightings in the local area and given the fact that the sightings happened on bodies of land that are each separated by bodies of water that can only be crossed by road bridges there would have to be at least three different cats.

If memory serves me right about four years ago a similar thing happened, more reports led to more sightings.

If for years these things have been running round the countryside then why have no farm animals been found dead or reported missing, and if as some suggest that these cats have been round for a long time (I’ve head some people claim since the 1960) why have no dead ones been found?

Is this a case of there being blanks and people filling them in or is there another explanation?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you.

Spot fixing

omdaddi — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 10:20:04 GMT

Does anyone else think that the recent furore over spot fixing is somewhat too focussed on one team in one sport. I have these thoughts:

innocent until proven guilty - not the other way around?
if guilty is it only one team?
if guilty is it only one sport?

I personally find it hard to believe that a sample of 1 team in 1 sport means that spot fixing (if proven) is only restricted to that team in that sport.

Maybe as a massive cricket fan I am clinging to straws. I guess I have a vested interest.

Uploading Pictures

chaggle — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 08:32:01 GMT

Does anyone upload pictures using the "Manage Attachments" feature? Does it work? I've just tried it and I get a message

500 [IOErrorEvent type = "ioError" bubbles= false
cancelable=false eventPhase=2 text= "Error #2038"

Any idea?

Hawking in 'God didn't do it' shocker!

smudge — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 06:45:20 GMT

Should be an interesting read when the book is out
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/20...g-bang-creator

Consumer Skepticism

Dr B — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 10:24:28 GMT

Not really a scientific issue but here an example of the sort of thing we could be helping the consumer with (though I accept that 'Which' magazine does this as well).

Anyway, recently I decided to renovate our home. This included, among other things, sorting out the floor in the house and extension (it's uneven in places). I also wanted a wooden floor. I originally was thinking of getting engineered wood (like Parador) but decided instead to go for a good quality solid wood (oak) floor.

I spoke to around 5 flooring companies and the advice / job description varied massively. Having done my own research, including going for a pint with a trading standards guy, I came to the conclusion that the capacity to either be ripped off or be given bad advice is high. If you are thinking of getting a good quality flooring my initial advice (brief) would be as follows.

1 - do not buy products from the big 'home improvement' chains.
2 - do not buy products from China or East asia - they delaminate or bow in our climate and you will have to replace it all
3 - engineered flooring is an affordable alternative to laminate - get good quality eng wood if you can stretch to it.
4 - think about whether the floor can be / should be floated or not (fine for laminate and some eng woods, but not solid).
5 - moisture content - different decisions for kitchens and bathrooms - some products are totally unsuitable for the kitchen - dont buy them!!!!

6 - solid floors cannot be floated and must be either bonded or fixed to the sub-floor (or both) and this can require a new sub-floor if yours in unsuitable to take it.

I originally thought my floor would cost around �3000 - �4500. However, it is going to cost double that - and I am not being ripped off (i need a lot of sub-floor preparation that you might not need). However, only certain people told me about this. Others were quite happy to fit expensive floors in a wholly inappropriate way. It is this that I am warning against here.

I am not an expert but i would suggest to anyone thinking of laying down a new wood floor to think along these lines (this is just my opinion)

Good / high quality laminate - Pergo
Good / high quality engineered wood - Parador
Good / high quality solid flooring - Tuscan

European materials is the way to go.......

If anyone else here has had any issues or wants to share advice...then here is the place to discuss it. Obviously i am not qualified to give advice to you, but this is my experience so far and based on my own research over the last couple of months.

Are thorium reactors the way forward?

asthmatic camel — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 10:46:14 GMT

Interesting article in today's Daily Torygraph.

Quote:

There is no certain bet in nuclear physics but work by Nobel laureate Carlo Rubbia at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) on the use of thorium as a cheap, clean and safe alternative to uranium in reactors may be the magic bullet we have all been hoping for, though we have barely begun to crack the potential of solar power.

Dr Rubbia says a tonne of the silvery metal – named after the Norse god of thunder, who also gave us Thor’s day or Thursday - produces as much energy as 200 tonnes of uranium, or 3,500,000 tonnes of coal. A mere fistful would light London for a week.

Thorium eats its own hazardous waste. It can even scavenge the plutonium left by uranium reactors, acting as an eco-cleaner. "It’s the Big One," said Kirk Sorensen, a former NASA rocket engineer and now chief nuclear technologist at Teledyne Brown Engineering.

"Once you start looking more closely, it blows your mind away. You can run civilisation on thorium for hundreds of thousands of years, and it’s essentially free. You don’t have to deal with uranium cartels," he said.

Sounds too good to be true, but is it? I have no idea.

The price of water.

bindeweede — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 21:45:19 GMT

A relative of mine recently posted a link to this article on Facebook. Apparently, a little over two years ago, the average price of a litre of Evian water was 31p.

http://www.which.co.uk/advice/switch...ater/index.jsp

I do find those figures hard to believe. A half litre of Evian today will be about 50p, probably more. And the average litre of supermarket water was 8.5p? And they say they bought litre bottles where possible.

Has the price of water, bottled or not, really risen so much in a couple of years?

Reasons why i am a theist

Javan502 — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 19:01:36 GMT

i believe Theism explains best our existence, and i believe, the God that revealed himself in the bible, is the creator of all that exists. What are my reasons to believe so ?

1. The universe had a beginning, therefore a cause. Since beyond our universe, there was no time, no space, and no matter, that cause must be timeless, beginningless, eternal, spaceless, transcendent, invisible, personal, incredibly powerful. That description fits best to the God of the bible.
2. The universe is finely tuned to permit life on our planet. Over 120 fine tune constants are know up to know, and as more time pasts, more are discovered. This might be due to chance, to physical need, or to design. Chance is a very bad explanation. Some advocate a Multiverse. But to have just one life permitting universe, you need 1 to 10^500 attempts to get it done. Thats a 1 with 500 zeros. If we put it in comparison, that in our universe, there exist around 10^80 atoms, this shows how improbable it is, that a Multiverse could explain finetuning. It could not be by physical need, since if so, why are there many planets, which are not life permitting, but our is ? So its best explained by design. Our earth/solar/moon system is a very strong evidence. Our solar system is embedded at the right position in our galaxy, neither too close, nor too far from the center of the galaxy. Its also the only location, which alouds us to explore the universe, In a other location, and we would not see more than stellar clouds. The earth has the right distance from the sun, and so has the moon from the earth. The size of the moon, and the earth, is the right one. Our planet has the needed minerals, and water. It has the right atmosphere, and a ozon protecting mantle. Jupiter attracts all asteroids , avoiding these to fall to the earth, and make life impossible. The earths magnetic field protects us from the deadly rays of the sun. The velocity of rotation of the earth is just right. And so is the axial tilt of the earth. Beside this, volcano activities, earth quakes, the size of the crust of the earth, and more over 70 different paramenters must be just right. To believe, all these are just right by chance, needs a big leap of faith. This is indeed maibe the strongest argument for theism.
3. Life. Abiogenesis has not been able to explain the existence of life on earth. Science cannot explain it. There are strong reasons to believe, a natural origin is not probable, and a bad explanation. First of all, why whould dead rocks need to evolve, to create life ? Secondly, just one living cell is more complex than the most complex machine created by man. A living cell is irreducible complex. All parts must be on place, making a gradual evolution not possible.
Even the simplest cell needs DNA , which is a information carrier. Information is always created by a mind. There i no natural mechanism known to man, to create information. Information is by essence spiritual, and not physical. There is no bridge to cross the gulf from material to spiritual. Even through millions of years of evolution. Its not possible.

http://www.christiscreator.com/evolutionclass101.htm

On the one side, we find the real world of objects, events, and tensional spacetime relations. On the other side, we find fully abstract representations that contain information about the material world. That articulate information is abstracted first by our senses, secondarily by our bodily actions, and tertiarily by our ability to use one or more particular languages . Between the two realms we find what appears to be an uncrossable gulf.

Add to this the moral argument, experience of miracles, the testimony of the bible, and you have a nice case of theism.

MMR compensation payout

chaggle — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 07:28:38 GMT

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/he...-18-years.html

Quote:

In a six-page judgment, the panel which examined the case said: 'Robert was a more or less fit boy who, within the period usually considered relevant to immunisation, developed a severe convulsion ... and he then went on to be epileptic and severely retarded. The seizure occurred ten days after the vaccination. In our view, this cannot be put down to coincidence."

Quote:

A Department of Health spokesperson said: "This decision reflects the opinion of a tribunal on the specific facts of the case and they were clear that it should not be seen as a precedent for any other case. The safety of MMR has been endorsed through numerous studies in many countries. Thankfully, more parents are having their children vaccinated with MMR and consider it as safe as other childhood vaccines.

Not autism - but can we expect an awful lot of "I told you so" comments?

Can they get away with this?

chaggle — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 16:21:47 GMT

http://www.watchesshop.com/manufacturers/breo.html

Quote:

The Breo watch range is a vibrant range of sports and fashion watches suitable for the gym and everyday use. Most Breo watches have been proven to have many health benefits for the wearer due to a material called Tourmaline, which is used throughout many of the Breo watch ranges. Tourmaline occurs naturally and is a mineral that is used as a semi-precious gemstone which has many health benefits including: Natural detoxification of the body, aids recovery after sport, increases concentration levels, aids sleep, meditation and relaxation, improves vitality and moods as well as increasing the body�s ability to facilitate oxygen.

(My highlight)

Great headline

chaggle — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 14:50:08 GMT

Quote:

Blow for bishop as orgasm church flops

The rest of the article pales into insignificance but in case anyone is interested

http://www.thelocal.se/28582/20100825/

Quote:

Sweden�s highest court has refused to hear a last-ditch plea by the Madonna of the Orgasm church to be recognized.

Don't Be A Dick

brianp — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 10:42:30 GMT

Phil Plait recently gave a talk at the TAM8 meeting where he argued that directly attacking proponents of woo is not the best way to change hearts and minds:

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/...ow-online.html

Al Stefanelli disagrees

http://alstefanelli.wordpress.com/20...-to-be-a-dick/

As does Richard Dawkins who argues that, while we probably won't change the mind of our opponent, we might well influence others. (Sorry I can't find the piece by Dawkins which I read yesterday).

What do you think?

George Souli� de Morant

bindeweede — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 23:40:15 GMT

"The Father of Western-style acupuncture practice."

"Unfortunately he was a fabulist, according to an article published in the S�ddeutsche Zeitung."

http://ksjtracker.mit.edu/2010/08/20...-dubious-past/

" safe but ineffective".

bindeweede — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 23:27:30 GMT

Quote:

Is There an Alternative Medicine?

Dr George Lundberg, "MedPage Today ".

http://www.medpagetoday.com/Columns/21819