HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: What makes a creationist?
Keywords: creationist
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 22:32:45 GMT

In article <ksiew.718902447@munagin>, ksiew@mullian.ee.mu.OZ.AU (steven
kok-hsien siew) writes:
>   After reading the articles posted by several creationist,
> I get the feeling that creationist are a totally different
> spicies altogether.
>  
> This brings to mind the following questions.
>  
> 1) Have anyone done a psychological profile of
>    a creationist? What are his motives? 

  Great idea!  Anybody got a copy of the MMAT they can send off to a bunch of
creationists?  I always wondered what profile they would give anyway.

 |  __L__   *******************************
-|-  ___    * Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub   *
 |  | o |   * kv07@iastate.edu            *
 |/ `---'   * Iowa State University       *
/|   ___    * Math Department             *
 |  |___|   * 400 Carver Hall             *
 |  |___|   * Ames, IA  50011             *
 J  _____   *******************************
From: lking@athena.mit.edu (Loren King)
Subject: Antti's views
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 17:54:26 GMT


  I'm getting a bit tired of reading Antti's evasive
one-liners in response to questions asked of him.  In 
particular, there are three points on which he has remained
silent: (1) his misdefinition of the concept of evolution;
(2) his gross ignorance of the practice and application
of mathematics, evidenced by his belief that all of mathematics
can be derived from the empirical observation that one apple and
one apple make two (it frightens me just to repeat it!); and
(3) his sytematic evasion of requests that he present a critical
statement of his own views concerning the origins of organic
life and consciousness in the world.

  How about it, Antti?  Thrill us with your accumen ... write
us more than one line, and something that isn't a direct (and
evasive) response to someone elses critical appraisal of the
views that you hint at holding.

  Write us a synopsis of your position.




___________

Loren King
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: Antti dodges reality (take two)
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Distribution: local,world
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 18:26:50 GMT

In article <Bvs5rx.F7t@news.cso.uiuc.edu>, METZE@uimrlm.mrl.uiuc.edu (Virginia
Metze) writes:
> 	Scientists and teachers tend to believe that they can
> 	bring understanding and knowledge and give that belief
>         up with	great difficulty.  They basically believe that 
> 	no one could possibly simply be determinedly anti-science --
> 	even after the last 12 years!  Or prefer believing lies
> 	and stupidities to the truth.  I don't even understand it
> 	myself...

  There is a wonderful Hindi expression to describe people like this.  The best
translation I could come up with was "Nemesis of knowledge".

 |  __L__   *******************************
-|-  ___    * Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub   *
 |  | o |   * kv07@iastate.edu            *
 |/ `---'   * Iowa State University       *
/|   ___    * Math Department             *
 |  |___|   * 400 Carver Hall             *
 |  |___|   * Ames, IA  50011             *
 J  _____   *******************************
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: t.o., the home game
From: kmagnacca@eagle.wesleyan.edu
Date: 12 Oct 92 17:18:37 EDT
Organization: Wesleyan University

In article <Bvv0tx.J19@watdragon.uwaterloo.ca>, jdnicoll@watyew.uwaterloo.ca (James Davis Nicoll) writes:
> In article <97924@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
>>
>>-1 if your post originates from a third world country... like
>>Canada (he says, hoping to cheese of Larry and get a nasty
>>email response 8-)
> 
> 	*sigh* Biologists should stick to biology and stay  away from
> areas they aren't qualified to comment on. The first world is the USA
> and its allies (eg: Canada, Japan, Airstrip One), the second world is
> The (former) USSR and its minions in the Evil Empire, and  the third
> world is composed of those nations who either choose not to belong to,
> or are not worth the bother of forcing into the first or second world.
> 
> 	Mesoamericans have different definitions, I am told.

   That's -25 for not seeing humor with a smiley.

Karl
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: huston@access.digex.com (Herb Huston)
Subject: Re: Plant Death before the Fall (Gall Bladders Anyone?)
Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 11:04:10 GMT

In article <1bkjvdINN15o@fido.asd.sgi.com> livesey@solntze.wpd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:
>In article <IerPAny00Vop43WXcl@andrew.cmu.edu>, "Robert J. Knapp" <rk3h+@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>|> 
>|> Please explain why every morning my back porch is covered with mouse
>|> guts.  Cats do eat small animals, it's part of their "circuitry," they
>|> will however leave a gift of the digistive system for their owners in
>|> exchange for the food and attention the cats recieve.
>
>Desmond Morris has a slightly different version of this.   

In _Catwatching_.

>He claims that what cats are up to is teaching the humans 
>they own how to hunt.   "See this small animal?  Well, 
>you can do that too, if you try".
>
>Personally, I don't know how anyone can tell what an
>animal is really up to.   Doubly so for cats.

Well, that is the way the mother cat teaches her kittens how to hunt,
and he said that displaying the prey to humans is most common in neutered
females.

-- Herb Huston
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: amorgan@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Crunchy Frog)
Subject: Re: Further Clarification
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University.
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 19:16:07 GMT

In article <1992Oct16.172023.2568@hsr.no> onar@hsr.no (Onar Aam) writes:
>>>In an earlier article I stated that life as a whole is 
>>>tending towards greater
>>>complexity. This is a huge topic which is hard to prove or disprove, 
>>>maybe even
>>>impossible. But I will give it a shot.
>>
>>I have one comment.  Please read Stephen Jay Gould's book entitled
>>_Wonderful Life_.
>
>I think I have read that book.

Since he says that evolution is not a ladder (i.e. no less complex =>
more complex) and that complexity is a term that is almost impossible to
define and seems to have little relevence to evolution if you *do* define
it, do you still hold to your statement above?

NOTE: He may not *explicitly* say that, but if you read his other books
he does and I think the message is there as subtext in WL at least.

C Frog
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: sbradley@scic.intel.com (Seth Bradley)
Subject: Re: 350 lb super-athlete goat?
Organization: Intel SCIC, Beaverton, OR
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 05:44:19 GMT

In article <63@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
>The t.o regular crew says no problem.  Fine;  you should be able to show 
>me a goat, a mountain sheep, a burro, or some such animal which, at around
>300 - 400 lbs, can lift 2000 lbs.  

Or maybe you could actually pay attention to the several posts which
have described gorillas as being able to do that or more?  But then,
that would have you paying attention to facts, and we know that's
just not going to happen...
-- 
Seth J. Bradley, Senior System Administrator, Intel SCIC
Internet: sbradley@scic.intel.com   UUCP: uunet!scic.intel.com!sbradley
----------------------------------------
"A system admin's life is a sorry one.  The only advantage he has over
Emergency Room doctors is that malpractice suits are rare.  On the other
hand, ER doctors never have to deal with patients installing new versions
of their own innards!"  -Michael O'Brien
From: bruce@uxb.liv.ac.uk (Bruce Stephens)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Applauses to Ted
Date: 14 Oct 92 11:10:54 GMT
	<1992Oct12.163804@IASTATE.EDU>
	<1992Oct13.065803.9595@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>
Organization: Centre for Mathematical Software Research, Univ. Liverpool, UK

>>>>> On 13 Oct 92 06:58:03 GMT, tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode) said:

> Trygve   (Do you think I'd be more convincing if I had typed in a few
>           words at random in all-caps?)

Well, let's see...

> Close, but you've actually gotten it backwards--you SEE, we know from DOPPLER
> shifting of distant celestial bodies THAT the universe is EXPANDING at a
> STEADY clip.  INDEED, the further away you look, the FASTER things are 
> moving, with all INDICATIONS that they are asymptotically approaching the
> speed of light itself, proof THAT the universe is expanding as fast AS IT
> possibly can.

(With a 1/6 chance of each word being in uppercase.)  I think it looks
more convincing.

--
Bruce Stephens
From: throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Holden and the C programming language
Summary: Ted's program still unportable, inflexible, inaccurate, and unclear
Date: 13 Oct 92 01:03:00 GMT

: From: news@fedfil.UUCP (news) (Ted Holden)
: Message-ID: <67@fedfil.UUCP>
: K&R C compilers, free with UNIX, are a classic example of getting what
: you pay for in life.  

Good grief, I see here that Ted seems not to know what K&R C is.  K&R C
isn't an implementation or a suite of implementations, it is the defacto
standard that predated the ANSI C standard.  Unix or not has nothing to
do with it.  Free or not has nothing to do with it.  The point is, there
is no C standard by which Ted's program is a legal, meaningful program. 
Ted claims that this is a "nit".  So it is, but it's a larger nit than
Ted seems to think, and that program displays sloppy craftsmanship and
careless disregard for detail and accuracy. 

: From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
: Message-ID: <1992Oct10.131309@IASTATE.EDU>
: Indeed, the only compiler I can think of that would work on your program is
: Turbo C (and only because they violated several ANSI restrictions).

Actually, there are quite a few implementations under which the program,
by coincidence, will run.  The most popular and widespread ones in Unix,
such as gcc and the unbundled C implementations c89 (DEC and IBM) and
acc (Sun) may well all run it and produce what looks like sensible
output.  Nevertheless, it is illegal under the ANSI standard to declare
main to return void.  The function main returns an int to the invocation
environment, and if the program doesn't do this, there is no guarantee
that the program will work properly. 
--
Wayne Throop  ...!mcnc!dg-rtp!sheol!throopw
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: Kazmaier at 200,000 lbs vs the 200,000 lb sauropod
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1992 18:20:41 GMT

In article <718611252@sheol.UUCP>, throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop) writes:
> : I honestly cannot think of any other possibility, other than for one.
> 
> I can think of dozens.  Though, granted, Ted's is unique in that it is
> less likely to be true than any of them (except maybe the one about the
> blue faeries from Arcturus tying myriads of helium balloons to the
> sauropods). 

  Don't sell yourself short.  I think a newcomer might be tempted to side with
Ted if given this alternative, but anyone who has spoken to Ted for more than a
few months would probably vote for anything Ted disagrees with, even the blue
faeries from Arcturus.

 |  __L__   *******************************
-|-  ___    * Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub   *
 |  | o |   * kv07@iastate.edu            *
 |/ `---'   * Iowa State University       *
/|   ___    * Math Department             *
 |  |___|   * 400 Carver Hall             *
 |  |___|   * Ames, IA  50011             *
 J  _____   *******************************
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: ingles@engin.umich.edu (Ray Ingles)
Subject: Re: Plant Death before the Fall (Gall Bladders Anyone?)
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 92 23:23:38 EDT
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor

In article <1992Oct14.143336.26046@city.cs> lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
>In article <1243@tdat.teradata.COM> swf@tdat.teradata.com (Stanley Friesen) writes:
>>In article <Bvw345.41E@well.sf.ca.us> keithd@well.sf.ca.us (Keith Doyle) writes:
>>|
>>|I presume now that we have determined that felines
>>|Also, aren't there some species whose young are born inside
>>|the body of one of the parents, and who eat their way out
>>|or something like that, implying that they too, may have
>>|had to go through a bit of evolution after the Fall to get
>>|to such a state.
>>
>>Yep, there are several such.  Also species of *parasite* that are specialized
>>to take over a host's body as they grow from egg to pupa.  [This one is
>>*really* gross - even to a trained biologist].
>
>This sort of thing `nature red in tooth and claw', did not
>happen before the Fall. I agree - its really ugly how life
>has been corrupted by Sin.

 Oh, it's almost too easy. I guess I'll try to be first.

 1) Really? Is there any evidence besides the Bible for this?

 2) How fast did the change from herbivore to carnivore occur? Was it
instantaeous? Did it take some time? What mechanisms were involved in the
change? Did they resemble the proposed mechanisms for evolution in any
way? If they differ, in what way?

 3) Was this due to God's influence, or Satan's? I.e. did God decide to
make cats carnivorous, or did Satan?

 4) What did a cat look like before the 'Fall?' What did a parasite look
like (pick a parasite, any parasite)?

 5) Do we happen to have *any* fossils of, say, what a predator used to
look like before the Fall? (Or since there was no death before the 'Fall,'
immediately after?) It's only been a few thousand years, surely one
or two skeletons were preserved. Or would we mistake them for a completely
different species? If so, what?

 I could go on, but that's enough to get you started, I should think. Not that
you answered (or even acknowledged) my last posting full of questions, which
I emailed to you so as to be sure you wouldn't miss it.

>Lionel Tun   (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk)
>Vision Group, City University, London, EC1V 0HB. 071-477 8000 x 3889
 ^^^^^^ ^^^^^
             None so blind...

Sincerely,

Ray Ingles                  || The above opinions are probably
                            || not those of the University of
ingles@engin.umich.edu      || Michigan. Yet.
From: scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu (Scharle)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: mutations of DNA
Date: 9 Oct 92 15:51:14 GMT
Reply-To: scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu (Scharle)
Organization: Univ. of Notre Dame


    In an email conversation, a correspondent wrote that
DNA is not only unlikely to mutate successfully, it even corrects 
itself and wants to return to its original form, even when 
mutations are intentionally introduced.

    I assume that the correspondent is not scientifically adept,
and you may assume that I am not, either.  My preference is not to
pretend that I know what I am talking about when I am not, so I 
probably will not respond to this point unless forced, but I am 
curious as to what this is supposed to mean.


-- 
Tom Scharle                |cm65n6@irishmvs(Bitnet)
Room G003 Computing Center |scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu(Internet)
University of Notre Dame  Notre Dame, IN 46556-0539 USA
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Subject: Re: Applauses to Ted
Summary: Great minds think alike.
Reply-To: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Organization: The Aurora Group
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 92 17:55:09 GMT

In article <1992Oct8.101718.13261@nic.funet.fi> Teemu Makinen writes:
>   Why not, for example, say that the Earth has been bigger and less dense by
>that time? That would give the gravity difference you are looking for. It's
>only to say, that the gravitational force has pulled the Earth into a smaller
>planet than it was before. It would also give to you some anomalous mountain
>formations as the surface area shrinks.

Hey, you have just rediscovered the Once Hollow Earth Theory, which I
first proposed here two or three years ago!  So far, this theory has
been able to explain everything that Ted's explains--even the telepathic
animals--and more.

>   No, that is too obvious.

Aw, now you've taken all the fun out of it.
-- 
Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every
isaak@aurora.com      generation is humbled by nature." - Philip Lubin
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: gmartin@zia.aoc.nrao.edu (George Martin)
Subject: Running of the up the score on Ted (was Re: Running up the score on Colby)
Summary: Pot calling the kettle?
Organization: NRAO
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 04:14:37 GMT

In article <69@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
>
>
>In article <97924@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
>>Below is my proposal for making debating on t.o. a competitive
>>event. Posters can score points depending on what they induce
>>the creationist (C'ist) they are debating to do or say in the 
>>t.o. forum. 
>
>My own view is that the creationists must be winning by this standard
>of reckoning, i.e. seeing what sort of behavior you can induce from the other
>side.  A Mr. Richard D'Ippolito kept score on this sort of thing for about
>a month or so, about a year ago, and posted some of his results, i.e. 
>just a brief sampling of vibes from several of what I call the t.o "crew".
>You can easily see that some creationist ran up a really big score on Colby...
>the funny thing is that I'm not mentioned at all in any of this, having been
>preoccupied with other business at the time.

  [A lots of alledged quotes with no attributed context deleted]

>Greg Hennessy:
>
>        You seem to make the stupid assumption...
                                               ^^^
>        He...has plenty of time to jump up and down and wet his pants...
           ^^^                                                        ^^^
>        The only scientific conclusion I can make is that Bales is lying.
>

Hey I knew Greg way back when he was just an undergraduate.  Only an
average bridge player at best but he seemed to be a reasonable person
none the less.

What were in the ellipsises in your alledged quotes from Greg?

Hey Ted,
  How in the hell is this going help you?  It looks like you have collected
phrases which may not be complementry to you, but you include no context
with which someone can judge what has been said.

How/what is someone suppose to judge?

  [The rest of Ted's "quotes" deleted]
>-- 
>Ted Holden
>HTE
>
-- 
George Martin
Systems Analyst                     NRAO/VLA                  Socorro NM
Internet: gmartin@something.aoc.nrao.edu
"Skating away on the thin ice of the new day."  (Ian Anderson)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: onar@hsr.no (Onar Aam)
Subject: Re: evolution through time
Organization: Rogaland University Centre
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 14:53:16 GMT

>In response to Onar [onar@hsr.no (Onar Aam)], regarding whether chaos
>theory applications are being examined in evolutionary biology:
>
>>Oh, you can bet on it. The problem is that chaos-theory and, more generally,
>>theory of complexity is still not awknowledged by many biologists.
>
>I wouldn't say that these weren't "acknowledged" but rather, "not generally
>used."  The number of biological problems which would benefit from the
>application of chaos-theory is indeterminant.  For many it may not be
>all that helpful. Definately worth looking at, though.
>
>
>>There is a huge gap nowadays, I think, between molecular biologists and
>>evolutionists. They don't communicate very well. Until this happens,
>>progress in evolution will be restrained.
>
>I don't know. Perhaps. Most molecular biologists are interested in
>quite different subjects than evolutionary biologists. However,where
>interests overlap I've seen quite a bit of collaboration, at least
>in the bacteriological fields.  (Hell, in bacteria there's practically
>no evolutionary studies that can be done without data at the
>molecular level.)
>
First of all, I slept badly because of my horrible misspelling of "acknowledged".

And you're right. All major progresses in the understanding of bacterial
evolution are based on data of molecular biology. Sadly, however, this is the
only field in which such fine collaboration is taking place. (as of my knowledge) 

Chaos is a new science (its roots goes way back into the last century, though),
and before this theory is integrated into biology (which yet it is not) we will
only have a limited understanding of life. 


Onar.

Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: prl@csis.dit.csiro.au (Peter Lamb)
Subject: Re: Holden and the C programming language
Organization: CSIRO Division of Information Technology
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 10:32:11 GMT

gmartin@zia.aoc.nrao.edu (George Martin) writes:

>In article <1992Oct13.234020.24730@csis.dit.csiro.au> prl@csis.dit.csiro.au (Peter Lamb) writes:
>>printf(\n\n ratio = %f\n", aa);

>But
>being fair, is the lack of the leading " in the second printf () a
>typo on your part or is it the way it appeared in the article?

You are quite right. Apologies to all. The above printf statement should read:

printf("\n\n ratio = %f\n", aa);

-- 
Peter Lamb (prl@csis.dit.csiro.au)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: David.Rice@ofa123.fidonet.org
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: String+flashlight/egg-chicken=Earth
X-Sender: newtout 0.02 Oct  1 1992
Date: 12 Oct 92  09:07:34

Tag: Lionel Tun (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun))
 
LT> "Could someone clever please explain the creationism-
LT> explained cartoon. Are strings, torches and batteries, 
LT> dogs and chickens meant to equal the earth or what??"
 
Why not come up with a better theory? We've been waiting.

--- Squish v1.01
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode)
Subject: Re: Friesen on elastics and sauropod necks
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix @ U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 92 19:45:38 GMT

In article <70@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
>
>5.  We've had a number of the t.o regulars claiming that a squat thrust
>is somehow a very inefficient way to come up with weight, i.e. that animals
>have some magical way of coming up/standing up with is far  more efficient.
>They ought to take their insight to the American Olympic weightlifting
>team.  Those guys have been looking for more efficient ways to get weight
>up for decades, and haven't found one.

Ted, Ted, Ted, you really ought to at least gain a nodding familliarity 
with a subject before you start trying to use it as evidence for your
theories--you'll really be much more convincing if you cite evidence
that actually exists instead of "evidence" that you appear to have
simply made up.

For starters, you might try taking a field trip to a zoo and watching
an elephant get up--it's nothing at all like a squat thrust.  If that's
not something that can be fitted into your schedule, many other animals
will do--cows, dogs, cats, etc., all get up in ways that are entirely
not analogous to a full squat.

Next up, you might want to consider learning about such concepts as
leverage and kinesiology--for the former, consider especially the
structural tradeoffs between speed and force, and for the latter, you
might want to note the way the rectus femoris works against the gluteus
maximus and the biceps femoris fights the quadriceps throughout the
performance of the squat.  Humans are just not designed with performing
squats in mind.

Finally, if you're going to be talking about olympic lifts, you might 
want to find out what they are first (hint:  the squat isn't one of
them).  In any case, whether it's an olympic lift or an IPF-sanctioned
powerlifting competition, the object is to lift as much weight as
possible in the lifts that are done in that type of meet; these lifts
are not chosen because they are the lifts that humans are best suited
and they are unlikely to consider changing them to lifts that the human
anatomy can lift more weight in any more than they would be likely to
change the various swimming competitions into footraces because humans
are better suited to running than to swimming.

Trygve
Newsgroups: talk.origins