HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: mike@isgtec.com (Mike Sellers)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Question for Creationists (AND some obligatory evolutionary news!)
Summary: Another answer, and the inner ear of the _Eoraptor_
Date: 10 Sep 92 01:14:43 GMT
Organization: ISG Technologies Inc., Mississauga Ontario

Benjamin T Dehner writes:
> James Meritt writes:
> > Lionel Tun writes:
> > } Capt Dave Kristof writes:
> > } > For you Creationists out there, a simple question:
> > } > What is the purpose of mankind?  
> > }
> > }To worship God.
> > Why?
> 
> 	More to the point, what is this omnipotent/omniscient being that he
> needs something like me to worship him?  Is the THAT insecure?

Is it OK for a non-creationist to interject here?  

According to some other Christians, "man is that he might have joy."
That's from Mormon scripture.  We believe that God created us so that
we could be as joyful as he is.  All this stuff about God making us 
so that we could worship him reminds me of "Night On Bald Mountain"
from Fantasia...

Now, getting back to talk.origins:

I hope this isn't stealing his thunder, but I recently had the _great_ 
opportunity to spend a little time with Andrew Leitch (I think I have the 
spelling right) while he analyzed the fossil head of an _Eoraptor_, found 
in Argentina, age approximately 230 million years.  The head approximately
5" long, was still encased in rock, but he had taken a magnetic resonance 
scan of it and, (ahem) using my company's software, was able to reconstruct 
a 3D image of the skull within the rock.  

The really amazing thing was that the MR scan provided a lot of detail
not normally available in fossil reconstructions.  For example, he was
able to isolate the *semi-circular canals* of the inner ear, in a 
dinosaur that lived long before any of us sniffed the air.  

While he, as a paleontologist, has no questions about the fact of 
evolution, we had a great time discussing the different conundra 
surrounding the thread of life on earth... for example, how is it
that ancient dinosaurs evolve just the same arrangement of inner ear
structures for balance that we have?  I know, convergent evolution and
analogous structures are the easy answers, but what are the mechanisms
involved?

Anyway, this finding and others will be detailed, according to Andrew,
in the January 1993 National Geographic.  Take a look, it should be
an interesting article!
--
              Mike Sellers      User Interface Team Leader
           mike@isgtec.com      ISG Technologies, Toronto, Canada
              "Actum ne agas" -- Do not do what has been done.
                         Furare tantum ab Optimis
From: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Subject: Re: answer to John Ata's whining
Reply-To: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Organization: The Aurora Group
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 92 00:22:11 GMT

>one side is polite and tries to honestly convey
>what they think, while the other side, which is in the majority,
>tends to be emotional and rude.

Is it polite to say that you, who have been studying the subject
for years, have missed the fact that it violates the most
fundamental laws of physics and probability, while I, who haven't
studied the subject at all, can see this?

Is it polite to say, without giving any evidence, that the theory
you're working on will lead to communism, genocide, brutality,
religious and moral decay, and assorted other evils?

Is it polite to ignore responses and to repeat the same mistakes
in facts and logic over and over and over?

The creationists who post here generally don't engage in outright
name-calling.  They probably honestly believe that they are being
polite.  But then, creationists never were much good at recognizing
reality.
-- 
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: rpjday@cuug.ab.ca (Robert P.J. Day 277-3175)
Subject: Re: Burden of proof
Organization: Calgary UNIX Users' Group
Distribution:  world
Date: Sun, 13 Sep 1992 22:09:39 GMT

In article <716191101.1@iphase.FidoNet.Org> Cliff.Fleming@iphase.UUCP (Cliff Fleming) writes:
>Mr. Colby,
>       It would seem your opponent in the good old creationism/evolution debate has gotten a little hot under the collar. How entertaining. However, a veteran of many such arguments, I would like to suggest a tactic really infuriate your theistic opponent. Shift the burden of proof to him.
>       An erroneous presumption on the part of most theists is that they are exempt from being forced to prove their side of the argument. They simply look for potential flaws or shortcomings in the evolution argument and arbitrarily assume that their side is correct by default.
>        It usually comes as a surprise when one challenges them to prove their side. In order to prove creationism, they must be able to prove the existance of their deity through the same rational format that they demand of their opponents. I have yet to find a Christian who can even offer a rational definition of his god.
>      An excellent book for use in challenging the theistic arguments is:
>       ATHEISM - THE CASE AGAINST GOD
>       1979 by George H. Smith
>       Prometheus Books.
>       Library of Congress # 79-2726
>                                         Hope You Enjoy,
>                                         Cliff Fleming

  I'm not sure this would be appropriate, since the creationist lobby is
emphatic that their crusade has nothing to do with religion.  Those of us
who have actually looked at it long and hard know better, but this is the
claim.  Tee hee.
  A more effective approach, and one that has been conveniently ignored
by EVERY single creationist to wander through here before being punted on,
is to ask the creationists to ->define<- the "theory" of creation science.
In all the years I've been in and out of this group, there has never
been such a theory presented.
  If, God willing :-), any creationist were to present one, it would 
have to eventually be based on sudden creation of everything a few thousand
years ago by the deity of one's choice.  Once this is established, there
is no point going further.  The proper response is that this "theory"
is a religious belief, and while it is perfectly acceptable as religion,
it does not qualify as science and is disqualified from consideration
as a scientific alternative.  Period.
  While I find Smith's arguments useful for torturing various flavors
of Bible believers, they don't belong here.  Try alt.atheism.

R. Day
Member, Alberta Skeptics
... the pit bull of skepticism ...
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Back to "Bales' scales"
From: sbishop@desire.wright.edu
Date: 10 Sep 92 06:47:25 EST
Organization: Wright State University 

In article <1992Sep9.204338.15821@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu>, zuber_rg@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu (Robert G Zuber) writes:
> 	Hey Bob. What's the theory of creationism?
> 
> Rob Zuber 

Hey, Bob, are you EVER going to discuss ice core dating?

Apologies if you do discuss it in your posting.  The whole thing was over 600
lines and I *NEVER* read anything that is that long, I don't care WHO posted
it.  (Hint:  Break things up by topic, then more of us might read them.)

Sue
From: m23364@mwunix (James Meritt)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Holden Numbering
Date: 8 Sep 92 14:50:47 GMT
Organization: MITRE Corporation, McLean VA

In article <2890@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
}I honestly don't know

Good start.  You should have stopped there.
Newsgroups: talk.origins,alt.atheism,sci.skeptic
From: warren@nysernet.org (Warren Burstein)
Subject: Re: worthless comic strips
Reply-To: warren@nysernet.org
Organization: Mail to News Gateway at Wang Labs
Date: 10 Sep 92 07:19:56 GMT
Followup-To: talk.origins
Keywords: creationist propaganda

Isn't it sort of contradictory to have a cave-man comic strip be
anti-evolution?
-- 
/|/-\/-\       I'll leave you with this saying:
 |__/__/_/     Now I am depressed...
 |warren@      
/ nysernet.org
From: czl30@duts.ccc.amdahl.com (Chris Lee)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Question for Creationists
Date: 7 Sep 92 19:59:39 GMT
Reply-To: czl30@DUTS.ccc.amdahl.com (Chris Lee)
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

In article <1992Sep2.130157.3954@city.cs> lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
>In article <dkristof.715431601@hq> dkristof@Pt.hq.af.mil (Capt Dave Kristof) writes:
>>For you Creationists out there, a simple question:
>>
>>What is the purpose of mankind?  
>
>To worship God.

No, Bast placed us on this earth to feed the cats.

Chris Lee
From: alanf@tekig6.PEN.TEK.COM (Alan M Feuerbacher)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: History or Science?
Date: 15 Sep 92 06:51:05 GMT
Distribution: world,local
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.

In article <1992Sep14.143332.22556@swbatl.sbc.com> kamphau@oktext.UUCP (Mark Kamphaus) writes:
>
>So to restate my question, why is creationism focus on science to try to
>reveal something apart from what they claim to be a *created* history
>instead of making science a moot issue by claiming that it cannot assertain
>the 6K boundary and then seeking to express their beliefs as history?
>
>mark

IMHO, creationists are basically orderly people who can't stand to see
something as orderly and productive as science not support their beliefs.
Therefore they go to any lengths to convince themselves that their beliefs
really are scientific, in spite of what scientists say.  The process of
convincing themselves requires them to try to convince others.  Its all
consistent with the evangelical spirit.

Alan Feuerbacher          |  As long as you think you have the truth, you
Tektronix, Inc.           |  will feel no need to pursue knowledge and
PO Box 500, MS 47-623     |  understanding.
Beaverton, OR  97077      |  There is often a difference between good
alanf@atlas.pen.tek.com   |  sound reason and reasons that sound good.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: ks54079@cs.tut.fi (Saarinen Kimmo Samuli)
Subject: Species or just subspecies ? (Was Re: macroevolution)
Organization: Tampere University of Technology
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 07:57:49 GMT

Yes, it seems to me, that Antti has spread his wings, abandoned
our national newsgroup and started to conquer this international
newsgroup instead. Anyway, the style and the "facts" are the same,
so be patient, it's very hard to get any _reasonable_ argumentation
out of him. Instead of reasoning and poundering different aspects
of the issue he smash his statement (with an issuficient amount
of argumentation, or totally without it) and produces several 
this kind of remarks, thus the number of the articles are getting
high. And he usually reacts on every reply to these remarks, so
you can imagine the growing rate of the articles ... He is a JW,
and I don't know if he gets some 'scores' to his account by this
way, but who knows ?

I will take the risk ...

In article <1992Sep9.150803.11851@cs.joensuu.fi> 
asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen) writes:
>sbishop@desire.wright.edu writes:
>>Then they cannot be one species.  One of the more common definitions of 
>>species is 'animals who freely interbreed and produce life fertile offspring.'
>>If they don't/can't interbreed then they are different species.
>
>>This is one of the more basic tenents of science.  If you have studied
>>science, how come you don't know this?
>
>	Don't blame me - actually this was my point: The extreme subspecies 
>	can't interbreed with each other, so they're often considered to 
>	be different species - especially if the other subspecies are 
>	extinct. 

Grmph, so what did you wanted to say with this ? On your opinion
there can't be such cases that the extreme subspecies can evolve
far enough to be in some point of time so isolated from
each other taht they can be considered as different species ?

Or is there any limits within the "sub"species can vary but not
exeed ? If there is, do you know the limits ? If you know,
please enlight us by describing them and how you have discoverd
them. 

>		Andreas - Siperian Sirri   Siberian Stint

	k@	(kat, evolved from cat)
-- 
ks54079@cs.tut.fi           Kyll{ mies kissan nostaa,
kissa@cortex.sai.vtt.fi      jos h{nt{ kest{{.        - san. lasku Jaalasta
-- 
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Subject: The t r u e testament of God Almighty.
Reply-To: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Tue, 8 Sep 1992 14:32:52 GMT

In article <1992Sep2.130157.3954@city.cs>, lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun)
writes:
>In article <dkristof.715431601@hq> dkristof@Pt.hq.af.mil (Capt Dave Kristof)
writes:
>>For you Creationists out there, a simple question:
>>
>>What is the purpose of mankind?  
> 
> To worship God.

   Well then why the heck are you doing such a crummy job?  A huge group of
people have labored for centuries in an interdisciplinary effort to bring you
the good news, read directly from God's most enduring testament, the world He
created.  You haven't bothered to read the simplified introduction.
 
                  [alt.praise.the.lord stuff deleted]

> Lionel Tun   (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk)
> Vision Group, City University, London, EC1V 0HB. 071-477 8000 x 3889
  ^^^^^^^^^^^^

HA!  "There are none so blind as those who will not see."

Dan
Danwell@IASTATE.EDU
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Holden Numbering
From: sbishop@desire.wright.edu
Date: 12 Sep 92 14:27:24 EST
Organization: Wright State University 

In article <7@fedfil.UUCP>, news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
> *>> Says you!  After all, any statement from the man who said that new born horses
> *>> can't run, that horses can't comfortably carry any weight over 125 pounds,
> *>> that giraffes have enormous blood pressure in their heads *(ALL totally
> *>> untrue)*, is very suspect.
> *> 
> *> Sue Bishop is either VERY stupid, or a liar, possibly both.  I have never
> *> made ANY of the above statements.
> *> -- 
> *> Ted Holden
> *> HTE
> *
> *OK, group, did or did NOT Ted say that giraffes have high blood pressure?
> *And Ted, you DID say that a new born horse cannot run.  Sorry I didn't save
> *it but I'm sure someone else can verify it.  And you also said a year or
> *two ago that anything over 125 pounds on a horse was a 'handicap', a mis-
> *information about horse racing, actually.
> *
> *Sue
> 
> I find the difference between things I say and the way they come back from
> Sue Bishop to be so great, that I have no problem in claiming never to have
> made the statements Bishop claims I have.  I have claimed that giraffes
> require tremendous blood pressure to get blood to their brains;  that is not
> at all the same as saying that that blood, once gotten that high, is STILL
> under tremendous pressure and that therefore they live with constant high
> blood pressure within their heads.  There IS a bit of a problem when they
> LOWER their heads to drink...
> 
> Bishop once mentioned making some poor little horse haul her 200+ tochas
> around, and I mentioned the obvious fact that somebody should call the 
> SPCA.  There ARE horses which can carry men in armor, Belgians...
> 

Once again Ted must stoop to insults to make a statement.....  Somehow
he manages to get a parade horse in full parade gear, silver mounted saddle,
tapaderos, and me, as being animal abuse.   Once again I remind the Tedster
that most horses carry an average of over 200 pounds of gear and rider.  That
is, unless they are being ridden by a very small person.  And Belgians carried
well over 300 pounds.  But then, Ted never was too good with numbers, anyway.


> I once mentioned that I had never seen a baby horse GALLOPING.  That's
> not at all the same thing as saying that baby horses CAN"T RUN.  The 
> difference to me is fairly obvious.as
> 

That is NOT what you said.  You seem to get your remarks all tangled up.
Just like your logic.

Sue

> 
> -- 
> Ted Holden
> HTE
>
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Holden Numbering
From: sbishop@desire.wright.edu
Date: 4 Sep 92 12:40:12 EST
Organization: Wright State University 

In article <2890@fedfil.UUCP>, news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
> In article <KAI.92Aug31094228@kai.nada.kth.se>, kai@kai.nada.kth.se (Kai-Mikael J-Aro) writes:
>> 
>> Do giraffes lie down to sleep?  
>> Kai-Mikael Jdd-Aro	email:  kai@nada.kth.se	    "Don't win, don't lose."
>> IPLab	 		voice:  +46 8 790 91 05		-- Yoshigasaki-sensei
>> NADA, KTH		fax:    +46 8 790 09 30
>> S-100 44  Stockholm	telex:  812 6154 7052 SICS
>> SWEDEN			teletex:2401-812 6154 7052=SICS
> 
> I honestly don't know, but they DO so something a good deal more interesting.
> 
> They carry their necks almost straight up;  it's the only way they can deal
> with the weight.  One minor problem:  the blood pressure it takes to get blood
> to their heads is immense.  It would blow our vascular systems apart.
> 

Ted, you have been REPEATEDLY corrected on this.  This is TOTALLY untrue.
Giraffes do NOT have immense blood pressure.  Why on earth do you keep
claiming this when all the facts are totally different?  It just makes
you look even more stupid than usual.  

Sue

> McGowan and other experts are now claiming that sauropods had to have held
> their necks our horizontally, that had they held them as high as the bones
> might appear to allow for, there would have been no getting blood to their
> brains.  The heart needed would not have fit inside their bodies.
> 
> Nonetheless, for a creature such as a supersaur or ultrasaur to have held 
> its head out horizontally would have required musculature it didn't begin
> to have.  Were such a creature to have 30,000 lbs of mass from the shoulders
> outwards, and this seems conservative since it weighed 360,000 lbs, and a
> center of gravity 15' out from the shoulders for this 30,000 neck, which
> also seems conservative, then it was looking at 450,000 ft. lbs. of torque.
> 
> You've got a total dilemma here.  The ONLY way out is to assume that the felt
> effect of gravity was then heavily attenuated.
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Ted Holden
> HTE

No, your felt level of stupidity is heavily attenuated.

Sue
> 
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: Oahu wallabies (was Re: Logic and God)
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 22:11:47 GMT

In article <1992Sep4.041642.1652@csis.dit.csiro.au>, prl@csis.dit.csiro.au
(Peter Lamb) writes:
> Agreed. I have found absolutely no evidence that this test has ever been
> carried out. Michele Smith (gms@vax.oxford.ac.uk) indicated that from her
> experience in an Australian bio. research lab, performing the test legally
> would be very difficult, as both Australia and Hawaii have strict import
> restrictions on living animal material (including on semen).

  Simple solution: find a country that has more lax import restrictions, bring
both types there.

                              -Kurt
From: David.Rice@ofa123.fidonet.org
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Horseshit
X-Sender: newtout 0.02 Aug 21 1992
Date: 11 Sep 92  21:57:48

Tag: Ted Holden (news@fedfil.UUCP (news))
 
Hi! I'm the guy you have honored by saying I've posted the most
"stupidist" question you've ever had to read. Comming from you,
that's a high complement--- from anyone else I'd be insulted or
concerned about myself.
 
Receintly you said the following:
 
1) foals cannot run (i.e. "new born horses")
2) horses cannot comfortably carry any weight over 125 pounds
3) other enlightening revelations
 
I was present when my brood mare Loreth (R-Bar-Bar) dropped her
foal, Reba. The first thing Reba did was nicker "Shit, born in
a barn again!" The second thing she did was stand up and run
after me, aparently believing I was her dam. (We shoved her at
Loreth's tits and she straightened herself out fast enough to
prevent life-long emotional damange. SMILE!)
 
Anyone who believes the newly foaled cannot run has the excuse
of ignorance if she or he remains silent with this belief. You,
however, spoke out of you ignorance as if it were factual--- no
excuse.
 
Reba is now 5 years old. I weigh 170 pounds. She is so comfortable
with hauling my fat ass around, she nods off into sleep with me
on her back when we stop and talk to another rider for an extended
period of time. And she only uses three legs to stand on! She is
comfortable carrying my ladyfriend and I on her back when we go
riding--- her whithers get damp after several hours of this, but
she has many time carried both of us all day.
 
I have thus refuted your claims. Care to retract them, or will
you continue to assert them, just like all your other errors
that have been refuted?
 
TH> "I honestly don't know"
 
Obvious.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: seanna@bnr.ca (Seanna Watson)
Subject: Re: Question for Creationists
Organization: Bell-Northern Research, Ottawa, Canada
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1992 01:18:58 GMT

In article <1992Sep10.095949.26234@city.cs> lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
>It is the evolutionary philosophy which conditions you into saying
>`something like me'. You, yes _you_ are made in God's image - can
>I say `fearfully and wonderfully created'? Anyhow, God has decided
>that He wishes us to relate to Him in a personal way - to love Him
>and worship him. If you want to question this, ask Him yourself.
>
I agree--I am made in God's image, fearfully and wonderfully created.
Yet I am sure that you would agree that I started out from a random
meeting of my mother's ovum and my father's sperm.  I then grew, through
a perfectly natural process, into an embryo, then a fetus, and then I 
was born.

If God can work through this natural process to make people who are
nonetheless still his creation, then why can't he work through other
natural processes, such as evolution?
-- 
Seanna Watson   Bell-Northern Research, 
(seanna@bnr.ca) Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Opinions, what opinions?  Oh *these* opinions. | Occam's razor split 
No, they're not BNR's, they're mine.           | hairs so well, I bought 
I knew I'd left them somewhere.                | the whole argument.
From: m23364@mwunix (James Meritt)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: And what about the decay in the speed of light?
Date: 8 Sep 92 14:47:46 GMT
Organization: MITRE Corporation, McLean VA

In article <david_s.1.715531716@gribb.hsr.no> david_s@gribb.hsr.no (Sjen, David Andreas   8-94) writes:
}Has anyone out there read the report 'The Atomic Constants, Light and Time'
}by Trevor Norman and Barry Setterfield, issued by the Stanford Research 
}Institute in August 1987? 

I sent him the FAQ on this.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: warren@nysernet.org (Warren Burstein)
Subject: Re: Oahu wallabies (was Re: Logic and God)
Reply-To: warren@nysernet.org
Organization: Mail to News Gateway at Wang Labs
Date: 4 Sep 92 08:09:25 GMT

In <715512375.16997@minster.york.ac.uk> cjhs@minster.york.ac.uk writes:

> the pacific ocean is a very effective contracepive

Don't let it out or they'll cut off government funding.
-- 
/|/-\/-\       The entire world		Jerusalem
 |__/__/_/     is a very bitter theft.
 |warren@      But the Kibo
/ nysernet.org is ***.
Xref: sparky talk.origins:11208 alt.atheism:17009