₦airaland Forum

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Confusing. Nothing deserving of a circlejerk was said yet you give yourselves one?

I don't get most of that post (maybe it could do with some punctuation, so should many of mine actually), but I'm assuming he thinks there has to be a purpose for evolution. There isn't one.

^^^ that is correct. Is that supposed to be an insult?

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You're the one making a claim.

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From what you've written, her license was revoked because she failed to do her job. apparently she showed no remorse as well (indicating she felt she has done no wrong, but that's just my assumption).

Imagine if the mother is atheist, or any other religion (or even a decent xtian), and is terribly concerned with the state of her child at that moment. Expecting professional help she turns to a pro but gets said pro resorting to faith. That's not very professional, is it? She wasn't hired to pray. The state of the mother though is not the issue, the child's is. Rather than doing her job she was praying. He could have died (maybe there's even permanent damage), and she could have aided him by simply doing her job. Replace praying with any other task, outcome would be the same (her licence would be revoked).

Alos, post the source if your aim is to rage.

No op, I disagree. There is no such thing as cold, there is an absence of heat/energy. There is no such thing as dark/black, there is an absence of light etc. Not everything has opposites, everything has properties.. Take that pagan...

Actually op, just wanted to ingratiate a bit. You have nice, simple ideas that you've at least put some thought into (unlike the vast majority). Do you have a blog good sir? Do you follow an organized religion?

Evil Brain: You've answered your own question. Germs are also living things, and they also evolve. If humans develop a way consistently wipe out the germ that causes the disease, then that germ will be under evolutionary pressure to find a way around it. This is the reason why hospitals are full of antibiotic resistant "superbugs".

Another thing a consider is a germs don't actually benefit from killing their hosts. If the host dies, then all the germs inside it die too. Very virulent diseases like ebola tend not to do well in the long run because they kill their victims too fast. So ebola descends on a village, kills everyone inside and peters out once it runs out of victims. On the other hand, intestinal roundworms are one of the most successful and widespread human parasites because spread quietly, they don't kill their victims and they hardly cause any disadvantages to their hosts.

That means that germs tend to evolve to become less virulent over time as the pathogens adapt to the hosts and vice versa. In nature, the rule is adapt or die. The virus that caused the great flu pandemic of 1918 failed to adapt and became extinct the day its last victim died. Meanwhile the germ that causes syphilis evolved from a "you have 3 months left to live" disease 600 years ago to a chronic illness only kills you after decades of spreading to all your girlfriends.

Evolution is simply natural selection happening over a long time. Natural selection simply means that inheritable traits that give a living thing a survival advantage tend to become more common in the population over time. This a such a basic and obvious thing that its hard to imagine why any sensible person will deny that its happening.

Think of it this way: If a deadly new zombie apocalypse disease emerged and you and your kids were the only ones immune to it. Billions will die but most of your descendants will grow to adulthood and have kids of their own. Within a few centuries, the world will be full of little mobingas, the majority of whom will be immune to the zombie virus. And because the original Mobinga had black skin, a big nose and a tiny JohnThomas, so will a large percentage of the world's population.

Evolution is little incremental changes occurring over time. It's hard to appreciate it in the short span of a human lifespan because it occurs so slowly in larger organisms with long life-cycles. But life has existed on earth for hundreds of millions of years. Try and wrap your mind around how long a million years is, then you'll understand how it is impossible for living things not to change dramatically within that scale of time.

You deserve some sort of award for this, but I fear your target audience will not get it.

all they'd have do (if they were looking for shorter time-frames) is look at dog breeds, the taller europeans being ~5 feet about 500 years ago (look at their armour, even the napoleon complex is a bit of a misnomer, he was not short for that era), and the precarious condition of bananas: the much feared bananacoplypse (no, really). That is asides from viruses and all the others already pointed out in this thread. It will still end up with quotes from a book which was written during the times when the round wheel was cutting edge stuff, with no evidence. In their defence parts of the book may have been written with good intentions.

Soul_caine: Nothing can ever make me think or even doubt the existence of my GOD. Maybe i am dogmatic, biased, uneducated,foolish,old school, a freak etc. It doesn't matter to me a bit because i have something that does who dont believe in GOD lack: i have faith!

Faith is the difference between a homo sapiens and an animal because faith involves thinking and believing animals dont do that. Not calling pple who dont believe animals, no far frm it; jst expressing d singular character that makes for d excercising of faith.

Animals can't have faith because they can't reason. It requires reason - reason fails - use faith as last resort. Generally most atheists are still in the 'this can be reasoned' camp while the religious are in the 'oh my god were gonna dai, @deity help oz plz' camp. (Not so sure about the animals can't reason bit)

Anyways that's not my main reason for jumping in. It's that I'm fairly impressed that you're admitting your belief is based on faith. This is fantastic. You concede that there is no actual proof, but choose to have faith. Seriously that is wonderful (no troll, really) and you can as much faith in whatever you wish to (you should see some of the things I trust..). However, a crucial bit, do you believe in separation of church and state? Do you think authorities/society are justified in prosecuting victimless crimes, personal freedoms etc? I'm curious, really.

I'm guessing.... No.

Edit: we r animals actually, my bad, other animals

What makes you think the average atheist is interested in converting people?

Lord Babs: Because your god doesn't have an email address nor a phone contact. On the incredible note, he's not on facebook, twitter and my ever-loving nairaland. I contacted my associate in the FBI, and she said your god's name was not found on their data base. It beats me hard why some cretins still believe in ghost-like-fairy-tales!

You couldn't be wrongest. His on facebooks

@yield, yup sentences that never finish (complete with these) and lack of focus...

@ave, yeah the details point is not so much a good indicator on second thought, well not in that way. INTJ's are not overly focused on details (but loove strategy, like long term vision/goal and would be rather efficient at attaining these using whatever method, many would say the best). Pesky minutiae is where ISTJs leave the rest of us dazzled (they make excellent accontants, for instane). When focusing on the task at hand INTJs tend to be way ahead of INTPs

@fellis. I know... I will now take my stereotyping and derail another thread.. Pretty much abusing the system and giving jung et al reasons to regret their work.. I will also be ostensibly contrite while actually pretty darn good with myself..

On to main topic. DEATH TO ROMANCE and all the feeler nonsense. I do like that they give free hugs and stuff. Also, really warm smiles.

Edit: the intp link
www.intp.org/intprofile.html
If you can't relate to that then you're probably INTJ ( the bad guy in every movie, with the pussy cat and the ability to make us all his minions, joking)

PhysicsQED: Well, for a not heavily mathematical explanation of general relativity, you can actually go straight to a book written by the originator of general relativity himself:

Albert Einstein - Relativity: The Special and General Theory

http://www.bartleby.com/173/

The theory as he worked it out originally in his papers is quite mathematics heavy but he presented a much less mathematically involved explanation in that book. This book is in the public domain and is available in many other places online.


A great cosmology book (with basically no equations or math, but lots of helpful drawings to visualize things) is Black Holes and Time Warps by Kip Thorne. He also provides a lot of history and context for all of the ideas that were developed and why certain ones were rejected or accepted. It's a really great read although the focus is on black holes in particular.

There are also two books (also non-mathematical) by two science writers that discuss current ideas in astronomy and cosmology that I read some years back that I would recommend:

Marcia Bartusiak - Thursday's Universe (1986)

Timothy Ferris - The Whole Shebang: A State-of-the-Universe Report (1997)

Both were really good reads.


On the ask a physicist thing, probably you could start a general thread where input from those with knowledge in chemistry, pure math, astronomy, biology, and/or physics etc. could answer questions. I might answer some.

Oh yeah, and why do you loathe math?

Thanks again. Reading the book by the man himself has always seemed daunting, I didn't know it was accessible to the average (Kip Thorne I thought would be inaccessible as well). Math, my time has passed it seems, sadly. I'm not a big fan of current teaching methods, especially pre-tertiary. It seems to cater to one type of student, the rest of us better learn how to figure out stuff on our own. Though the current system does seem to work well for the majority so I shouldn't be complaining too much. I would say it was never presented in a way that was fun to me, and I'm basically useless if whatever task I'm assigned to does not qualify as 'fun'.

That thread idea is awesome. I would need to do some lurking before it's implemented though so that it's not wasted. I'm new here so would have study their etiquette.

Yield: What type are you?

Blatant P. INTP. I will comb my hair this week just you wait and see...

I love robots, and how we view being romantic: actions speak louder than words. Get that s*6t out here. /troll. @avi read up an intp description and see if it fits more. I'll add a link of the more popular (I think) one. But yeah, most regulars on a forum would be I (goes without saying, Es are out there interacting face to face, bear in mind this is not the same thing as being shy at all, it's about what is more energizing to you). Most critics of religion would be NT, as well as many of the more intelligent (or more logical, actually more accurate to say mathematical/logical intelligence, we all should know there's more than one type of intelligence) religious debaters. NFs would also know what they are talking about, but are more likely be religious and avoid debating just for sport. Explaining this bit would take too much time.

Then the J/P, yeah I don't get much J from your posts but it's certainly possible. Do you constantly question/doubt just about everything (read the same article a gzillion times, go through just about every detail over and over). Are you satisfied with just knowing, or do you need outside validation of some sort? A finished product (not just a prototype). Do you have problems finishing projects once you've figured all the lovely theoritical bits?
You could still be a P even if you don't follow typical P - like behavior, but it's all so long to explain. One trait that seems peculiar to INTPs is as kids, say they are taking a walk on a tiled floor, patterns will show up somewhere, and they would play little games with themselves (like avoid x-color, use only the third tile in so-so sequence). It doesn't have to be tiles of course, some have gone as far as synchronizing traffic lights and the flow of ppl etc. Basically, patterns which are not so obviously physical in nature (well that's not the correct way to put it, but you should get the point). If many of these don't relate then you really are J, just slightly atypical. And yup, INTx is definitely over-represented in the asperger's community (not schizo!). Bear in mind, just like shy != introvert, aspie is most certainly not INTx, ostensibly they might seem similar but they are very clearly diffrent. The fact is though, a lot of aspies are INTx . I love this topic

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Not to bug you.. Well actually to bug you do you think it's possible for one with a loathing for math to get general relativity. Is there anything you would reccommend one has at the back of his mind? I get an accelorometer wouldn't register anything in free fall, and what seems straight to you is actually bent like say a line on the planet, supposedly it's doing something with time as well...argh, it's too much. Any tips? Also, if you have time maybe we should have a ask the physicist section or something. Don't worry, I'm pretty sure you won't be bothered much. Thanks

And the constant battles here are tedious. I'd hang out in atheism/black but it's mostly american folk, with little action anyways. Any other web hangouts for atheist 9ja?

Well actually, quite a few futurists expect radically enhanced lifetimes (maybe even immortality of sorts) with ~30 years, and their predictions aren't baseless (but we still don't have my flying cars! We weren't promised that though). Better to not pput too much weight in that, but if it works out, what would jesus do? You still alive, don't you want to go to heaven abeg?

tpia@:
didnt watch the video but yes, i'm prettty open minded since i dont judge others by my own standards.

If only everyone followed this credo. But to be fair it's actually impossible to fully follow. Well, attempt it maybe. I recommend the video if you have the time, it's fairly well done imo

What's the official law have to say on this? Seems to me like he willingly gave them the money. What's he pissed off at now?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T69TOuqaqXI

What say you? Do you agree with his assertions? Do you think you are open minded (by his or your standards)? Is it even important?

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What?

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No you

Actually, that picture is what pointed it out to me (just about every atheist would have caught this but would be unable to express it clearly). And I'm yet to meet anyone defend this.

Especially in environments like 9ja ppl have no idea they're being manipulated. We underestimate the power of emotional abuse. Some ppl are so stupid abuse initially seems ineffective, however long term you start to notice how damaged they are. Meh. They don't seem to care.

Suffering and smiling zombies, ho ho ho

Technically you are a programmer. Once you encounter any problems that a simple google cannot solve though...

bigafees: PLS I'M FACING BELOW ERROR WHEN TRYING TO PRINT GRIDVIEW IN ASP.net using vb.net

Control 'GridView1' of type 'GridView' must be placed inside a form tag with runat=server


pls how can solved this error very urgent...... tanx in advance

The error message literally tells you what's wrong, unless I'm missing something. Add runat=server in your form tag (it should be after 'head', I can't remember actually). Also, use google

There are probably many reasons of course, in my opinion the best is how he plays the abusive spouse. You are not worthy of his love. You are flawed and pathetic, but he still loves you. You do not know what's best, but stick to him and everything will be alright. Do not trust anyone else, you really are worthless and they'll seek to use and destroy you. But don't worry, as I'm so much better than you, and them, I'll protect you, everything will be fine if you follow me. If you break my rules, I will punish you, but it will be for your own good.
Many women eventually freed from abusive relationships should relate, I would imagine. Many others continue to remain in the relationship despite years of physical and mental abuse. Quite a few even think it's normal behaviour. At the very bottom, you have those that actually encourage it.

For those in it due to indoctrination, general public opinion changes, so will they. The others ( minority, some with good intentions but ultimately selfish) will dream up a god if there wasn't one. They require it to feel special, purpose or something, as appearently this universe is a film put together just for them (starring them actually as well), with god as the audience

caezar: I am astounded by your ability to throw out strong scientific concepts and claim that to be science.

You are no match for any awesome.

Ooh, I noticed. I'll need to be smoking some of your stuff to get your awesome.

Edit: no really, scientific concepts, where did I do that? That's the silliest thing I've heard in a while. Are you going to redefine the term 'science'?

@caezer
Random, not pertinent to the discussion this post. But from what I read, holding energy in your hand was one of the reasons einstein set off on his quest (can you catch up to light and hold it?). Such musings led him to great discoveries, whiich impact every single one of us, using the scientific method. He, and the rest of the scientific world, could have just left it to 'god', and we wouldn't have e=mc2 and the other nice things science gives us. Anyways, I understand you have no problem with the scientific method, just found it interesting

caezar: You forget that game of life was programmed that way!

No I don't. It's why I say naturally evolved. Particle bounce against paricle against particle... Eventually a pattern is formed. All that would be required would be energy (with its both wave-like and particle-like properties, agaiin, in this universe), with certain 'self existant' properties ( just like if you have something that has always existed, its effects would have always existed, in this case the effects would be the properties). It does not require an intelligent programmer. It seems to require a hell of a lot of time though, in this universe ie. Pre-big ban.g is just speculation (just pointing that out there for clarity's sake).

Btw iirc the galaxy-sized collider is what some think would be needed to test string theory. More or less to criticize it so basically it's an example of the scientific method, which you have no problem with, at work. No evidence = no science

Sirniyeh: Hello my colleagues on Nairaland,
some doubt whether the story is true. I swear, it is a true life story!
The latest development in this matter is that, the pastor is presently sick and bedridden in a hospital. His church attendance has reduced to 10%. On this last sunday, the wife of the pastor went to church to declare her intention to carry her husband to the herbalist's house for the ritual. Misunderstanding bursted among the remaining few members when they heard the wife's decision and no one knows what would happen in next sunday.
The question is, do you think the wife made mistake to have exposed her husband's trip to herbalist for ritual?
The pastors blindness for seven years has brought poverty to their family. They onply depend on little stipends from good samaritan. The wife has no tangible job. The pastor who happens to be the breadwinner is now stormed with consequence of disobedience and pride. What is your opinion?

Really, true story? He should get another doctor(s). I get faith is important to him, ok. Create some sort of placebo, make up stuff to make him think 'god' is winning. Contact the herbalist and get him to tell you what exactly was in the bag, is there an antidote? If this were true, hypocrisy would be virtually killing him. Sorry, I find that a bit funny