Active Users:607 Time:18/05/2026 11:26:46 AM
Re: I'm just carrying on a conversation. Dreaded Anomaly Send a noteboard - 05/12/2010 07:56:43 PM
Just curious. How could I in theory go about checking whether men walked on the moon? How would I go about proving this to myself or to a skeptic in a manner that would actually verify it happened without relying on someone elses word? I am an agnostic in this. I have to admit that some of the evidence for it looks and sounds pretty dodgy. Fortunately my faith in science doesn't rely on that. If it ever came out it was staged I would just shrug my shoulders. It just isn't that big of a deal if someone did that 40 years ago. But it isn't something that I can duplicate or that anyone else has the spare cash to duplicate.


If you could go to the moon (a big if, but bear with me), there would either be evidence that men walked there, or there wouldn't be. That's what "falsifiable" means: in theory, the assertion that men walked on the moon could be shown to be false, by a lack of physical evidence.

Some people are more sensitive to spiritual things than others. For them it is hard to imagine that other people may lack that extra sense that seems such a natural part of them. They don't understand how someone can not feel the things they do and attribute it to the other person not trying hard enough or blocking themselves from feeling it on purpose. If you were to tell them that their experiences were not duplicatible they might not believe that you had ever tried to actually duplicate the experience because when they experimented it worked for them. It takes awhile to figure out that we are not all made the same and to allow for that in our judgements of each other. Just because one person can do something and the other can't does not make them inferior or mean that they are lying or crazy or whatever.


I do understand what you mean here. An analogy I came up regarding this goes as follows: Imagine two people, one raised on land (living in the open air) and one raised deep under the ocean, surrounded by water. They would both find it uncomfortable, if not intolerable, to switch places. The first one would be disturbed by the increased pressure, while the second one would feel incredibly vulnerable without being immersed in the comforting sea.

Nevertheless, my main objection to religious experiences is not the fact of the experiences themselves. It's the idea that I should accept the experiencer's own religious explanation, when logically simpler ones exist, and the experiencer is not necessarily particularly qualified to come up with an explanation for the experience.

And you are right. It is nice that they have proof now. A whole new world of possibilities has opened up to their view.

:)
Tash


:)
Reply to message
More Important Than Soccer: Completely new type of DNA discovered - 02/12/2010 04:48:51 PM 1723 Views
that is TOTALLY inappropriate - 02/12/2010 04:58:47 PM 933 Views
Of course there is... - 02/12/2010 05:02:30 PM 940 Views
I saw, I'm just not in the proper habit yet - 02/12/2010 05:35:33 PM 1031 Views
Crazy awesome. - 02/12/2010 05:07:49 PM 995 Views
Re: Crazy awesome. - 02/12/2010 10:32:56 PM 835 Views
It's confusing, that's for sure. - 03/12/2010 02:01:11 AM 835 Views
lol, or maybe not - 09/12/2010 07:49:19 PM 1208 Views
So the movie Evolution was real! - 02/12/2010 05:24:16 PM 919 Views
Nice reference, but not quite. - 02/12/2010 10:32:04 PM 864 Views
Thanks for clearing that up - 02/12/2010 11:23:36 PM 979 Views
Wow. *NM* - 02/12/2010 05:32:08 PM 513 Views
I love how it was found in a massively polluted lake - 02/12/2010 05:35:22 PM 854 Views
The answer to your question is: Pretty damn cool. *NM* - 02/12/2010 05:33:54 PM 495 Views
Goddamnit I am SO PISSED that I have a meeting at 2!!! - 02/12/2010 05:50:21 PM 826 Views
I won't pretend I know enough about biology to understand the impact of this - 02/12/2010 06:26:24 PM 981 Views
It's like finding a type of rock that eats laughter - 02/12/2010 06:51:15 PM 827 Views
I think I had an ex once that was made of arsenic. *NM* - 02/12/2010 07:10:57 PM 468 Views
Maris? *NM* - 02/12/2010 07:33:14 PM 506 Views
Well you are made of poison, so that makes sense. *NM* - 02/12/2010 07:39:09 PM 476 Views
Curse you, poetic justice! Curse you! - 04/12/2010 03:38:37 AM 1015 Views
So, is it an alien? - 02/12/2010 07:19:49 PM 976 Views
I don't see why it couldn't be natural - 02/12/2010 07:22:49 PM 879 Views
They haven't mentioned anything saying it's not from Earth, I think - 02/12/2010 08:03:44 PM 994 Views
It was funded by NASA, I think - 02/12/2010 08:15:15 PM 1007 Views
lols. *NM* - 02/12/2010 08:17:40 PM 480 Views
The bacteria in question is part of a known lineage - 02/12/2010 08:07:34 PM 1209 Views
see my note below - 02/12/2010 08:13:35 PM 980 Views
Maybe - 02/12/2010 08:23:16 PM 922 Views
it could be there are some in the lake naturally - 02/12/2010 09:00:42 PM 826 Views
Huh! I must have missed that part. *NM* - 02/12/2010 09:05:15 PM 464 Views
No it isn't! - 02/12/2010 07:39:34 PM 989 Views
I really didn't understand that, either. - 04/12/2010 10:44:51 AM 997 Views
So, apparently, this bacteria doesn't use arsneic for its DNA in its natural state? - 02/12/2010 08:06:02 PM 881 Views
While awesome, it's a bit of a problem. - 02/12/2010 09:04:22 PM 883 Views
Re: While awesome, it's a bit of a problem. - 02/12/2010 10:34:34 PM 823 Views
It's interesting, but not completely shocking - 02/12/2010 08:08:46 PM 1056 Views
I don't understand why this is such a big deal. It always seemed common sense to me that there are - 02/12/2010 10:40:22 PM 1026 Views
It's much more than an educated guess. - 02/12/2010 11:59:18 PM 1086 Views
You can't "know" from this distance. - 03/12/2010 03:13:05 AM 797 Views
Why not? - 03/12/2010 04:42:15 AM 1064 Views
obviously you have not learned to look at the back label on the car *NM* - 04/12/2010 07:04:42 PM 439 Views
Yes, we can. - 04/12/2010 06:04:48 PM 1230 Views
The problem probably is with me. - 04/12/2010 08:00:56 PM 876 Views
No, they aren't. - 04/12/2010 10:01:25 PM 897 Views
Depends on how you view evidence, no? - 05/12/2010 04:50:11 AM 1132 Views
There are correct and incorrect ways to view evidence. - 05/12/2010 05:42:41 AM 832 Views
Are you baiting me to bait you? - 05/12/2010 06:41:49 AM 1065 Views
I'm just carrying on a conversation. - 05/12/2010 07:26:39 AM 1068 Views
Re: I'm just carrying on a conversation. - 05/12/2010 07:08:04 PM 847 Views
Re: I'm just carrying on a conversation. - 05/12/2010 07:56:43 PM 1041 Views
Re: I'm just carrying on a conversation. - 06/12/2010 03:15:37 AM 1006 Views
Re: I'm just carrying on a conversation. - 06/12/2010 09:18:51 PM 921 Views
Okay. - 06/12/2010 11:22:44 PM 1077 Views
I watched that and was very intrigued - 03/12/2010 01:31:29 AM 752 Views
It's neat, but I object to the circus act - 03/12/2010 02:52:46 AM 1003 Views
yah, and it's kind of shooting themselves in the foot anyways - 03/12/2010 09:10:21 AM 883 Views
xkcd - 03/12/2010 10:35:24 AM 1043 Views

Reply to Message