Hi Phil, List,
Humanity's arrogance is only outweighed by it's ignorance.
You say NO... I say prove it.
I say possible... You say not!
There's more evidence that there IS than proof there's NOT.
A closed mind knows nothing and agrees with nothing but itself... An
open mind however realizes that possibilities are endless. It's a damn
good thing you weren't one of the Wright brothers. ;) Or DaVinci,
Galileo, Newton, Einstein, Tesla, Edison, Plato, Alexander The Great,
Hannibal, Constantine, Archimedes, Fibonacci, Pythagoras, Herodotus,
Lincoln, Kennedy, Washington, Roddenberry, Lucas, Spielberg, or
countless others. Hundreds and thousands of other very important people
to the evolution of human thought and innovation, philosophically,
militarily, scientifically, and theoretically have contributed greatly
to the advancement of humanity. With curiosity and the gall to actually
think openly without boundaries we wouldn't be able to believe we could
fly, or give serious thought to the possibility of life elsewhere.
You're missing the whole REASON behind the belief which drives the study
that ultimately results in discovery.
How dare we actually think... ;) How silly of us humans...
Regards,
Eric Wichman
Meteorites USA
Spacifieds.com
P.S.
"... I can make up an equation that proves the existence of mermaids,
bigfoot, Nessie, unicorns, dragons,..." "...'ll write a formula to prove
it's existence..."
Go for it! It would be an exercise for the unimaginable. ;)
Phil Whitmer wrote:
The Drake Equation is a prime example of mental masuturbation. It
proves absolutely nothing. How can an equation prove anything when
none of the variables are known with any certainity? As Rob points
out, one zero nullifies the whole silly thing. How about Ne; the
number of known Earth like planets supporting life=0. If you want
dumb equations, the creationists have a bunch of them that proves
there is exactly one planet that supports life. I can make up an
equation that proves the existence of mermaids, bigfoot, Nessie,
unicorns, dragons, what imaginary being do you want to believe in?
I'll write a formula to prove it's existence. I'll be easy, because I
already know that life begets life. The Drake Equation misses the key
concept in the alien debate; mainly how does abiogenesis occur? How
does non living matter become alive? Once we figure out the mechanics
of this most basic problem, then we can extrapolate about whether this
seemingly miraculous event could happen more than once. If you're
going to believe in spontaneous generation on other planets, you had
better understand how it happened here first. Someone has to explain
to me how those left handed isomer amino acids from meteorites
organized themselves into living, self replicating DNA. (See this
thread is related to meteorites!)
Crichton summed it up best at a lecture at Caltech :
The problem, of course, is that none of the terms can be known, and
most cannot even be estimated. The only way to work the equation is to
fill in with guesses. [...] As a result, the Drake equation can have
any value from "billions and billions" to zero. An expression that can
mean anything means nothing. Speaking precisely, the Drake equation is
literally meaningless...
And puhleez, don't give me that stupid absence of evidence argument,
it didn't hold water when Rumsfeld used it for imaginary WMDs, and it
doesn't justify the belief in phantasmagorical alien creatures.
Mental masturbation is fun, but don't confuse it with real science!
From the Urban Dictionary:
Mental masturbation:
1. The act of engaging in useless yet intellectually stimulating
conversation, usually as an excuse to avoid taking constructive action
in your life.
2. The act of engaging in intelligent and interesting conversation
purely for the enjoyment of your own greatness and individuality.
Subjects range from obscure lp's to cultural movements in
preindustrial societies. Either delivered through grand monlogues or
subtle conversation orientation, it links large words and random
references resulting in nothing acually being communicated.
3. Overly intensive self gratifying procrastination, thought and
contemplation for a subject not necessarily warranting such effort.
4. The pretense of superior knowledge or intelligence by claiming
conjecture, theory, feeling or opinion as fact.
5. The act of engaging in impractical/nonproductive mental exercise /
thinkings / writings / etc., through which a practitioner only
comforts oneself mentally. Such acts don't lead to any constructive
results what so ever in the real world; some might even imagine
oneself being transformed into superman, or simply the opposite sex, etc.
In short, it's just bs/crap.
Phil Whitmer
______________________________________________
http://www.meteoritecentral.com
Meteorite-list mailing list
[email protected]
http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
______________________________________________
http://www.meteoritecentral.com
Meteorite-list mailing list
[email protected]
http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
