The Cincinnati Beacon notices a relationship between global warming and pirates.
General consciousness about global warming seems to have reached a new critical mass, perhaps thanks to Al Gore’s movie and the growing awareness of green technologies.
But has anyone noticed, while more people become aware of global warming and take steps to combat it, that our culture has become filled with even more pirates? Pirates, in many ways, are experiencing a renaissance in America right now.
Read it here.
LONG, BORING, TECHNICAL POST @ RealMenLoveChristians
Seriously, it’s long. You have been warned.
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Hey RMLC… so you’re a young earth creationist huh? Well each to their own I suppose. However let me just sort a few points out;
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1) The Earth is a far bit older than 6000 years old. Try 4.5 billion instead, and you’ll be a fair bit closer. The universe itself is quite a bit older still.
Now, we know this, beyond reasonable doubt, by a variety of ways. I myself am qualified in stating the earths age.
Why?
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In the last 4 days, I have clocked up 40 hours of work on a large machine called the SHRIMP (Sensitive High mass Resolution Ion Micro-Probe), basically a giant mass spectrometer (think CSI). What I’ve been doing for those 40 hours is date rocks, of ages ranging from 450 million years to 2000 million years (that one was a standard, so we have very good understanding of its age and decay processes).
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The SHRIMP allows us to compare, with very high detail, the ratio of various lead, uranium and thorium ratios to determine the age of the rock. You see, there are four stable types of lead; one is common, non radiogenic lead, one comes from thorium decay, and the others come from the two isotopes of uranium. By comparing the ratio of any ONE radioisotope with its decay product, we can get an age. With three, we get a very good agreement on that age.
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Now, I’ve heard the argument that decay constants can supposedly change, which would through off the ratios. However, there is one problem with that. The SHRIMP has three ratios to measure. For the decay ratios to change to just the right degree for all three relationships to give the SAME AGE is a ridiculous assumption.
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The level of chance it would require, especially when decay ratios have never been observed to change (please be aware that even a tiny, infinitesmal shift would be detectable over the course of a couple of years) is so mind boggling remote that I would have a better chance of swimming to the US, picking a door at random, and finding you.
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Even if that wasn’t enough, the age calculated coincides well with the geological strata in which the rocks were found. Then there are also observations in other fields (eg astronomy, paleontology, archaeology, biology etc) that all also indicate ages of life, the universe and everything greater then that in the bible.
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Hence, the only possible way the earth/universe is 6000 years old, is if some god decided to change all the multitude of data, in a very precise way, to make it appear to look a lot older. Now, if that was the case, surely god would want you to believe the world is actually really really old?
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2) Your basing your assumptions on a text that was not written at the same time as its subject matter. Scholars in the field give the bible being written over a century after the agreed time of Christ. How do they know what happened? None of them were there. Plus, a hundred years is a bloody long time for a story to twist and change.
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3) The bible contains proven falsehoods and self contradictory statements. Just take a look at 1 Kings, 7:23 and 2 Chronicles 4:2, where apparently pi = 3 (it doesn’t, and if you know any basic geometry, you can prove so yourself), or, also in 2 chronicles, 6:36, apparently there is no man which sinneth not, despite several sinless individuals being mentioned in other books (1 John, 3:6/9, 5:18). (King James)
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So, if the bible is the infallible word of god, yet the bible is wrong, where does that leave god?
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4) There are other religions, many of which are older than the Abrahamic religions. Moreso, nowhere in the world did christianity arise spontaneously, other than the middle east. The only reason christianity is widespread, is because of the economically driven trade expansion by the western europeans, who brought their culture, and thus their religion, around the globe (something muslims, hindus and buddhists also achieved).
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Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there is no god, just that it is highly unlikely the world is as the bible says it is. I would be perfectly willing to change my opinion if god gave us a sign (say someone parting the oceans. That’d be cool) that could not be otherwise explained. He did it back in the biblical times didn’t he? Why not now?
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However, while I’m waiting for that, I’m going to go out and enjoy my, if you’ll excuse the phrase, god-given gifts of observation and common sense and ignore the bollocks that is the bible.
@zankou - agreed
erm @ rmlj … you want to drown? *sigh*
quote from a webcomic called super metroid galaxy “some say ignorance is bliss, some say ignorance is ignorance.” not an exact quote, but thats cause giegie took it down, apparently to get a new server
RMLC- So, if teh Lord has a plan for us, and we don’t know what it is….then how do you know trying to stop (lessen) global warming ISN’T the plan? Maybe the big guy wants to see if we’re really willing to put any effort in to solve our own problems instead of handing them all off to them. Never mind what ‘the bible says’, if you’ve got a lot of scientific data telling you something (in this case about global warming), it might be worthwhile to listen, no?
alchemist - yeah, you’re right.
in both ways lol
it worked
octarine - the eighth colour
lol
on an unrelated note - led zeppelin rocks!
i live in ecks ecks ecks ecks - alchemist, you will know what i mean
‘To him’, not ‘to them’. I have no idea where the ‘to them’ thing came from….unless maybe RMLC is secretly Hindu and has a few gods to work with. (Hey Bobby, if you ever get a chance, being able to edit our comments would kick butt.)
alchemist - remember the thing about “wizzards”(rincewind’s hat)/witches and wizards having “octagons” as well as cones & rods in their eyes? lol
@ everyone - good books those, read the discworld series by terry pratchett if you have a few years (exaggeration? never!). theres more than 60 books.
@ iron gill kid
what’s a hindu?
(you must know this one.)
@wench octarine
Ummm….! I’m sensing a joke? I think? Meep.
yes, about new zealand.
the answer is…
lays iggs!
@anyone who didnt get it
what’s a hin-du
(whats a hen do)
lays iggs
(lays eggs)
That joke sucked…
i agree with zankou.
it did. =(
…..Uhm…..lol?
im listening to get this, lol.
they’re playing clips of rex hunt saying things about “the thugs in the scallop industry” followed by “this is dizzy stuff folks” lol.
Shawn, not being there 2000 years ago no more disqualifies someone from discounting the authenticity or accuracy of the bible than it does someone reading it today being able to say it is all true. In both cases you all you have to do is do some fact checking, list all internal inconsistencies, compare what the bible say to what other cultures of the time were saying, analyzing the literary style of the bible, and of course questioning the motives of the people who wrote it. Bible = not true because all evidence says so. FSM = true, because Pastafarians say so.
i just emailed the get this guys.
told em to come to this website.
lol.
any pastafarians listening to triple m now?
its in australia but you can listen online!
talkback mountain now lol
To realmenlovechrist,
All religious disputes put aside. If you believe in Christianity as you say you do, don’t you think that God would consider pollution a sin, for it hurts, as you would say, His creations?
*Sorry. By “realmenlovechrist” I meant “Shawn”, and for the record, I know that “All religious disputes put aside” is not a complete sentence, and I apologize for the extra period.