Flat earthers are crazy

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prentice". Admittedly, he came across as the same sociopathic narcissist th at he was as a candidate, as is as president, but some people don't find th at worrying, which is the implication of the claim that there no such thing as negative publicity - at least not for the kind of audience that include s krw.

Which was? "Draining the swamp" was great rhetoric, but a little short on s ubstance, particularly when you notice that a crooked property developer is an integral part of the swamp.

Still I see some of them fall for delusions like religion. That is why I presented a scale: there are not many that are dumb enough to fall for "flat earth", but already some more for "creationism" and even more for religion in the broader sense.

How is that bad? Teaching them to read gives them access to various opinions. What is bad: teaching them that there is only one truth and that it has been determined many centuries ago.

Intelligence doesn't stop people being stupid, they just do it less of the time. It's a popular myth that it does.

NT

Would the blind auction raise as much money, however? After all, that's the key point here.

Perhaps have it more like normal bribery. Have a single "voter" who can accept bribes, paid to the the national treasury. Candidates would not just /offer/ to pay, as they would in a standard auction - they would /actually/ pay up front to buy the vote. Then other candidates could pay more to steal the vote, and so on back and forth until all but one have given up. That way the country gains not just from the winner, but from all the losers too - and as the money is paid in advance, it is /real/ money and not just promises.

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prentice". Admittedly, he came across as the same sociopathic narcissist th at he was as a candidate, as is as president, but some people don't find th at worrying, which is the implication of the claim that there no such thing as negative publicity - at least not for the kind of audience that include s krw.

And how's that working out? Some parts of his message are fine, but the du de is so confrontational and easily upset he's not fit for the job.

Please, please, just get Trump out of there now. Replace him with any Repu blican senator, I don't care. There were big red flags during the campaign , and things are worse than I imagined. I thought his campaign behavior wa s just that, but instead he's the same old.

It took a while for me to figure out what you meant here. But that is why the process should be standardised and organised - then candidates could be guaranteed value for their money. It is only fair!

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Apprentice". Admittedly, he came across as the same sociopathic narcissist that he was as a candidate, as is as president, but some people don't find that worrying, which is the implication of the claim that there no such thi ng as negative publicity - at least not for the kind of audience that inclu des krw.

substance, particularly when you notice that a crooked property developer is an integral part of the swamp.

Not to mention the number of lawyers retained by members of the WH and thei r families. This isn't normal. And don't blame the media. Trump and co. are being accused of some hefty crimes. The media can't make that up.

Some people like music, some don't. Some hear a spiritual call, some don't. Both are orthorgonal to intelligence. Religion is universal across cultures and history.

Speaking rationally, it's very likely that life on earth was designed and seeded here by some life form that existed before our solar system formed, and the mechanisms of evolution were included in the plan. Maybe there's a copyright notice in our DNA somewhere. And until you explain and prove the origin of the universe, all ideas are up for consideration.

What impresses me is how many people think they have all the answers now, and that they are masters of "science", and have contempt for people with other ideas. People like that are characteristically bad electronic designers.

If "intelligence" stops people from considering possibilities, it's misdefined.

Done the right way and with a bidding frenzy even skilled operators can get drawn into paying way over the odds for something for fear of missing out. The UK 3G telecoms auction was a well designed sealed bid blind auction. It raised so much money in bids that winning a franchise almost destroyed the winners and set back UK deployment of 3G technology quite badly due to the subsequent lack of funds.

I recall the guy who designed it having no trouble getting a bunch of highly educated businessmen on an economics summer school course to bid

Rational players stopped bidding at 99p.

In my opinion it is always worthwile to research the matter, and be open in attitude towards new findings. Religion is often contrary to that, it already has all the answers and they were written down long ago. New findings that contradict those answers are ignored or disputed, in extreme cases to the level found in the "flat earth" discussions.

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Correct, all ideas are up for consideration. But it has to be backed by ev idence to be considered.

If those "other ideas" are not backed by solid research showing them to be plausible, then they deserve contempt. I could claim the moon is made of c heese because it appears as such. But I'd get ridiculed, and rightly so, be cause despite essentially all of us never setting foot on the moon and seei ng it ourselves, there's mountains of evidence against it.

Why's that? You pick what answer you believe is true and go with it. Just because someone chooses an alternative theory that doesn't hold water does n't make them any more creative or a better problem solver. It just means they're stubborn and/or highly paranoid they're being lied to. Take the fl at-earthers: they have "other ideas", believe NASA and governments are lyin g to them. I've never personally seen the earth from space, but I know it ain't flat.

Some great scientists and mathematicians and inventors were believers. Most, actually.

For instance:

The Brat went to a Jesuit high school, mostly for the sports. Those guys are smart and often funny. She took a course there in comparative religion that was very objective, taught by a female atheist.

Anti-religion is just another ignorance.

In the medieval period you had to take Holy Orders to be admitted as a fellow to a major university. Newton had to swear celebacy and affirm the 39 articles of the CoE to become an undergraduate but managed to get college statues changes so that he never did and was close to being considered a blasphemer if some of his views had ever been made public.

Jesuit scholars were always pretty amazing. A lot of what we know of medieval technologies comes from woodcut prints made by the Chinese after Ferdinand Verbeist befriended the Chinese Emperor (after very nearly being killed and then winning a predict the date of the next lunar eclipse - armed with then herectical Copernican data tables).

Every now and then a Chinese made medieval cannon with Verbeist Fecit on the side comes to light in the Far East. He also made the first steam powered car for the Emperor (although details of it are hazy).

The Vatican Observatory is still quite capable although their actual observations are done elsewhere.

I disagree. There are lots of things, like the origin of life or the origin of the universe or the nature of consciousness, that so far have no testable theories, no "solid research". What do you suggest there, total enforced silence?

Speaking of evidence,

"There was never an actual historical popular belief that the Moon is made of green cheese (cf., the myth of the Flat Earth).[citation needed] It was typically used as an example of extreme credulity, a meaning that was clear and commonly understood as early as 1638.[1]"

So your reference to people believing in moon cheese is as prejudiced and uninformed as the concept itself.

One can certainly assign probabilities to alternate theories. But most people do that badly. The other people are inventors.

Because they lock onto comfortable techniques, or pick a problem solution too soon and stick with it, or emotionally deny that things are possible. Most people are uncomfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity and with considering other peoples' ideas... all poison to creative design.

Chaos is the mother of invention.

The fact is that in the past, lots of scientific discoveries have been made that, before their discovery, were explained as "acts of God". Even scientists like Newton had explanations for certain facts, and did not have explanations for other facts, which he declared to be the act of God. But then, other scientist discovered how that worked and how it could be scientifically explained.

There is a receding line between things that are scientifically explained at the moment, and things that are not, and it would be illogical to attribute all those things to God, when there has not been proof for a single one of them.

Results obtained in the past suggest that in the future, part of these will be scientifically discovered. As long as not one of them has been scientifically proven to be an act of God, it is safer to assume that there is no God, and there merely are things that we cannot yet explain.

I'm not sure why you always want to dismiss observational science. Sure we can't replay the origin/ evolution of life, nor the universe. But still there are observations.. that then need to be explained by some theory. There is life, (at least where I am now.) so some origin, and evolution as shown in the fossil record.

For the universe there is cosmic background radiation, the ratio of nuclei, red shift of far away objects.. etc.

(I haven't really been following the thread, so I hope that is not too far out of the blue.)

George H.

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evidence to be considered.

be plausible, then they deserve contempt.

I was referring to theories which do have research/evidence vs. opposing th eories which have little to none, yet a subgroup of people continue to beli eve them, e.g. vaccines causing ASD, non-existence of manmade climate chang e, a flat earth, evolution deniers, etc.

t I'd get ridiculed, and rightly so, because despite essentially all of us never setting foot on the moon and seeing it ourselves, there's mountains o f evidence against it.

I was simply making a point by stating something ridiculous that nobody bel ieves to be true. I wasn't claiming anyone ever believed it.

If you're claiming, to use an extreme example, that people who believe in a flat earth are more likely to be inventors, that's ridiculous.

Depends what we're talking about. I'll go back to the flat-earthers again; those people are not necessarily any more creative than anyone else. Sure , they're creative for coming up with explanations as to why the earth is f lat, but their theories are full of holes. I'd say if anything, their unde rstanding of physics and trust in science is sorely lacking.