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From: HowTheWorldWorks
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  • Racial profiling is nothing more than human observation.How can the government tell us how to think and act,who to like ect.Hea I have a great idea lets apply affirmative action to pro basketball.The team must have one Woman one Asian,A Mexican A Black and one White guy.Also lets vote to implement salary caps for Hollywood actors while were at it.That will solve everything.Can anyone see what is happening to our country.American citizens are homeless broke and were worried if someone is racist?

  • This guy is annoying as fuck.

  • I would've dedicated an entire video to the science part. That would've been interesting. But I understand, you're maybe more comfortable talking on economics than hard science, but for fuck;s sake, the very prospect of teh subject outweighs any of the petty other stories about air traffic or the fact taht the research was in the private sector. That doesn't bother me, but privitisation of scienc,- I'm not so fond as you of that. The LHC wouldn't get anywhere from pure privitisation.

  • Thanks 4 your courage. America needs a lot more citizens like U. It was intellegent & couragous people who we can thank for the wonderful Constitution we have which protects our basic rights. Well spoken.

  • They created life. "Created" is a very interesting word, it implies someone of intelligence is behind the scenes manipulating the outcome. This really doesn't prove anything other than intelligence is needed for life to exist.

  • Dr Venter, who has been working on synthetic life for a decade, told The Times: “It is our final triumph. This is the first synthetic cell. It’s the first time we have started with information in a computer, used four bottles of chemicals to write up a million letters of DNA software, and actually got it to boot up in a living organism." They made every gene by using alignments to find conserved nucleotide residues... people who don't know how biological science works should shut up...

  • I'm very surprised he believes in evolution.

  • you said arizona immigration law nine times...i think that was about one minute of the entire video. yes, i found counting how many times you said that more interesting than the context with which it was held.

  • Emptiest eyes I´ve ever seen. This guy is living dead.

  • right, by actively knowing where to put everything in exact proportions, and how to insert the DNA, not by just throwing everything together and waiting for something to happen

  • yes! you finally move your eyes and head.

    i've been waiting for this moment... :)

  • Thumbs up, man!  : )

  • Cuba are anti-homosexual!? Where are you getting that information from?

  • ok calm down little fox news boy

  • I find myself fixated on that electric outlet behind your left shoulder. It's far more interesting than listening to you speak.

  • @knucklepunt you suck. that guy's smart. he might be a freaky eyed christian, but he's got a good enough brain to use in public.

  • @De4sher How is he a "freaky-eyed Christian" for lauding a genetic breakthrough that lends even more evidence for evolution?

    Talk about being unclear on the concept.

  • @DrCruel look at his eyes. they are freaky.

    and the fact that he likes science doesn't make his eyes non-freaky. the points i made were unrelated.

    what did you not get?

  • @De4sher No they're not, and he's clearly not acting like a Christian fanatic as you implied.

  • @DrCruel i did not imply anything else than to say he's kinna smart.

    why the fuck are you arguing with me if we actually agree?????

  • @knucklepunt That must be why Leftists are such retards. When they go to a college lecture or talk, instead of listening to the speaker they stare blankly at wall fixtures.

    Really. I've seen them do it. Then they ask questions from a predetermined script, often ones that have no bearing whatsoever on what the speaker was talking about or that the speaker already answered in the lecture.

    "Don't taze me bro." Real moonbat nitwits.

  • @knucklepunt and on the left side, there is some sort of cable tv connector

  • @knucklepunt Someone has nothing better to do then to try and bully others on, YOUTUBE? Oh my. I find myself fixated on your fail of a bully comment. Do you come in blue? You are just so cute!

  • @knucklepunt Nah. i find the cable outlet much more interesting than the electric outlet.

  • Dude, get some furniture!

  • the scientists did not create life they just added synthetic dna to a cell that was already alive. All it is is genetic modification and the scientist himself even acknowleged that. It is a great discoverey because it could be used dor things like medicine though

  • @david52875 No, your missing the important part, when you remove the nucleus of a cell it is in effect dead, the amazing part is that when they introduced the new modified genome the cell began to devide. Therefore they have turned something that was once dead into something that is alive.

  • This way we may live forever, imaging to take a DNA sample of the person in his/her childhood and the create a living cell based on it and inject to the same person when he/she is 40 years old. So if this cell would survive it may reproduce healthy cells not infected by viruses. Also no cancer because this cell would have same length of DNA (DNA getting shorter during cell division process). But how to make it strong enough to dominate over existing cells.

  • You are such an ignorant fuckface.

  • Hey man. I am curious: Do you believe in God?

  • There's no such thing as the "greatest scientific breakthrough ever." Everything is relative.

  • Comment removed

  • 3:13 for SYNTHETIC LIFE!!!!!!!!

  • 0:00 Click A million times xD

  • cuba sounds like a great place.

  • Is this guy a homosexual? Sure as fuck comes off as one.

  • @johnnydarkly You must be one demented mother fucker. Keep you sick fantasies to yourself.

  • @SkaRocksYea You listen to Ska but you're a Republican LMFAO You're a little pathetic bitch who listens to counter-culture music but you're a mainstream cunt who roots for teabaggers, you're a walking contradiction.

  • @johnnydarkly this the perfect comment to show whats wrong with the way people think now a days.......because someone listens to a type of music associated with a certain group A, and a person who is a part of group B it makes group C see them as a "walking contradiction"! I listen to everything from Mozart to Metallica to 50 cent.....I also am a Christian who believes in the Big Bang theroy and evolution (I believe God created life and evolution was a result of his work)..whats that make me..

  • @Brianjr79

    Perhaps sycophant would be better than walking contradiction?

  • any cuban that comes to florida gets a free green card if they set foot in the country so wat they complaining about

  • I've been running artificial life simulations for a long time. Try darwinbots.

  • i lol'ed really, SAYS CUBA.

  • Actually, they didn't create life. They did not actually create DNA. All they did was transpose existing DNA from one bacterium to another bacterium. In effect, all they did was pull the hard drive out of one already functioning system and transferred it to another already functioning system. This is not creating anything. Not from scratch. They did not create anything brand new.

  • @MikeTMerciless Good point.

  • @MikeTMerciless

    No, you're incorrect. They synthesized the DNA. They did copy a large portion of the genome in Mycoplasma, so some genomic "plagiarism" was involved, but it was synthesized nonetheless. If transferring DNA were all it took to stake a claim to creating life, than we've already done this hundreds of thousands of times. It's called somatic cell nuclear transfer. If it were really that simple, this wouldn't be making the news at all.

  • @MikeTMerciless Actually although i think i agree with the point you are making, if you remove the nucleus from a cell it is in effect dead, and when they introduced the new dna genome it began to devide so the great achievement is the simple fact they turned something that was once dead into something that is alive. Sure they used components from already existing molecules but i think thats irrelivant.

  • @greeny202a

    But the wording of HowTheWorldWorks sounds like they took dead matter shook it up and - presto: life, like 'in the beginning!' They USED already existing material, they didin't create DNA...

  • @aveyowyns No life itself uses already existing material you fool! But the achievement (as i stated in my last comment) is getting the new cell to divide again after you have removed its genetic material, life is defined as a random self replicating patern, the cells are "self replicating" and copying the new artificial genome, therefore it is in effect creating life.

  • @greeny202a

    The first INSTANCE of life did not use existing LIVING or once living material - it used non-living material... Who cares what YOU say the acheivment is I'm refering to how HowTheWorldWorks descirbed it...

  • @MikeTMerciless

    No they took pieces of DNA strains, called alleles , then reorganized them in the way they wanted. Just like I am taking a bunch of letters in a certain sequence to make a sentence. While yes the letters I did not invent, but these sentences are my own creation. DNA is just a code or a language. If we can decode it we can write any "program" we want.

  • @Kreature8888 But they didn't create life. That's the point. The sentence isn't even a creation, but a copy of what works.

  • @MikeTMerciless Then would you submit that they succeeded in manipulating life in way where they could predict the outcome?

  • @Kreature8888 Not at all! They haven't even proved that. If they do it enough times under different conditions and present their notes, hypotheses and conclusions bearing that out, sure, but so far it's been a crap-shoot; that was the researchers' words, not mine. And then you have to have the verification process, and that could take a decade at least, given how long it took these people to do it.

  • @MikeTMerciless Hmm, I think 'artificial' is the important term when they say they created created an 'artificial life form.' Its a fascinating proof of concept that by using an existing template and ready made parts, a self replicating cell can be crafted. This opens the door for custom crafted molecules, and that is the really exciting part of this discovery.

  • @MikeTMerciless well the thing i understand they did, was they actually created some DNA, piece by piece, but modeled to code for some specific proteins they saw you kinna need.

  • @MikeTMerciless Scientists have tried unsuccessfully to create life to prove evolution. They tossed all these elements supposedly replicating the earth 6 trillion years ago, give or take a few, and zapped it with electricity and were unsuccessful in even creating one living DNA. They made a non living, non replicating mass of stuff.

  • @MikeTMerciless Wrong, they created a cell that had the ability to perform every function that defines an organism as living. They DID create every gene that the new life form contains within its genome. They wrote the sequence using templates based on other already living organisms. Artificial life has been created. Where do you get your info sir?

  • @ImtheTroubleIn421 They didn't create anything beyond taking a template, using pre-existing material to make an exact copy of it, then transferring that into an already living cell and observed the results. It was no different than making a copy of a program and inserting it into a functioning computer. They didn't even create every gene; but rather used many of the same genes and spliced on the rest. This was derived from Science Daily. This was not Artificial Life.

  • @theantiismist Spanish facist dictatorship!? ok... yeah But its actually the American corporations that... never mind you are right you and your friggin mecha i guess.

    And by the god damn way, my point is americans are ALLOWED TO HAVE LAND which means you are WRONG, you can check their justice system if you wish or to fucking ask some one who wans to buy land and its not near the fucking border or THE OCEAN.

    GET A LAWYER or something

  • @theantiismist Oh so you are familiar with the mexican constitution, well you should read article 27 of the mexican constitution which states that ONLY MEXICANS can own land IN THE BORDER or NEAR the ocean, you can won land in EVERY OTHER PLACE.

    Soo the statement made by this guy is FALSE, dont belive me read that article

  • People of other nationalities CAN IN FACT own propierty in mexico i ask you to investigate BEFORE you start atacking that country, aliens cannot own propierty IN THE BORDER of mexico or near the ocean, and thats because super powers have always tryed to use latin american countryes for their resourses thats the reason

  • hey two things:

    1) craig venter (the synthetic life guy) also was key to giving us the human genome. it was basically him vs the NIH in sequencing the human genome and he invented shotgun sequencing which was much better than the stuff the NIH was doing so in the end the NIH and him joined forces and they adopted his shotgun sequencing method and the human genome was sequenced so we truly do owe a lot to this guy.

    2) what's the song you put at the end? the violin thing.

  • this dude needs a TV show.

  • THAT'S. . .Not really all that interesting.

  • So we can now create life. Why do I feel like humanity is unfit for this...? Oh, maybe because we are.

  • Gee, Lee...when you first heard of this experiment going on, you said, quite sarcastically, "I can't think of any ways THIS could go wrong!" And now, you're talking about how wonderful it is.

    Make up your damn mind.

  • You suck. Try comedy.

  • And then it's like blah blah blah bah regardless of this regardless of that blah blah blah you talk too slow, you're slurring, stuttering, too fast, correcting yourself, looking around. It's news, work on the delivery a little bit.

    2:33

    Listen to yourself saying "not to mention." It's ridiculous. I could ridicule you for that, easily, and that sort of thing doesn't pass people by easily.

  • Work on your s's.

  • If you want to report the news, you need to have a Hollywood accent and a better camera angle. Do you have a zit on your chin?

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 Thank you for replying, please note that I am a giver not a taker, though from what i can gather form your comments, your been taken before.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 I apologize. I seem to have misunderstood the real meaning of your comments. After carefully reading between the lines i have detected the clear homosexual advance, which i accept, please comment again if you wish to wet my balls.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 I lost interest in this discussion the moment you said the age of the Earth has nothing to do with chemistry, then said "math on a piece of paper happen by accident and not design" Thats so much bullcrap its not even worth going into. You assume im an atheist, but you know nothing of my personal beliefs. Your not interested in an honest, civil discussion you just want to rant.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 Cont- Plus, if his dumb enough to be homophobic and believe the Earth is six thousand years old i severly doubt his intellectual integrity. So, yes, if he believes the Earth is six thousand years old he is a bad chemist.

    No im not gay. Why would you assume that?

    You dont have to be an atheist to be a credible scientist you just have to be unbiased.There are plenty of theists that believe in evolution. Sarfati is not credible because he is employed and funded by creationists.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 Whats with the question marks dude? You're going to break your fucking keyboard, calm down.

    The consenus in science, agreed upon by every field of science, is that evolution is fact. One fringe chemist does not discredit 200 years of verified, painstakingly tested evolutionary theory.

    I said "a person's beliefs doesnt neccessarily discount their science" however Sarfati is employed, funded and a member of an Apologetics Ministry. Thus is work is biased. Cont-

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 As Dr Sarfati is a creationist whom works for Creation Ministries International a christian apologetics ministry specializing in Young-Earth creationism, i sincerely doubt his work is credible or unbiased. Though a person's beliefs doesnt neccessarily discount their science Sarfati is a homophobic creationist with extremely conservative views. He is not a credible scientist. The vast majority of scientists support evolution and they all have PhDs too.

  • @Fangtorn Yes, because there isn't any as yet. Everything they were showing as proof has been shot down by modern science and technology.

  • @buisyman I cant find what comment your commenting but i seriously hope your not delusional enough to be arguing evolution has been shot down by modern science. I really hope im misunderstanding your comment because i cant find what your replying to.

  • @Fangtorn Sorry, dude, but I can't remember. Possibly I was commenting on the fact that modern genetics research has blown evolution theory almost completely out of the water. We aren't in any way, shape or form related to apes. It was believed that we are decended from apes because we supposedly look similar. We differ from apes genetically about as much as we differ from an ameba.

  • @buisyman Em what is meant by us being related to apes is that we share a common ancestor not that we're descended from apes. And no, we share about 97 percent of our DNA with primates. Modern genetics supports the theory of evolution by natural selection as does the entire spectrum of biological science. If modern genetics had blow evolution "out of the water" i would have heard about it long before now, in loftier places then the youtube comments section, considering it would redefine biology.

  • @Fangtorn That Shared DNA you're talking about is what is called "junk DNA". It's the base DNA thqt all life on this planet shares. They Don't know what it does or why it's there. The DNA that defines a speces, i.e. that last 3% you mentioned. Non of ours matches the ape. They are finding no evidence of a "shred ancestor".

  • @buisyman The number of genetic differences between humans and chimps is ten times smaller than that between mice and rats. "Junk DNA" or noncoding DNA is simply do not encode for protein sequences. We dont yet know their function, but we know their sequences and those match with that of apes. Who are "they"? There is plenty of evidence for our relation to primates, we are primates, modern human evolutionary science is built on the fact we are primates and is supported by credible scientists.

  • @buisyman That is utter rubbish, man and primates have a common ancestor.Even Darwin never said we were descended from apes.

  • @BarthBunzel THAT'S what having a common ancestor means, you dolt. sheesh, where were you people educated, Count Chocula university?

  • @buisyman

    Agreed!

    There is no such thing as Evolution, only Adaptation exists. And no matter how much a species Adapts, it will always be what ever it is. Darwin's Birds are a perfect example of Adaptation, even though Dorkwin called it Evolution. The Finches are still Finches. They will never 'Evolve' into another species of bird. The Coelacanth (since we have found dozens since 1938) which is over 360 million years old, hasn't changed one fuckin' cell in all that time!

    Evolution=Fallacy!

  • @DrGoodwrench64 Actually, those pictures in Darwins book have been proven to be fake, did you know that? They're STILL being used in text books to "prove" that dinosaurs evolved into birds.

  • @DrGoodwrench64

    So you're saying:

    "I've never seen a species evolve, according to my personal definition of evolution, therefore evolution doesn't happen."

    and

    "I know of a species that hasn't evolved in a while, therefore evolution doesn't happen."

    ... and you're calling evolution a fallacy? I'm going to take a wild guess here and say you're not a scientist.

  • @psychosavant

    In 360 million years the world has changed. Land masses have moved, the Earth has even changed angel on its axis. And in all that time, the Coelacanth hasn't changed in the slightest. It would seem that all the factors to force change are accounted for yet, there is no evolution in this example. It would seem to me that if evolution was real that it would be in constant motion. Yet, it seems that evolution has taken a break. How convenient.

  • @DrGoodwrench64 The bible is not 6000 years old, and here's why.

    /watch?v=5-FyKoU2uRo

  • @DrGoodwrench64 Evolution is scientifically proven. Stop being so stubborn about unicorns and talking snakes.

  • @Aresftfun Actually it hasn't been proven...hence why it is a theory. It makes scientific sense but only in theory. It hasn't been proven and any scientist will tell you that completely.

  • @monkeywolf Scientific theory. Look it up. It's not what you think. What you're thinking of is a hypothesis.

    I actually get annoyed when people say "My theory" because they don't have evidence and it is their hypothesis. However, a theory is the highest level science can achieve. Theories use Scientific laws encompassing them also. (Laws are almost assuredly to not be disproven, such as the law of conservation of energy, and a theory that uses that is the theory of....Gravity.)

  • @Aresftfun Yes I know the difference between a Law and a theory and a hypothesis. A Hypothesis is a thought that needs to be proven, a Theory is something that almost always happens, but cannot be shown to work 100% of time, or cannot be proven at all but is scientifically sound. Also the law of energy conservation is that energy is not destroyed or made from nothing merely transfered. Gravity doesn't really use that law. Since, from what can be assumed, the Theory of Gravity is based off of...

  • @Aresftfun Pockets or ripples in Space-time. even you if put out in space would give off gravity and have objects floating around you because you make that little push within space-time. It doesn't really require energy or the transfer of energy tog et going. It just is, this why Gravity is the most interacted with but most unknown force of the 4 universal forces. ( Once more the Theory of Evolution hasn't been proven. Or else is would be a law. There are also potholes in the theory as well.

  • @monkeywolf I'm sorry but you don't understand basic science. Come back when you know what evolution is and the scientific method.

  • @Aresftfun lol? If anything I just should I know well above basic science. Good to know you can't refute what i presented and thus you decide to use a logical fallacy to weasle out of it. Oh well.

  • @monkeywolf Then what do you believe in? That thousands upon thousands of mammal species actually went on a boat smaller than the Titanic and stayed there forty days and night with nothing but 6 people and a 900 year old man to keep them from killing eachother, let alone the dung? What about the plants? They would have died without good soil on a boat safe from water. Also, what explains the fossils? The devil trying to trick you? God testing your faith? You're not making sense.

  • @Aresftfun Once more you committed another logical fallacy, you assumed something you don't know whether to be true or not. Apparently you can't handle the fact that science isn't full proof at all...which I don't get why since every scientist worth their weight will tell you science is NEVER full proof. Hence why the most popular science terms are normally THEORIES and not LAWS. Big Bang, Black Holes, Evolution, General Relativity, those are all theories. They make sense sure, still theories.

  • @monkeywolf And until someone comes up with a better theory, evolution is true. That's right. If something else can explain the fossils and all animals' correspondence to eachother and have the same capability to accurately predict the changing of a species and can also explain why DNA is similar with all living things, call me. I am positive that magic is not the answer. Or "miracles" as some might call it.

  • @Aresftfun Just because there isn't a better theory doesn't make the theory true. That is a logical fallacy again. Also evolution itself doesn't explain fossils or even animal correspondence last i checked it merely detailed why some species outsurvived others through genetic mutations and the like. Unless I am wrong please do correct me, but the theory about fossils details something of meteors hitting the earth. (and yes I am being snide)

  • @monkeywolf You are completely wrong. Just search "How are fossils developed?" in google and you will see how they come to be. If you are referring to the beginning of life it is abiogenesis which happened in primordial Earth. Basic elements in the atmosphere were combining because of the high chance of lightning stikes and amino acids were created with that. Amino acids have also been found on asteroids, so we know life is probably abundant.

  • @Aresftfun Actually I took what you meant wrong I thought you meant more along the lines of "how they got to be in the ground" then literally how fossils were made that is easy, and to sum it up in one word, compaction, or maybe a better word is pressure. How life also began is a theory as well there are tons of theories for that from a super heated sess pool of cells to astroids. Once more Theories are NOT facts nor are they even really true, they are valid simple as that.

  • @monkeywolf Thanks for reiderating that.

    There is proof that it was from the Primordial earth. Miller/Urey experiment, where compounds that were in the early earth in abundance and an electric current was put through it and chemical reactions occurred to create amino acids.

  • @Aresftfun Lol yes I know, I was just saying there are tons of theories out there about how life started. None of them can be proven as to which one actually DID start life though.

  • @monkeywolf We have a pretty accurate contraception, though.

  • @monkeywolf Therefore I conclude it was not a fallacy on my part but on yours.

  • I'm more of a scientist than you are a savant, that's for sure. 

  • @DrGoodwrench64 You know, the bible says that God holds everyone on the earth with his hand. Time to say "the theory of gravity is a lieeee!"

  • @DrGoodwrench64

    That is one dumb theory. How does that explanation account for new species? It doesn't? You believe that humans coexisted with dinosaurs? Great. Actually, I think you are confusing Darwin's theories of evolution with the Pokemon theory of evolution. Darwin(not Dorkwin) never proposed that animals evolve DURING their life span. I'm sure the field of hard working educated biologists would be really interested in "Adaptation", though, you should write to a science journal.

  • @DrGoodwrench64 Transitional forms:

    /watch?v=HpW7nQl3-D4

  • @Thebattlewalrus nah, a spiderbear would be better.

  • @jmt24 You're obviously the victim of the liberal education system. Let me explain. It doesn't matter what a word means to you, and you can't change the meaning of a word, as libs love to do (to make themselves feel better).Each word means what is means, and you can't chage that. Stop being so trusting. stop blindly following your leaders and find out for yourself. buy a dictionary, for gods sake. maybe even learn to read, first.

  • @buisyman You're obviously the victim of neglectful parents. "you can't change..." Words have and do change over time. Also I didn't change any words you just don't understand them, nor the context I'm using them in."stop being so trusting" Stop assuming you know anything about me, because so far you couldn't be further from the truth. If you want to really talk about evolution then Pm and we can have a real discussion because 500 characters just isn't enough.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 I wouldn't say that athiests don't have standards, but that without a guide such as the bible, they have no moral standard. that means, I think, thatan athiests morals may be rethought and changed as they deem a situation demands. but, I might be wrong about that, too.

  • Oh wow, dude. You might want to check your facts on that story again. The guy didn't create life. He cheated just a bit.

    He created a synthetic cell, yes. But, he used real DNA from living tissue (of something). He pulled the Nucleus of a living cell and put in his synthetic cell shell, and it began to replicate.

    Let's not overstate his accomplishment. He didn't create the DNA or program the base-pair sequence. So he's not God. But it is still a huge leap forward in science.

  • @DrGoodwrench64

    You are incorrect on 3 facts. Firstly, the DNA was transfered into a prokaryotic organism, so no nuclei were involved. Secondly, the DNA was synthesized using Mycoplasmic DNA as a reference, so it was partially plagiarized from living cells, but it was synthesized nonetheless. Thirdly, the cell that it was transferred to was NOT synthesized, but rather a DNA stripped Mycoplasmoid of a different species.

  • @psychosavant

    The DNA wasn't synthesized. It was purchased. 1000 pieces of DNA was then assembled into a copy of another bacteria..? That's total crap. Why would you buy all the pieces of DNA and copy something that already exists? It would have been easier if he had just stripped the nuclei of the bacteria he copied and injected that into the Mycoplasmoid.

    Basically, he did a heart & lung transplant. We've been doing the same thing with viruses for decades.

    This isn't synthetic life, it's crap!

  • @DrGoodwrench64

    By comparing the assembly of nucleotides and bases of DNA to organ transplants, you've shown you only have a vague understanding of molecular biology. I would be inclined to introduce you to the err in your judgement, except that it's clear you're not interested in how it works, you're only interested in being right. If you were actually interested in thoroughly understanding how this really works, you would not have jumped to the immediate objective conclusion that "it's crap".

  • 'Arizona Immagration Law' those words were said about 84 times

  • that billionare = god

  • U should be on drugs or massive amounts of alcohol, U R seriously living on another planet. Why don't you kill yourself?

  • @Cwifty why dont you mature up a bit and give some usefull feedback.

  • i normally hate every single word that comes out of your mouth but this time you managed to make sound and extremely intelligent remarks

  • Conservatives simply dont understand science and are against it.

  • @Ramshobraja

    That characterisation is unfair. There are many scientists who's politics lean towards the right, not least of which the founding members of the George C. Marshall Institute, who are amongst the greatest enemies action of climate change. We on the left have no claim to science being our monopoly.

    Ofcause some right wing policies are anti-science, especially where social conservatism and christianity gets bound up in it, but the same can be true at the other end of the spectrum.

  • @sleepymagpie There are some anti-science elements on the left like with the opposition to genetic modified crops, and animal testing. Irrational and unscientific thinking in general is a casue for worry.

  • @Ramshobraja lol what? i am all for science and am totally conservative. thats a HUGE over generalization

  • @Ramshobraja so, how in the hell did you pull that out of your butt?

  • and how do you have three thumbs up?  I just love going on-line and getting my buzz on idiots how make the world a scary place to live...

  • Synthia is cool, no doubt about it. She is a major development, but an inevitable one, and no where near as important at the theoretical underpinning that made her possible.

    Synthia a very good example of what private individuals and corporations do well in science, I.E. applied sciences. Insidently, government funding helps them to do it even better, if it didn't they wouldn't go through the hassle of applying for it.

  • Comment removed

  • They made life, its big, but they could not have done it without building on the work of hundred, nay thousands of other scientists, working in fields which business does not as a rule fund. They could not have achieved this without government funded curiosity driven research that laid the foundation.

    Synthia would have happened regardless, because the technique for building her is likely to be propitiatory, and her daughters and sisters are going to be marketable products.

  • Saying that John Craig Venter is baseless, you can't know what he would have done. It is possible that it he might have, but it is equally possible that he would have consider it to be research he could not afford to personally fund.

  • And here is the thing, you can't copy right the theory of everything. There is no reason for companies to investigate what makes gravity function, because frankly, they don't know if there are products in it, and to find out will cost vast chunks of their profits. There are some, very few individuals who are rich enough to fund research, but even they cant fund the really big physics and cosmology experiments.

  • Charities just can't raise even close to enough money, because Joe the plumber does even begin to understand how important advancement has been in his life and will be for his children.

    It is arguable that funding of curiosity driven science is the single most legitimate function of science, and possibly even 'the only legitimate cause for governmental borrowing other than wars of defence against an occupier intent on genocide, because it is those who pay of the debt who benefit from it most.'

  • We live in a Renaissance of research, in which both scientific understanding is blooming like never before, and technology is developing at undreamed of rates. Remove the governmental funding of science and research will suffer, we all gain from for science, so it is fair that we all pay for it.

    The American economy as a direct result of Apollo has received $14 for every $1 spent on Apollo. Science is one of the few areas where it is demonstrable that governments can create wealth.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 haha! Thanks man. These were made with a very primitive combination of Microsoft Digital Image Editor, Paint, and Sony Vegas Pro. I don't even know how to use flash, or do any bone/limb rigging yet. Each one, around 2 minutes long, takes a few hours apiece. Pretty inefficient. If I figure out how to change the character's expressions and postures more, I intend to mimic the old cartoons, like Bugs Bunny. The expressions back then were priceless.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 I tend to find comics or cartoons where people are slapstick-type hurt or slapped or shot to be funny, and I'm just now learning how to do any sort of "story," though animating even a 5 minute video by my standards would take a long time for very little action.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 You ever wanted to do any animation or anything like that? If you want, feel free to watch my Furthur Skard videos. I'm new to the game and am trying to learn to animate. I don't yet have real 3D perspective and such, but I'm working on figuring it all out. Nor do I have voice acting, etc etc, but perhaps we have a similar sense of humor in some way.

  • While what Venter's company did was an impressive feat, I wouldn't call it "creating artificial life". That would mean to really start from "dumb", raw materials like silicone/sand or metal. Building a computer that passes the Turing test would be creating artificial life. Venter & Co. essentially took existing organic components and macromolecules like DNA -- chemicals that were part of living things before -- and recombined them into a new living thing (they essentially reprogrammed the DNA).

  • The Book's unequivocal meaning and Life are adequated to one another in a relationship of stark and simple imposition. You see God has a plan for us and unlike secularists and post-structuralists He speaks in clear and unmistakable terms.

  • Literalism reduces reading and interpretation to the Cratylean dream: one need only point to the appropriate passage and "Pouf" all doubt and ambiguity about what one should think, believe, or desire on a given situation vanishes. One need no longer wrack one's brain or one's heart or live in the terror that the world exceeds one's grasp.

  • Fundamentalism feeds on and fosters this reduction of the mind to the conditions of the immediate. For in fundamentalism literalism is raised to the status of a categorical imperative. It is the law that assures deliverance from all confusion. There is a single text, the Holy Bible. It contains clear, simple direct messages-proclamations-that establish the Truth once and for all. All of life's questions and contingencies are resolved by statements that are beyond change and interpretation.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 Yep, whatever you say, please fuck off for a thirty fifth time.

  • The way: the refusal to comprehend anything that exceeds the limits of the simple declarative sentence. Two reductions thereby feed on one another: the world is reduced to facts and simples; the mind reduced to a permanently blank slate.

  • Literalism is the first line of defense of a mind that wants to put itself to sleep. A sensibility that like Nietzsche's last man can only blink in blank incomprehension at anything that can't be immediately understood. It is the great protection against a world teeming with complexities. Literalism offers a way out, a way to keep the mind fixed and fixated at its first condition.

  • Santayana's statement made no sense precisely because it was a koan, a paradox intended to produce reflection, even introspection. It was there I suggested that one would find the key to its meaning; not in the assertion that its meaningless constituted evidence that Santayana was perverse or mentally unbalanced. We were, of course, talking at irretrievable cross-purposes with no way to bridge the gulf between us.

  • All attempts to suggest that the statement wasn't meant to be taken literally only produced further confusion then frustration then anger.

  • I once tried it out on some fundamentalist friends. They were at first puzzled by the unintelligibility of the statement then amazed that Santayana and I were so dumb we couldn't see the contradiction. Finally the light went on, almost in chorus, the literalist deconstruction of the statement: "If he wasn't a God how could she be a mother?"

  • Literalism is the attempt to arrest all of this before it takes hold. It's innermost necessity is the resistance to metaphor. For with metaphor one enters a world that has the power to unravel the literal mind. Let me offer one example. "There is no God and Mary is his mother." In this great aphorism Santayana asserts an ontological impossibility and a psychological necessity.

  • The literal in contrast puts an end to thought. It offers the mind a way to shut down, to reify itself. It thereby exorcises the greatest fear: interpretation and its inevitable result, the conflict of interpretations and with it the terror of being forever bereft of dogmatic certitudes. A metaphor is the lighting flash of an intelligence that sees, as Aristotle asserts, connections that can only be sustained by a thought that thereby liberates itself from the immediate.

  • Figurative language. That is the danger that must be avoided at all costs because in place of the literal figurative language introduces the play of meaning. The need to sustain complex connections at the level of thought (not fact) through the evolution of mental abilities that are necessarily connected with developing all the metaphoric resources of language.

  • Literalism is the linchpin of fundamentalism; the literalization, if you will, of the founding psychological need. For an absolute certitude that can be established at the level of facts that will admit of no ambiguity or interpretation. (Fundamentalists, ironically, are the true positivists.) But to eliminate ambiguity and confusion one must attack its source.

  • On second thought, let me concede it, the utter ontological truth of all the basic beliefs, ever each one. Only then perhaps can we focus on the question that constitutes the inherent and lasting fascination of religion. Not what people believe, but why. The consideration of religion as a psychological phenomenon-and as such perhaps the one that offers the deepest insight into the nature of the psyche and its needs.

  • It is thus important that I indicate up front that this is not a contract I can honor. Like Freud, I think it can be demonstrated that religion is a collective neurosis. In fact one implication of the following examination is that Freud didn't go far enough. But let me reformulate this hypothesis in a more convivial spirit. Let's bracket the whole question of whether religion has an object.

  • Religion remains of course the one thing we are enjoined to treat with kid gloves as if this is the one area of life where criticism and a rhetoric that tries to energize the force of criticism is verboten. Violating this rule is also the quickest way to lose what current statistics indicate will be the 93% of one's audience who say they believe in God.

  • @Lichtspielhaus234 Sure, it''s all wrong, we're all wrong. Now please go tell someone who cares to listen to your spewings. Fuck off for a thirty fouth time. 

  • Or, to put it in psychoanalytic terms, with those who fashion the Super-ego which is the agency essential to the hold that any religion assumes over its followers. O

  • Be that as it may, in terms of the psyche a far different condition might maintain with a pronounced dissonance between the sincerity of the surface and the depths where something quite different has taken hold of the psyche. Moreover, in the psychoanalysis of a belief system the primary concern must be not with the sheep but with the Grand Inquisitors.

  • Though he does not share their beliefs Strozier often comments on the charity and gentleness of his interviewees seeing in that a sign that we should always temper any criticism of fundamentalism by acknowledging the good things it does for people, many of whom would be lost or miserable without it.

  • We may in fact find the same "faith" informing a project that initially appears to have nothing to do with fundamentalism--global capitalism.