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My understanding is that Camping was a civil engineer - and this is the second time he's had math problems in his calculations (a long while back, he stated that the rapture would be in 1994).

 

If I were a client of his, I think I'd be really worried about the safety of any project he worked on. One can only hope that he wasn't involved in the engineering of any bridges.

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most science I would say absolutely but using that logic, there is no "proof" that the missing link exists thus (for now) disproving evolution.

 

Evolution has been conclusively proven, reproduced, and independently verified. If you are referring to the alleged "missing link" in the specific context of human evolution... that's an element of a model that has been found to be an inaccurate representation of biology. Its a red herring.

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Yeah, five more months of being bummed out, hoping for planetary cataclysm. Talk about a bummer....

Nolesrule, "...or something else just as stupid". Got THAT right!

I really think he was sincere in his 'belief'. What does that say about 'belief'?

We had a 'young-earth-creationist' visit campus a while back. He was a geologist, but not much of one it seemed. He had calculated the date of creation in very approximate terms.

Geologists in the crowd were visibly agitated with regard to some of the claims he made. I asked him why his date didn't agree with that of the infamous Archbishop James Usher? He fumbled a little so I helped him out. I noted that the room was full of smart people, people who had taken advanced courses in topics like calculus...so if he would just give us the technical details of how he calculated that date, we could probably repeat the process and get the same date...right?

He wouldn't do it. He just said he used pretty much the same methods as the Archbishop but arrived at a different date. I think by the time he finished this failure to answer a clear, very basic question, most of the audience was ready to go study Medieval literature or something instead.

Of the stacks of his books he had for sale, I saw two sold...or maybe given away.

 

Camping is never going to provide specifics. He is never going to be anything more than a self-deceived person in whom other misguided persons will place their faith. Sad.

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Camping is never going to provide specifics

 

of course not, you need more information like is it Backpacking, Winter, Summer, Summer Camp,or a float trip, all are different types of camping. Just about the specific thing is LNT and we know some even argue against that

 

 

 

 

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Speaking of forecasts made by scientists; whatever happened to the millions of refugees that the UN predicted would result from global warming in 2010? Maybe they were the ones taken in the rapture do you suppose?

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Science: Something that can be conclusively proven, reproduced, and independently verified.

 

If you don't believe me, ask any meteorologist, psychologist, sociologist, etc.

 

:)

 

Stosh

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Science: Something that can be conclusively proven, reproduced, and independently verified.

 

If you don't believe me, ask any meteorologist, psychologist, sociologist, etc.

 

Not really seeing your point here...

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:)

 

Science: Something that can be conclusively proven, reproduced, and independently verified.

 

Meteorology is the scientific study of weather. Ever wonder how conclusively proven, reproduced and independently verified the weather report is? Some of these guys would be better off conclusively proving, reproducing, and independently verifying by looking out the widow. Global warming is another one of those can-of-worms.

 

Psychology and sociology - OMG, where does one begin?

 

Stosh

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Most people accept science as a matter of faith, not because they have experimentally verified the cliams of science themselves.

 

Not quite. People may choose to believe that a conclusion is valid and accurate without actually reproducing an experiment themselves. However, the experiment can be reproduced by those with the resources and interest in doing so. You don't need "faith" to conclude that pure water freezes at 0 degrees celsius. You can just read numerous studies that explain how and why this occurs, and, if you want to, you can try to do it yourself. And, if you make a valid argument that contradicts the established theories and explanations for a given event, the scientific community must then make adjustments to account for new evidence. Contrast this with creatonism, for instance, that cannot be tested or independently verified by anyone. Creationists do not adjust or modify their "theory" to account for contradictory evidence.

 

There is plenty of abuse of science for political purposes --- examples being the use of Spotted Owls to get control over public lands, silicone breast implants that supposedly caused injury to women and panicing Americans about the use of Alar as a chemical on apples being just a few of many examples.

 

We had AlGore as the guru of Global Warming. He was a politician looking for a vote, not a scientist, but he led his followers to join his movement mostly as a matter of faith, not science. He told parables from science but his basic appeal was to faith, not reason.

 

True, but clearly the validity of the underlying facts and theories are completely unrelated to what people with ulterior motives will try to do with them. Your examples actually advance my point - that people need to start thinking critically about these topics, and examining the evidence and processes used to reach conclusions. The problem in your examples is not with any scientific study, its with people who try to use the results of scientific study to achieve their own goals. Much like how religion can be used to influence peoples' behavior based on faith, not reason.

 

Meteorology is the scientific study of weather. Ever wonder how conclusively proven, reproduced and independently verified the weather report is?

 

I'd refer you to the scientific method, and the differences between the concepts of hypotheses, scientific laws and scientific theories. Your weather forecast is a prediction or a hypothesis. The fact that it is not 100% accurate is not a failure of science, it just means that the hypothesis was not 100% correct. But what about the data, observation and experimentation that the hypothesis was based on?

 

Psychology and sociology - OMG, where does one begin?

 

Let's begin with the words themselves. "-ology" is a suffix meaning "study of". These disciplines are the study of the mind and behavior, and the study of societies. Both of these disciplines (should) rely on the scientific method when conducting research and formulating hypotheses.

 

The fact that theories and hypotheses can be disproven is an essential component of the scientific method - it is certainly not evidence of a failure of science. If I have a theory, and you show can conclusively show me that its wrong, then I must adjust my theory to account for the new evidence that you found. I don't need to "believe" that my theory is wrong, I don't need to have "faith" that my theory is wrong - I just need to look at the evidence! That's the case for all scientific disciplines, be it meteorology, physics or sociology.

 

As opposed to matters of faith and religion. Creationists, for example, will consistently ignore evidence showing that their theory is incorrect, or just say that "God is trying to trick us," etc. And yet we allow this hokey pseudo-science to be taught as a legitimate "alternate theory" in public schools.

 

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