Barak Hussein Obama? or Barak Hussein Osama?

Scott Seidman wrote:
"Wolfgang" wrote in
:

Actually, the story isn't quite that simple. The flat versus
spherical debate (not to mention infinite variations) raged for a long
time. It certainly IS true that most educated people knew a long time
ago that the question had been settled, but it was by no means a dead
issue as late as the mid-15th century......any more than evolution
versus intelligent design is today. Washington Irving may have
popularized the myth about Columbus, but many of the sailors aboard
his vessels undoubtedly had serious concerns about this spherical
Earth "theory."

Incidentally, while Columbus was obviously right about the shape of
the Earth, he was WAY wrong about its size (thus leading him to
believe that he'd arrived at the East Indies).......which had been
pretty accurately estimated by a number of folks centuries earlier.

Wolfgang


"Settled" might be an overstatement-- after all, we still have flat
earthers today.

Settled. Note that I said "educated people." Yeah, we have flat
earthers.....and we have creationists.....and we have intelligent
designers.....and we have dicklets and kennies and stevies.

There do seem to be some historians that hold that the
flat earth theorists were influential at the later Middle Ages,

It doesn't just seem so. It is so.

but most
historians seem to agree that based upon a relative scarcity of traceable
reference to a flat earth after about 800AD, the influence was marginal.

The Church has not yet been marginalized. Would that it were so.

As for Columbus, if he did in fact use a flat vs spherical Earth
hypothesis to bilk Spain out of funds, it certainly wouldn't be the last
time a scientist set up to disprove a straw horse to secure funding (but
it might have been the first!)

It would most certainly not have been the first.....not by a long shot.
However, it doesn't seem likely that he did. I mean, why would he so
much as hint at a discredited theory that predicted the certain failure
of the enterprise he was trying to bankroll?

Size was a different matter. I think that the Late Middle Age "natural
philosophers" had a fair problem understanding scale, and the fact that
people didn't understand that the distance of stars was so vast as to
preclude parallax errors was responsible for geocentrism holding on as
long as it did.

Well, all of that is, again, only partly true. Aristarchus of Samos
proposed a heliocentric model of the solar system as early as the third
century BCE. Hipparchus, a century or so later, came up with a good
estimate of the circumference of the Earth.....and the moon.....and the
distance between them, relying heavily on information gleaned from
eclipses, both solar and lunar. The ancient Greeks (as well as the
later Arabs) were well aware of the implications of the terminator on
the lunar surface. And, once again with the help of eclipses, they
were able to extrapolate from those implications and deduce the shape
of the Earth.* Astronomers and other natural philosophers in the late
middle ages had varying access to a lot of this information and equally
diverse opinions as to its validity and utility. Most of their
problems stemmed from, or were at least greatly exacerbated by,
official Church doctrine. Some things never change, it would appear.

This isn't what gave Columbus problems, though.

True. But then, I didn't suggest that it was.

Indeed, his estimation
of how far he travelled is remarkably accurate given his dead reckoning
preference (see http://www.columbusnavigation.com/v1a.shtml).

Stipulated. I don't need to follow the link.

The
problem was that he used Ptolemy's huge underestimation of circumference.

Yeah, that's what I said, he was wrong about the size of the Earth.

Almost 500 years before Ptolemy, Eratosthenes had an estimation of
circumference to within 8%.

O.k., you've got me there.....I didn't mention Eratosthenes
specifically.

While he preferred dead reckoning, Columbus also had a quadrant on board.
I would think that a well developed technique for quadrant based
navigation at Columbus' time would indicate a well developed sense of a
spherical earth.

Yep. But then, I didn't suggest that Columbus was wrong about the
shape of the Earth. Quite the contrary, as a matter of fact.

Wolfgang
*and then there's the chinese, the mayans, the druids......and just
about everybody else who figured it out a long long time ago.

On 13 Dec 2006 12:51:13 -0800, "rb608" wrote:

wrote:
That said, I agree that people should be "taught" about both,
as well as about religion.

By the way you phrase the statement, I infer you do not consider ID as
religion?

I don't, no, but I don't begrudge anyone who chooses to (peacefully) do
so...and don't think ID is a satisfactory explanation of how life came
to be. But I am able to reach that conclusion for myself because I know
at least a smattering about the thinking behind ID. IMO, general
"science" class (in the non-collegial, preparatory education, such as in
a US lower, middle, or upper school) is as good a place as any to inform
about it under the premise that it is an alternative theory to what is
accepted as "science," but I don't feel that such instruction _must_
occur there. It isn't what I'd call accepted modern science, but
neither is much of early (erroneous) "science" which is taught about as
precursor information in the chain leading to current, accepted thought.

I don't think "intelligent design" is the
way life came about and evolution is the more-reasonable explanation,
but I'm certainly aware of both, and I'd make sure my children were as
well.

If you don't think ID is the way life came about, why would you want it
taught to your kids?

Because if they aren't well-informed, they can't possibly make
well-informed choices. There are lots of ideas that I don't personally
embrace that I don't wish to be hidden from anyone, children included.

And I think you'll find that most voters would want their kids as
well-educated as possible, and many of those would truly believe that
intelligent design is the more-reasonable explanation.

Many of those might believe the earth is flat; but that doesn't mean we
should squander resources teaching it in school.

Uh, yeah, "we" sure as heck wouldn't wanna squander resources teaching
things in school...why, shoot, too much of that kinda nonsense, and
before you know it, schools won't be able to afford new computers or
something...

IAC, just how do you "squander resources" by teaching about something in
a school? In fact, how do you squander them teaching about anything,
anywhere?

wrote in message
...
On 13 Dec 2006 12:51:13 -0800, "rb608" wrote:

wrote:
That said, I agree that people should be "taught" about both,
as well as about religion.

By the way you phrase the statement, I infer you do not consider ID as
religion?

I don't, no, but I don't begrudge anyone who chooses to (peacefully) do
so...and don't think ID is a satisfactory explanation of how life came
to be. But I am able to reach that conclusion for myself because I know
at least a smattering about the thinking behind ID. IMO, general
"science" class (in the non-collegial, preparatory education, such as in
a US lower, middle, or upper school) is as good a place as any to inform
about it under the premise that it is an alternative theory to what is
accepted as "science," but I don't feel that such instruction _must_
occur there. It isn't what I'd call accepted modern science, but
neither is much of early (erroneous) "science" which is taught about as
precursor information in the chain leading to current, accepted thought.

I don't think "intelligent design" is the
way life came about and evolution is the more-reasonable explanation,
but I'm certainly aware of both, and I'd make sure my children were as
well.

If you don't think ID is the way life came about, why would you want it
taught to your kids?

Because if they aren't well-informed, they can't possibly make
well-informed choices. There are lots of ideas that I don't personally
embrace that I don't wish to be hidden from anyone, children included.

And I think you'll find that most voters would want their kids as
well-educated as possible, and many of those would truly believe that
intelligent design is the more-reasonable explanation.

Many of those might believe the earth is flat; but that doesn't mean we
should squander resources teaching it in school.

Uh, yeah, "we" sure as heck wouldn't wanna squander resources teaching
things in school...why, shoot, too much of that kinda nonsense, and
before you know it, schools won't be able to afford new computers or
something...

IAC, just how do you "squander resources" by teaching about something in
a school? In fact, how do you squander them teaching about anything,
anywhere?

I get it. It's like child molestation. Most of us know what it is and
would never subject our children to such degenerate individuals with such
perverse behaviors, but because you want you children to be well learned,
you would actually introduce you children to a child molester and leave them
with he/she over the day.

Simple logic, the Rah Dean method of teaching about.

Op

wrote in news:25r0o2tmif0er5jp06na3uggm6ncg1cmb9@
4ax.com:

IAC, just how do you "squander resources" by teaching about something in
a school? In fact, how do you squander them teaching about anything,
anywhere?



When you teach as part of your living, you come to realize that time is a
precious asset. When you are teaching them one thing, you cannot be
teaching them something else. There are enough hard choices about what we
should spend this precious resource of time on, without worrying about when
we should cram in the fairy tales and tell the kids they're true.

--
Scott
Reverse name to reply

On Wed, 13 Dec 2006 14:12:54 -0600, wrote:
First, people cannot be "taught evolution" or "intelligent design," they
can only be informed about them (or "taught _about_ them, if you
prefer).

ahahahahahahahahahahaha! classic!

/daytripper (gasbag, thy name is Richard)

wrote:

First, people cannot be "taught evolution" or "intelligent design," they
can only be informed about them (or "taught _about_ them, if you
prefer).

Do you take yourself seriously? I mean after typing the above, can you?
Like your "clarification" made any difference to anything at all?

That said, I agree that people should be "taught" about both,
as well as about religion. I don't think "intelligent design" is the
way life came about and evolution is the more-reasonable explanation,
but I'm certainly aware of both, and I'd make sure my children were as
well. And I think you'll find that most voters would want their kids as
well-educated as possible, and many of those would truly believe that
intelligent design is the more-reasonable explanation.

So let's say clearly what you mean: to be well educated you must be
"informed about" ID. I bet McCain never says that, ever ... I mean
they're kicking school boards out in that blue of blue states, Kansas
for pushing ID. What's sad is that McCain is pandering, but God knows
what you're doing. You may actually believe what you write. Let me be
clear: I've seen the greatest minds of my generation and they don't know
**** about Intelligent Design.


Giuliano is polling better then McCain right now.

"Giuliano"...was that the guy in the porno with Paris Hilton, or the guy
Tony, Bruce Springsteen's guitar player, and the guy with the
Fraankenschteen's Bride hairdo whacked in the season finale of the
Sopranos?


Someone's just seen Britney's summer do. We get it. I thought you
would've got a Harvey Wallbanger reference in too ... try putting ~ in
front of the word in Google next time ... and for my part, I won't trust
TB's spell checker quite so readily.



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

On Wed, 13 Dec 2006 16:37:38 -0500, GM wrote:

wrote:

First, people cannot be "taught evolution" or "intelligent design," they
can only be informed about them (or "taught _about_ them, if you
prefer).

Do you take yourself seriously? I mean after typing the above, can you?
Like your "clarification" made any difference to anything at all?

Obviously not to you and a few others. And you're perfectly entitled to
be as wrong as you decide to be.

That said, I agree that people should be "taught" about both,
as well as about religion. I don't think "intelligent design" is the
way life came about and evolution is the more-reasonable explanation,
but I'm certainly aware of both, and I'd make sure my children were as
well. And I think you'll find that most voters would want their kids as
well-educated as possible, and many of those would truly believe that
intelligent design is the more-reasonable explanation.

So let's say clearly what you mean: to be well educated you must be
"informed about" ID.

Is that what I mean? Well, thankfully, you're here to explain it...

I bet McCain never says that, ever ... I mean
they're kicking school boards out in that blue of blue states, Kansas
for pushing ID. What's sad is that McCain is pandering, but God knows
what you're doing. You may actually believe what you write.

Let me be clear: I've seen the greatest minds of my generation and they don't know
**** about Intelligent Design.

Well, sure, but one really shouldn't hold that against a bunch of 10
year old kids, no matter how much smarter they are than you...

wrote:


Well, sure, but one really shouldn't hold that against a bunch of 10
year old kids, no matter how much smarter they are than you...

But we should hold it against 'grown-ups' who ought to know the
difference between theology and a sneaky end-run that tries to convert
religious theology in to a science. They should know better.

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

wrote in message
news
...Is that what I mean? Well, thankfully, you're here to explain it...

Starting from the admittedly magnanimous assumption that you have something
to say and (even more generously) that it means something, SOMEBODY should
explain it......and you are clearly incapable of doing so. Now, let me go
way out on a limb here and suggest that you think I'm wrong about this.
O.k......prove it. Seriously.

Wolfgang
emeril absinthe oprah emeril emeril latifah oprah