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Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?



 
 
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  #421  
Old October 30th 18, 07:40 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Gerald Kelleher
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Posts: 1,551
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 3:19:04 AM UTC, palsing wrote:


How unfortunate for this point of view that god is quoted in the bible, in many places, to have said...

“Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
Romans 12:19

Does this sound "loving, personal" to you? Really?


It would probably help if you read the next statement of Paul -

"On the contrary:
“If your enemy is hungry, feed him;
if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Paul

What better than to come to this newsgroup and show you fine people what you are missing by cutting yourselves off from experience, after all, it doesn't get any worse than having difficulties with one 24 hour day equating to one rotation of the planet.

If you can't feel what is incorrect or find things anti-inspirational then that is vengeance or at least the only one I know spiritually. There are always pseudo-Christians who operate at the same dreary pseudo-intellectual level but they have always existed in some shape or form.








  #422  
Old October 30th 18, 01:40 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Paul Schlyter[_3_]
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Posts: 1,344
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

In article ,
says...

On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 1:54:30 PM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Sunday, October 28, 2018 at 3:50:13 PM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:

On Sun, 28 Oct 2018 12:11:44 -0700 (PDT), Gary Harnagel
wrote:

My point is that why should one draw the conclusion that there is no
afterlife nor God from absolutely NO evidence when there is SOME
evidence that there is?

Well, if you think those meager data is some evidence for a God -
which God? The catholic God? The protestant God? The orthodox God?
The Sunni Muslim God? The Shia Muslim God? The Jewish God? The Hindu
God? The Zoroastrian God? The Bahai God? The Norse God (which one of
them)? The Roman or Greek God (which one of them)?

The human race has invented a LOT of gods. Some founders of religions
may have had some experience with The One True God and then added
trappings (and subtracted things) from them. Others founded religions
based upon certain concepts of there own. The question is, which GOD
would you be most comfortable with? (You, of course, would prefer a
nonexistent one :-)


You see? With your question "The question is, which GOD would you be most
comfortable with?" you admit that man created God, for the purpose of
getting comfort. Because that's your criterion for "The One True God":
the one you feel most comfortable with.... Since people have different
dreams and different desires, they will choose different "One True God"
and all of them are creations by the human imagination.


But that's what most humans do, even atheists. They choose a nonexistent
God not because it makes sense but because it makes them more comfortable.
Yet they hypocritically assert that it is scientifically correct.


I don't know anyone who motivate their religious belief on scientific
grounds. Do you? Instead it is generally recognized that the existence or
non-existence of some supreme being cannot be determined by science, at
least not by our science today. Now, if the "One True Supreme God" would
choose to reveal itself to us humans on a larger scale, the situation
would become very different. But for some strange reason that hasn't
happened in modern times, despite the description of numerous such
revelations have been described, both in the Bible and in the Holy
Scriptures of other religions. How come? Does the "One Supreme True God"
enjoy playing hide-and-seek with us?


Which one? And don't just tell your own belief, instead evaluate the
meager data and tell which one of these gods those data support the
existence of. And do motivate your choice.

Actually, the data only supports that "something" leaves the body at
death that can't be accounted for scientifically.


HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?


Because it hasn't been accounted for scientifically, just like dark matter
hasn't been accounted for scientifically.


There are many measurements of the universe confirming that the visible
matter alone cannot account for the observed movements in and among the
galaxies.

The only measurement of a human body losing weight you can point to is
one single measurement made by one individual in isolation. Even you
admit that it is a very meager set of empirical data. More empirical data
is needed before any reasonably reliable conclusion can be made, either
way.


Not your words here. You didn't write "that hasn't been accounted for
scientifically", instead you wrote "that can't be accounted for
scientifically". Thus you are making claims about the ultimate capacity
of science, and in particular about future science.


No, I'm not. English isn't precise enough for you to claim that I was
talking about all future science or just present science. In fact. I
believe that spirits will be detected scientifically some day.


The you shoudln't claim that they "can't be accounted for
scientifically"...

WHY DO YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN PREDICT THE FUTURE? Isn't that quite arrogant?


You sure do jump to unwarranted conclusions fast, don't you :-)


I'm just drawing the natural conclusions from your claims to show you how
exaggreated they are...


It is ASSUMED to be spirit (we might as well call it that since we have
no other name for it, just like we have no idea what dark matter is).


By religious people like you, it is assumed to be a spirit, of course. A
lot of people are victims of wishful thinking.


Just like atheists are.


Only the hard atheists which claim there cannot be any suprebe being in
existence. You cannot accuse the soft atheists for this, they merely
claim we don't know if there is a supreme being or not. I mean, who would
wish lack of knowledge? Some religious people of course, but not others.


You also assume that those meager data (one measurement by one signle
person, which has never been replicated by anyone else) are trustworthy.
Any sane person would instead want confirmation by other intependent
measurers before finding it worthwhile to even start speculating what it
is. Girst it must determined whether it is, or not.


You keep applying strict scientific procedures as an argument, but you
seem to keep forgetting that I have stated that the PROBABILITY that
spirits exist (and therefore God exists) must make atheists question
their position. Although there are no additional experiments that
confirm MacDougall's data, there are also no experiments that refute it.


And you strongly exaggrregate this probability, calling it "almost
certain", "99%", "99.9%" or whatever.

If it's ACTUALLY a conscious spirit, then it supports a number of
religions and implies that there is life beyond the grave. It seems
to me that the pure Christian religion taught in the Bible supports a
loving, personal, prescient God


Here you sound like a Jehovas Witness. Are you a Jehovas Witness?


No :-))


Well, your belief seems quite close to theirs, so perhaps you should
consider joining them?


whose goal is to make us become like Him.


Do God really want competitors? Because that's what would happen if we
became like him - that would make us God-like, right?


So you're off with another false assumption. Jesus prayed that we would be
one as He and His Father were one. There is NO competition.


You want Christianity to become polytheistic on a massive scale? That we
all should become gods?

Btw do you, or do you not, believe in the trinity of the Father, the Son
and the Holy Spirit? Or do you belive that the Father is the one and only
god?


All other religions would have us either be groupies to God (even some
Christian religions today advocate that - see Mark Twain's "Letters
from the Earth")), or we "transmigrate" from lower animals to higher
animals to human to ? or we attain nirvana or whatever. They don't seem
reasonable to me. That' what "motivates" my choice. We're all free to
choose, but:

"He chose ... poorly" -- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade


Anyway, George Carlin, in his video "Religion is bull****" (can easily be
found on YouTube), was indeed very very right. I quote from it he

------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the bull**** department, a businessman can hold a candle to a
clergyman. Cause I got to tell you the truth. When it comes to bull**** -
big time, major league, bull**** - you have to stand in awe, in awe of
the all-time champion of false promises and exaggreated claims: religion!
No contest! No contest!

Religion easily has the greatest bull**** story ever told. Think about
it! Religion has actually convinced people that there is an invisible
man, living in the sky, who watches everything you do, every minute and
every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does
not want you to do! And if you do any of these ten things he has a
special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and
anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and
scream and cry, for ever and ever till the end of time!

But he loves you! He loves you, and he NEEDS MONEY! HE ALWAYS NEEDS
MONEY! He's all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, all-wise, but somehow
just can't handle money! Religion takes in billions of dollars, they pay
no taxes, and they always need a little more...

Now, you talk about a good bull**** story - HOLY **** !!!


The fallacy is that he's picking and choosing certain Christian religions,
like the televangelists and a few others (including Reverend Jeff on the
Young Sheldon show). It is not good for a religion to have a paid clergy.


So how should the clergy get food on their table? Or do you expect the
clergy to starve, or to be fed only by the Holy Spirit? :-)


  #423  
Old October 30th 18, 03:01 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Gary Harnagel
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 659
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

On Tuesday, October 30, 2018 at 6:40:20 AM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 1:54:30 PM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:

You see? With your question "The question is, which GOD would you be
most comfortable with?" you admit that man created God, for the
purpose of getting comfort. Because that's your criterion for "The
One True God": the one you feel most comfortable with.... Since
people have different dreams and different desires, they will choose
different "One True God" and all of them are creations by the human
imagination.


But that's what most humans do, even atheists. They choose a nonexistent
God not because it makes sense but because it makes them more comfortable.
Yet they hypocritically assert that it is scientifically correct.


I don't know anyone who motivate their religious belief on scientific
grounds. Do you?


I was mainly referring to atheists but some other religions do too.

Instead it is generally recognized that the existence or non-existence of
some supreme being cannot be determined by science, at least not by our
science today. Now, if the "One True Supreme God" would choose to reveal
itself to us humans on a larger scale, the situation would become very
different. But for some strange reason that hasn't happened in modern
times, despite the description of numerous such revelations have been
described, both in the Bible and in the Holy Scriptures of other religions.
How come? Does the "One Supreme True God" enjoy playing hide-and-seek with
us?


I believe He HAS revealed Himself, it's just that YOUR definition of "reveal"
is different from mine.

Actually, the data only supports that "something" leaves the body at
death that can't be accounted for scientifically.

HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?


Because it hasn't been accounted for scientifically, just like dark matter
hasn't been accounted for scientifically.


There are many measurements of the universe confirming that the visible
matter alone cannot account for the observed movements in and among the
galaxies.


And it is still unexplained. And some scientists disagree:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modifi...onian_dynamics

but I'm not in their camp.

The only measurement of a human body losing weight you can point to is
one single measurement made by one individual in isolation. Even you
admit that it is a very meager set of empirical data. More empirical data
is needed before any reasonably reliable conclusion can be made, either
way.


You keep trying to dismiss the data. Why? Does it make you uncomfortable?

"Barnhardt: Tell me, Hilda, does all this frighten you? Does it make you feel
insecure?
Hilda: Yes, sir, it certainly does.
Barnhardt: That's good, Hilda. I'm glad."

Not your words here. You didn't write "that hasn't been accounted for
scientifically", instead you wrote "that can't be accounted for
scientifically". Thus you are making claims about the ultimate capacity
of science, and in particular about future science.


No, I'm not. English isn't precise enough for you to claim that I was
talking about all future science or just present science. In fact. I
believe that spirits will be detected scientifically some day.


The you shoudln't claim that they "can't be accounted for scientifically"...


Picky, picky. We're both bigger than this pettiness.

WHY DO YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN PREDICT THE FUTURE? Isn't that quite
arrogant?


You sure do jump to unwarranted conclusions fast, don't you :-)


I'm just drawing the natural conclusions from your claims to show you how
exaggreated they are...


In your arrogant opinion.

By religious people like you, it is assumed to be a spirit, of course. A
lot of people are victims of wishful thinking.


Just like atheists are.


Only the hard atheists which claim there cannot be any suprebe being in
existence. You cannot accuse the soft atheists for this, they merely
claim we don't know if there is a supreme being or not.


You're describing agnostics, not atheists.

I mean, who would wish lack of knowledge? Some religious people of course,
but not others.


No one wishes that, but some do unconsciously.

You also assume that those meager data (one measurement by one signle
person, which has never been replicated by anyone else) are trustworthy.
Any sane person would instead want confirmation by other intependent
measurers before finding it worthwhile to even start speculating what it
is. Girst it must determined whether it is, or not.


You keep applying strict scientific procedures as an argument, but you
seem to keep forgetting that I have stated that the PROBABILITY that
spirits exist (and therefore God exists) must make atheists question
their position. Although there are no additional experiments that
confirm MacDougall's data, there are also no experiments that refute it.


And you strongly exaggrregate this probability, calling it "almost
certain", "99%", "99.9%" or whatever.


That's what a scientific analysis concludes. Haven't you investigated that?
Why not? Is it because you can continue to think wishfully?

If it's ACTUALLY a conscious spirit, then it supports a number of
religions and implies that there is life beyond the grave. It seems
to me that the pure Christian religion taught in the Bible supports a
loving, personal, prescient God

Here you sound like a Jehovas Witness. Are you a Jehovas Witness?


No :-))


Well, your belief seems quite close to theirs, so perhaps you should
consider joining them?


No, my beliefs are very different from theirs. If you knew anything about
them, you would know that.

whose goal is to make us become like Him.

Do God really want competitors? Because that's what would happen if we
became like him - that would make us God-like, right?


So you're off with another false assumption. Jesus prayed that we would
be one as He and His Father were one. There is NO competition.


You want Christianity to become polytheistic on a massive scale? That we
all should become gods?


We've already discussed this so there's no point in you trying to repeat
this false argument. Why do you regurgitate a dead debate?

Btw do you, or do you not, believe in the trinity of the Father, the Son
and the Holy Spirit? Or do you belive that the Father is the one and only
god?


We have already discussed this. Christianity, Judaism and Islam ARE
polytheistic in one sense, but in another they are monotheistic.

All other religions would have us either be groupies to God (even some
Christian religions today advocate that - see Mark Twain's "Letters
from the Earth")), or we "transmigrate" from lower animals to higher
animals to human to ? or we attain nirvana or whatever. They don't
seem reasonable to me. That' what "motivates" my choice. We're all
free to choose, but:

"He chose ... poorly" -- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Anyway, George Carlin, in his video "Religion is bull****" (can easily
be found on YouTube), was indeed very very right. I quote from it he

------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the bull**** department, a businessman can hold a candle to a
clergyman. Cause I got to tell you the truth. When it comes to bull****
big time, major league, bull**** - you have to stand in awe, in awe of
the all-time champion of false promises and exaggreated claims:
religion! No contest! No contest!

Religion easily has the greatest bull**** story ever told. Think about
it! Religion has actually convinced people that there is an invisible
man, living in the sky, who watches everything you do, every minute and
every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he
does not want you to do! And if you do any of these ten things he has
a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and
anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke
and scream and cry, for ever and ever till the end of time!

But he loves you! He loves you, and he NEEDS MONEY! HE ALWAYS NEEDS
MONEY! He's all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, all-wise, but
somehow just can't handle money! Religion takes in billions of dollars,
they pay no taxes, and they always need a little more...

Now, you talk about a good bull**** story - HOLY **** !!!


The fallacy is that he's picking and choosing certain Christian religions,
like the televangelists and a few others (including Reverend Jeff on the
Young Sheldon show). It is not good for a religion to have a paid clergy.


So how should the clergy get food on their table? Or do you expect the
clergy to starve, or to be fed only by the Holy Spirit? :-)


Your namesake was a tentmaker and took time off from his ministry from
time to time when he was low on funds.

"After these things Paul departed from Athens, and came to Corinth;

"And found a certain Jew named Aquila, born in Pontus, lately come from
Italy, with his wife Priscilla; (because that Claudius had commanded all
Jews to depart from Rome and came unto them.

"And because he was of the same craft, he abode with them, and wrought:
for by their occupation they were tentmakers." -- Acts 18:1-3.

I expect "clergy" to have an honest occupation, like Paul.
  #424  
Old October 30th 18, 05:34 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Gerald Kelleher
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,551
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

Well, after over 400 posts all I have seen are people betrayed by an empirical icon who spent his later years mocking his idea of God and religion but ended up with a Church service and a burial in Westminister Cathedral no less.

Spiritual people sense something greater than themselves whereas empiricists only recognise that some are greater than others.
  #425  
Old October 31st 18, 12:47 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Mike Collins[_4_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2,824
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

Gary Harnagel wrote:
On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 3:57:17 AM UTC-6, Martin Brown wrote:

On 28/10/2018 09:57, Martin Brown wrote:

Approximately 1 mole of water vapour which is probably about the amount
that would be lost due to evaporative cooling of a still warm corpse
when the heart stops pumping blood around the body.


I had a suspicion that the charlatan quack that did this "experiment"
might be up to no good and now I have some more proof.


My, but you are quick to grasp at straws.

Dogs lack sweat glands except on the paws and predominantly adjust their
body temperature by panting (which obviously stops when they die).

http://www.pethealthnetwork.com/dog-.../do-dogs-sweat

So far from proving that dogs have no souls and humans do all he has
proved is that human sweat glands still work for while after death (as
do many of the other organs which is what makes transplants possible)
and that dogs don't have very many sweat glands at all.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown


You have come to a false conclusion without doing a single calculation!

The first problem is the GUESS that about one mole (18 grams) of water
would be lost from "a still-warm corpse" with NO indication of the time
frame over which that would occur. The amount of water that a human body
loses is normally about 600 grams/day:

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu...rmo/sweat.html

That's 24 grams/hour or about 0.5 grams/minute. The loss of 14 grams
(average) noted by MacDougall occurred in a few seconds. Even with an
elevated temperature of 5°C, the vapor pressure of water increases by
only 30%:

http://intro.chem.okstate.edu/1515sp...e/vpwater.html

Say, 0.7 grams/minute, or less than 0.1 gram in a few seconds.

Unsubstantiated opinions are worthless.


Gary
I’ve kept quiet in this thread because I’ve disputed this experiment with
you before. I have read the paper and it’s crap and wouldn’t have a chance
of publication in a modern journal. Take it from me. A lot of crap papers
get published in journals but none of them are as crappy as this. I don’t
think MacDougall was a fraud but I do think his experimental techniques
were bad.
There’s no proper description of his methods. There are too few subjects to
draw any conclusions. To his credit he wrote that in the paper.
The insensible water loss of 600mL per day is taken as the standard but in
extreme circumstances sweat loss can be as much as ten litres per day. When
somebody is dying from an infectious disease their temperature is usually
raised which increases the sweat rate.
As somebody dies urine is released which will evaporate. And at extreme
sensitivity any weighing method is subject to errors. There’s no
description of the beam balance and it’s entirely possible that small
movements of the subjects or of the medical and nursing staff treating them
would affect the reading. Somebody moving round the bed could have that
effect.
Your statistics are meaningless. There are too few data points.
Another consideration is selection. Unconscious selecting of results often
occurs. I was involved in study lasting years of a urine Down’s syndrome
marker which promised to give a single test with better predictions that
the triple or quadruple blood tests currently used. It was a multi centre
study and my own lab did the assay on thousands of samples. Eventually the
test was shown to be no better than any single one if the current tests.
The problem was that the world authority on Down’s screening who had
initiated the study had unconsciously selected atypical samples in his
initial work.
I think MacDougall did this.
The work on dogs, as already mentioned in the thread would have been done
with a smaller beam balance and was also much more reproducible since he
presumably killed them and therefore knew the exact time of death.
You’re clutching at straws.
Be honest. If you read a global warming paper as lacking in data as this
you’d not give it a second’s thought before dismissing it.
You have to apply the same critical techniques to results you don’t want as
to results you do.
And, as I discussed with you before there a lots of fundamentalist doctors
who would love to repeat these experiments. And I’m sure they have but
since their results didn’t agree with MacDougall they never published.
As for the AWARE study I knew about this before it started. It was going to
prove that out of body near death experiences existed. It failed. Not one
of the subjects identified the targets.
Look critically at the results. A big negative.
And since alien abductions and implants were mentioned there is a real
explanation for these. It’s surprisingly common for people in operating
theatres under general anaesthesia wake up during the operation. Memories
of this are locked away, sometimes for years until something causes them to
surface. Hypnosis can do this. Since they were not fully conscious during
surgery the memories don’t have easy references. They describe distorted
faces with few features (surgical masks), strange looking hands (surgical
gloves) and smooth skin (surgical gowns).
The first man to describe alien abduction had surgery for appendicitis not
long before his hypnotic recall of the abduction.


  #426  
Old October 31st 18, 04:05 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Gary Harnagel
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 659
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

On Tuesday, October 30, 2018 at 5:47:13 PM UTC-6, Mike Collins wrote:
Gary Harnagel wrote:

On Monday, October 29, 2018 at 3:57:17 AM UTC-6, Martin Brown wrote:

On 28/10/2018 09:57, Martin Brown wrote:

Approximately 1 mole of water vapour which is probably about the
amount that would be lost due to evaporative cooling of a still
warm corpse when the heart stops pumping blood around the body.

I had a suspicion that the charlatan quack that did this "experiment"
might be up to no good and now I have some more proof.


My, but you are quick to grasp at straws.

Dogs lack sweat glands except on the paws and predominantly adjust their
body temperature by panting (which obviously stops when they die).

http://www.pethealthnetwork.com/dog-.../do-dogs-sweat

So far from proving that dogs have no souls and humans do all he has
proved is that human sweat glands still work for while after death (as
do many of the other organs which is what makes transplants possible)
and that dogs don't have very many sweat glands at all.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown


You have come to a false conclusion without doing a single calculation!

The first problem is the GUESS that about one mole (18 grams) of water
would be lost from "a still-warm corpse" with NO indication of the time
frame over which that would occur. The amount of water that a human body
loses is normally about 600 grams/day:

http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu...rmo/sweat.html

That's 24 grams/hour or about 0.5 grams/minute. The loss of 14 grams
(average) noted by MacDougall occurred in a few seconds. Even with an
elevated temperature of 5°C, the vapor pressure of water increases by
only 30%:

http://intro.chem.okstate.edu/1515sp...e/vpwater.html

Say, 0.7 grams/minute, or less than 0.1 gram in a few seconds.

Unsubstantiated opinions are worthless.


Gary
I’ve kept quiet in this thread because I’ve disputed this experiment with
you before. I have read the paper and it’s crap and wouldn’t have a chance
of publication in a modern journal.


In what way was it "crap""

Take it from me. A lot of crap papers get published in journals but none
of them are as crappy as this. I don’t think MacDougall was a fraud but
I do think his experimental techniques were bad.
There’s no proper description of his methods.


What would you consider "proper"?

There are too few subjects to draw any conclusions.


We all agree on this, but statistical analysis STILL gives a surprisingly
high confidence level.

To his credit he wrote that in the paper.

The insensible water loss of 600mL per day is taken as the standard but
in extreme circumstances sweat loss can be as much as ten litres per day.


10 kg seems extreme. Do you have any reference for that?

Nevertheless, let's go with that. 10000 gm/day is about 400 gm/hour, or
7 grams/minute. A minute is a LONG time. That's still less than 1 gram
in 10 seconds. That takes care of THAT objection.

When somebody is dying from an infectious disease their temperature is
usually raised which increases the sweat rate.


That was taken into account in the 10 liters/day assumption.

As somebody dies urine is released which will evaporate.


Evaporation doesn't happen instantaneously.

And at extreme sensitivity any weighing method is subject to errors.


MacDougall reported sensitivity as 1/16 to 1/8 ounce.

There’s no description of the beam balance and it’s entirely possible that
small movements of the subjects


MacDougall chose patients who were moribund, specifically, those with
terminal TB.

or of the medical and nursing staff treating them would affect the reading.
Somebody moving round the bed could have that effect.


Experiments where interference occurred were not included in the four cases
where results were included. You claim to have read his paper so I'm
surprised you are unaware of these things.

Your statistics are meaningless. There are too few data points.


This is dead wrong. Statistical analysis has set procedures and methods
for calculating confidence levels. I followed them. Your claim is what
is meaningless because YOU haven't done the analysis. Do that and SHOW
where I made a mistake.

Another consideration is selection. Unconscious selecting of results often
occurs. I was involved in study lasting years of a urine Down’s syndrome
marker which promised to give a single test with better predictions that
the triple or quadruple blood tests currently used. It was a multi centre
study and my own lab did the assay on thousands of samples. Eventually the
test was shown to be no better than any single one if the current tests.
The problem was that the world authority on Down’s screening who had
initiated the study had unconsciously selected atypical samples in his
initial work.
I think MacDougall did this.


Well, he DID choose moribund TB patients.

The work on dogs, as already mentioned in the thread would have been done
with a smaller beam balance and was also much more reproducible since he
presumably killed them and therefore knew the exact time of death.
You’re clutching at straws.


Pot, kettle, black :-)

Be honest. If you read a global warming paper as lacking in data as this
you’d not give it a second’s thought before dismissing it..


You're comparing apples to acorns. I use MacDougall's data to cast DOUBT
on the ASSERTION that humans don't have spirits.

You have to apply the same critical techniques to results you don’t want
as to results you do.


Casting doubt on a theory isn't the same thing as believing whole-heartedly
in one.

And, as I discussed with you before there a lots of fundamentalist doctors
who would love to repeat these experiments.


And ALL hospital administrators and nurses are dead set against it.

And I’m sure they have but since their results didn’t agree with MacDougall
they never published.


Assertion without evidence. And YOU should know that MacDougall's work
has NO chance of being repeated today because of moral objection as well
as the greater degree of medical intervention due to technology.

As for the AWARE study I knew about this before it started. It was going to
prove that out of body near death experiences existed. It failed. Not one
of the subjects identified the targets.
Look critically at the results. A big negative.


It wasn't set up properly. They realized that after they winnowed the
patients down to 1 after starting from over 2000.

And since alien abductions and implants were mentioned there is a real
explanation for these. It’s surprisingly common for people in operating
theatres under general anaesthesia wake up during the operation. Memories
of this are locked away, sometimes for years until something causes them to
surface. Hypnosis can do this. Since they were not fully conscious during
surgery the memories don’t have easy references. They describe distorted
faces with few features (surgical masks), strange looking hands (surgical
gloves) and smooth skin (surgical gowns).
The first man to describe alien abduction had surgery for appendicitis not
long before his hypnotic recall of the abduction.


Interesting :-)
  #427  
Old October 31st 18, 05:22 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Paul Schlyter[_3_]
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Posts: 1,344
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 07:01:55 -0700 (PDT), Gary Harnagel
wrote:
I don't know anyone who motivate their religious belief on

scientific
grounds. Do you?


I was mainly referring to atheists but some other religions do too.


Apart from Christian Science, which religiond do that?


science today. Now, if the "One True Supreme God" would choose to

reveal
itself to us humans on a larger scale, the situation would become

very
different. But for some strange reason that hasn't happened in

modern
times, despite the description of numerous such revelations have

been
described, both in the Bible and in the Holy Scriptures of other

religions.
How come? Does the "One Supreme True God" enjoy playing

hide-and-seek with
us?


I believe He HAS revealed Himself, it's just that YOUR definition

of "reveal"
is different from mine.


A genuine revelation would also convince skeptics and non-believers.
Like e.g. a total solar eclipse, after the eclipse only maniacs would
deny that it happened. An all-powerful God who wants people to
acknowledge his existence could easily do that. So why doesn't it
happen?


There are many measurements of the universe confirming that the

visible
matter alone cannot account for the observed movements in and

among the
galaxies.


And it is still unexplained. And some scientists disagree:


Does it disturb you that there are phenomena for which we have found
no scientific explanation yet?

If science had explanations for everything, then there would be no
new science left to do...

However, even if we don't yet know what dark matter is, there is
still plenty of good evidence that dark matter does exist.

The only measurement of a human body losing weight you can point

to is
one single measurement made by one individual in isolation. Even

you
admit that it is a very meager set of empirical data. More

empirical data
is needed before any reasonably reliable conclusion can be made,

either
way.


You keep trying to dismiss the data. Why? Does it make you

uncomfortable?

Not particularly. But it is disturbing that you are so overly
confident in it. It is like trying to talk to a UFO zealot.

Just like atheists are.


Only the hard atheists which claim there cannot be any suprebe

being in
existence. You cannot accuse the soft atheists for this, they

merely
claim we don't know if there is a supreme being or not.


You're describing agnostics, not atheists.


I was actually talking about non-theists in general. The hard
atheists you refer to are a small minority.


And you strongly exaggrregate this probability, calling it

"almost
certain", "99%", "99.9%" or whatever.


That's what a scientific analysis concludes. Haven't you

investigated that?
Why not? Is it because you can continue to think wishfully?


Please describe your scientific analysis in more detail, and in
particular how you handle the possibility of systematic errors.
Confidence levels can handle only random errors, not systematic
errors.

Here you sound like a Jehovas Witness. Are you a Jehovas

Witness?

No :-))


Well, your belief seems quite close to theirs, so perhaps you

should
consider joining them?


No, my beliefs are very different from theirs. If you knew

anything about
them, you would know that.


What's the difference? You criticise all contemporary churches and
want to return to Christianity as described in the Bible. Jehovas
Witnesses also want to do this. So in that respect you are very much
like them.

Btw do you, or do you not, believe in the trinity of the Father,

the Son
and the Holy Spirit? Or do you belive that the Father is the one

and only
god?


We have already discussed this. Christianity, Judaism and Islam ARE
polytheistic in one sense, but in another they are monotheistic.


Judaism is older than the Christian doctrine of trinity. And Islam
rejects it and considers it to be polytheism. Didn't you know that?

I'm only trying to find out if your Christian belief is of the
Nicaean or the non-Nicaean kind. If you are Nicaean, you accept the
doctrines from the church council of Nicaea in AD 325, and if you are
non-Nicaean you reject them.
  #428  
Old October 31st 18, 07:45 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Paul Schlyter[_3_]
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Posts: 1,344
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

In article ,
says...

On Tuesday, October 30, 2018 at 6:40:20 AM UTC-6, Paul Schlyter wrote:


By religious people like you, it is assumed to be a spirit,
of course. A lot of people are victims of wishful thinking.

Just like atheists are.


Only the hard atheists which claim there cannot be any suprebe being in
existence. You cannot accuse the soft atheists for this, they merely
claim we don't know if there is a supreme being or not.


You're describing agnostics, not atheists.


I'm mostly describing myself here. I consider myself an agnostic, but you
have called me an atheist several times. Which means that in your
vocabulary, someone who claims we don't know if there is a supreme being
or not is an atheist.



The only measurement of a human body losing weight you can point tois
one single measurement made by one individual in isolation. Even you
admit that it is a very meager set of empirical data. More empirical
data is needed before any reasonably reliable conclusion can be
made, either way.


You keep trying to dismiss the data. Why? Does it make you
uncomfortable?



I mean, who would wish lack of knowledge? Some religious people of
course, but not others.


No one wishes that, but some do unconsciously.

You also assume that those meager data (one measurement by one
signle
person, which has never been replicated by anyone else) are trustworthy.
Any sane person would instead want confirmation by other intependent
measurers before finding it worthwhile to even start speculating what it
is. Girst it must determined whether it is, or not.

You keep applying strict scientific procedures as an argument, but you
seem to keep forgetting that I have stated that the PROBABILITY that
spirits exist (and therefore God exists) must make atheists question
their position. Although there are no additional experiments that
confirm MacDougall's data, there are also no experiments that refute it.


And you strongly exaggrregate this probability, calling it "almost
certain", "99%", "99.9%" or whatever.


That's what a scientific analysis concludes. Haven't you investigated that?
Why not? Is it because you can continue to think wishfully?



I have now found, and read, the Wikipedia article about this experiment,
which can be found he

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/21_grams_experiment

And I have to conclude that you're a fraud, a chead, and a liar. SInce
you call yourself a Christian, let me remind you of the 8th commandment:

"Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour"

If you're not a hypocrite, you should take this seriously.

So how did you lie? Well, you admitted that the data from MacDouball is
meager, and has not been replicated. But you have falsely claimed that
there is no data suggesting that the human body does not lose mass at
death. And then you have, several times, asked "isn't one measurement
more statistically significant than no measurements?". And you've been
babbling about 99% confidence leve, "almost certain", and other nonsense.

Well, guess what? There **are** measurements failing to show that the
human body loses weight at the moment of death. To be more precise, these
measurements were performed my MacDougall himself !!!

MacDougall measured the weight of six different people while they were
dying. In five of these six cases he failed to find any weight loss at
the moment of dearth. In only one of these six cases did he find a weight
loss at the moment of death.

MacDougall himself stated that the experiment would have to be repeated
many times before any conclusions could be made. But it has not been
repeated by anyone else, so therefore we cannot conclude that the human
body loses weight at the moment of death. In the available data, it did
not lose weitgh at the moment of death in 5 cases out of 6.

You write "That's what a scientific analysis concludes. Haven't you
investigated that?" about your claimed 99% confidence level. Now, please
share your scientific "analyssis" which concludes, with 99% confidence
level, that the human body loses weight at the moment of death when in 5
of the 6 available cases it does **not**. Describe your method in enough
detail so it can be repeated by anyone who wishes to do so. Your
description should include:

1. Initial assumptions.
2. The method you have chosen.
3. The initial data.
4. Your calculations.
5. Your result.
6. Your conclusion, including the motivation for your conclusion.

I'm awaiting your description. If it doesn't arrive, I see that as a
confirmation that you indeed are a fraud, a cheat, a liar and a con
artist.


  #429  
Old October 31st 18, 11:09 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Quadibloc
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 7,018
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

On Tuesday, October 30, 2018 at 9:05:25 PM UTC-6, Gary Harnagel wrote:

We all agree on this, but statistical analysis STILL gives a surprisingly
high confidence level.


As has already been noted in this thread, that gives exactly no confidence
regarding _systematic_ error, as opposed to random error.

John Savard
  #430  
Old October 31st 18, 05:17 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Gerald Kelleher
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Posts: 1,551
Default Neil DeGrasse Tyson headed down same loony road as Carl Sagan?

The Northern European cultures once celebrated the great annual cycle on this night with its counterpart on May 1st as nature goes into dormancy or emerges into complete bloom around these dates. It coincides with Polar night after 6 weeks of twilight at the North Pole as that latitudinal point along with the entire Northern hemisphere turns away from the Sun as a function of the orbital motion of the Earth.

Most people are cool and feel the changes as this is where all Northern hemisphere people come together as the golden leaves start to disappear from the trees and hedges -

https://www.pinterest.ie/pin/1911215...92050/?lp=true

You poor people can't let things go in order to be refreshed by perspectives that are before you every moment of your lives but choose to waste your talents on things that do not matter. That being the case it is much easier to show what is good about astronomy and the links between cause and effects both in general and in detail.


 




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