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Interesting Stuff Thread

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Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 17,736 ✭✭✭✭kylith


    Galvasean wrote: »
    That was my initial reaction too.
    Me too. I feel sorry for his ex-fiancée, but I'm glad he's happy.
    Dades wrote: »
    Is it a hormonal thing? Surely genetic refers to how our brains are wired from birth - which is fine. But isn't this just suggesting that a rewiring can happen when the brain is damaged and works naturally to overcome damage?

    I don't think this goes against the notion that people are born gay. On the contrary it complements the idea that our brains are wired a certain way.
    My only worry is that it could lead to some idiots labelling gay people 'brain damaged'.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    I'm giving up backflips.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    ^^^ Homophobe!


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,038 ✭✭✭sponsoredwalk


    recedite wrote: »
    I'm giving up backflips.

    Always knew you were a backflipper... :D


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,406 ✭✭✭Pompey Magnus


    Dades wrote: »
    I don't think this goes against the notion that people are born gay. On the contrary it complements the idea that our brains are wired a certain way.

    I think the worry may be that if it is down to how the brain is wired there may well be certain Christian groups sitting up to attention at this story, if this kind of thing works one way there is no reason to assume it can't work the other.

    The Ex-Gay Movement in the US is growing and is a relatively big business nowadays, the Attorney General of the US opposed the movement earlier this year by saying that there is growing scientific evidence that sexual orientation is an "immutable" characteristic. This story would provide the Ex-Gay Movement with ammunition to suggest that the scientific evidence may have been wrong and their argument that gay people can be "cured" would be strengthened.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    robindch wrote: »

    ^^^ Daily Mail reader !!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    if this kind of thing works one way there is no reason to assume it can't work the other.

    Forward flips then?


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Toronto zoo is to separate a pair of overly friendly male penguins.

    http://thedailyedge.thejournal.ie/gay-penguins-separated-at-toronto-zoo-275716-Nov2011/

    Meanwhile, here's how China got to hear about the story:



  • Registered Users Posts: 3,038 ✭✭✭sponsoredwalk


    Malaria is a disease caused by parasites passed to humans via the
    bites of infected mosquitoes. Globally, the disease causes over a
    million deaths every year, and is especially rife in parts of Africa and
    Asia. The parasites infect red blood corpuscles (the hemoglobin-
    containing cells that carry oxygen around the body) and hijack the
    support structure within the cells. Some people are known to be
    naturally resistant to the serious effects of malaria, and scientists
    have wondered for decades exactly how their resistance functions.
    Now new research gone a long way to solving the mystery.

    link
    The comments section indicates a libertarian perspective on the above.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,585 ✭✭✭lynski


    kylith wrote: »
    Me too. I feel sorry for his ex-fiancée, but I'm glad he's happy.

    My only worry is that it could lead to some idiots labelling gay people 'brain damaged'.

    Well, I was telling my husband about the rugby player the other day and how it reminded me of the story that my mother tells about a much loved, now deceased Irish singer. As far as she and her friends were aware he was a devil for the ladies, especially married ones, in his youth and he got caught by a husband who beat the living daylights out of him resulting in a blow to the head and waking up with 'the gay'. he was never out, just assumed to be gay.
    she genuinely believed that another blow could knock him the other way.
    i think this very straight rugby player possibly had some damage in the prefrontal cortex which controls inhibition so previously buried inclinations got unburied.
    Who doesn't know someone that is so far in the closet they do not even know there is a closet?
    unfortunately this does give fuel to the pray out the gay brigade and more ammo to aim at confused young people adding to the pile-o-misery created and perpetuated by various religions


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  • Registered Users Posts: 26,578 ✭✭✭✭Turtwig


    Neil DeGrasse Tyson is on Reddit right now answering questions! !
    My fav so far :

    If you could add one course to a student's curriculum, what would it be?

    Course title every university should offer: "How to tell when someone else is full of ****"


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Malty_T wrote: »
    "How to tell when someone else is full of ****"
    Funny, but this was something that catholic-controlled schools never taught.


  • Registered Users Posts: 26,578 ✭✭✭✭Turtwig


    robindch wrote: »
    Funny, but this was something that catholic-controlled schools never taught intentionally.

    FYP


  • Registered Users Posts: 26,578 ✭✭✭✭Turtwig


    If he ever does pass away - and I sincerely hope that isn't for several decades yet- then this should be his tribute. What a fitting one it is too. Truly an excellent youtube gem.



  • Registered Users Posts: 5,406 ✭✭✭Pompey Magnus




  • Registered Users Posts: 4,718 ✭✭✭The Mad Hatter


    Neutrinos still refusing to obey the laws of physics
    The scientists who appeared to have found in September that certain subatomic particles can travel faster than light have ruled out one potential source of error in their measurements after completing a second, fine-tuned version of their experiment.

    Their results, posted on the ArXiv preprint server on Friday morning and submitted for peer review in the Journal of High Energy Physics, confirmed earlier measurements that neutrinos, sent through the ground from Cern near Geneva to the Gran Sasso lab in Italy 450 miles (720km) away seemed to travel faster than light.

    The finding that neutrinos might break one of the most fundamental laws of physics sent scientists into a frenzy when it was first reported in September. Not only because it appeared to go against Albert Einstein's theory of special relativity but, if correct, the finding opened up the troubling possibility of being able to send information back in time, blurring the line between past and present and wreaking havoc with the fundamental principle of cause and effect.

    The physicist and TV presenter Professor Jim Al-Khalili of the University of Surrey expressed the incredulity of many in the field when he said that if the findings "prove to be correct and neutrinos have broken the speed of light, I will eat my boxer shorts on live TV".


  • Moderators Posts: 51,683 ✭✭✭✭Delirium


    AC Grayling - Making a case for atheism

    “We no longer have reason to fear the invisible policeman,” declares A.C. Grayling defiantly. One of the world's most revered philosophers and the first Master of London's recently-established New College of the Humanities, the author of more than 30 books, a director of the acclaimed Prospect Magazine and a frequent contributor to many newspapers, Grayling was giving the first in a series of lectures organised by Atheist Ireland. Grayling observed that it was the atrocities of 9-11 that reawakened the world to the dangers of intolerant religious ideologies. Since then the atheist campaign has become a media circus and attracted a glittering collection of eminences, including Steven Pinker, Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, who have deployed political and scientific arguments against religion with varying degrees of success.

    While most of their arguments have been as notable for their rancour and vitriol as their intellectual rigour, Grayling's approach has been different. Instead he is quiet, concentrated and conscious of the full implications of what he says, and it's because of this that his philosophical case for atheism is more impressive than any other. Grayling seeks to advance the atheist position by providing cast-iron intellectual justification for not believing in a supreme being - rather than by simply depicting his opponents as fools, charlatans and bigots. Grayling also upholds the value of an entirely secular world because he believes that, for a whole range of moral and ethical reasons, it would be a far better place to live.

    Full article here

    If you can read this, you're too close!



  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    koth wrote: »
    AC Grayling - Making a case for atheism
    He also sees it as “wonderful” and “refreshing” that a country that was once so tightly in the grip of the Catholic Church as Ireland was can elect a Humanist like Michael D. Higgins as President.

    Interesting to see an outside perspective on this; its not something that came up much in the presidential campaign, but that in itself is very significant. A few years ago he would have been knobbled very effectively by the RCC from the outset.


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    Just found out today the privately run creche/montessori my 3.5-year-old daughter is going to as part of the Early Childcare initiative, is providing religious instruction as a free extra:

    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=75543651

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



  • Registered Users Posts: 238 ✭✭dmw07


    Stolen from boreme

    Irish-American philosopher and writer on many subjects Terence McKenna, gives a poetic rant on the great evil that flourishes in the minds of many - relativism, or the lack of distinction between s**t and Shinola



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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,872 ✭✭✭strobe


    ninja900 wrote: »
    Just found out today the privately run creche/montessori my 3.5-year-old daughter is going to as part of the Early Childcare initiative, is providing religious instruction as a free extra:

    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=75543651

    :mad:

    For fuck sake.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,553 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    ninja900 wrote: »
    Just found out today the privately run creche/montessori my 3.5-year-old daughter is going to as part of the Early Childcare initiative, is providing religious instruction as a free extra:

    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=75543651
    That's a shocker. :eek:

    I feel for you - you can't really ask for a 3/4 yr old to be separated from the other kids so you really just have to suck it up.

    Last month we visited the Montessori my cherub will be going to in September and I surreptitiously scoped the place for iconography. It was clean.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,872 ✭✭✭strobe


    Dades wrote: »
    Last month we visited the Montessori my cherub will be going to in September and I surreptitiously scoped the place for iconography. It was clean.

    Going by the good ninja's situation I'd do more than look out for gruesome, guy being tortured, statuettes, man. Best to ask them straight up, I reckon.

    (Although I'd presume (hope) his deal is the exception rather than the norm...)


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,553 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    Well it was a fairly thorough walk through of the (half) day. Took about 40 mins all told.

    I guess ya never know though what goes on when the door shuts though my little spy will keep me in the loop.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,585 ✭✭✭lynski


    strobe wrote: »
    Going by the good ninja's situation I'd do more than look out for gruesome, guy being tortured, statuettes, man. Best to ask them straight up, I reckon.

    (Although I'd presume (hope) his deal is the exception rather than the norm...)

    Nope it seems to be the norm, in my experience. Most parents i have asked say they children were at least taught a grace before meals. I was very suspicious of christmas stuff last yr and it was all fine in the end, but they were quite sensitive as there was a few none rcc in the class.
    waiting for the holy god stuff from the daughters place this yr tho. son as now started in an et primary school so he now knows more about hindu customs then rcc ones as that is all they have covered so far. hehe


  • Registered Users Posts: 238 ✭✭dmw07


    I found this little piece about how the arrow of time is not an intrinsic property of physics, but rather an emergent feature interesting. Perhaps an insight into why we are here, and why we are the way we are. I mean we understand and can explain evolution but why exactly does evolution do what it does.



  • Closed Accounts Posts: 31,967 ✭✭✭✭Sarky




  • Registered Users Posts: 238 ✭✭dmw07


    Sarky wrote: »

    Where the second team St. Clabbert's science department?


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Sarky wrote: »
    Magnetic cows?
    Where's Gary Larson!?


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  • Moderators Posts: 51,683 ✭✭✭✭Delirium


    Sarky wrote: »

    I'm going to need a bigger fridge :P

    If you can read this, you're too close!



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