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Interesting Stuff Thread

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  • #2282
    Pushtrak
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,640 ✭✭✭Pushtrak


    http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-religion-analytical-thinking-20120427,0,5374010.story
    Those who think more analytically are less inclined to be religious believers than are those who tend to follow a gut instinct, researchers conclude.
    Read more at the link. I'll also post the concluding bit of the article...
    So does this mean that religious faith can be undermined with just a little extra mental effort? Not really, said Nicholas Epley, a social psychologist at the University of Chicago who was not involved in the study. But it does show that belief isn't set in stone, but can respond to a person's context.

    "There's an illusion that our brains are more static than they actually are," he said. "We have fundamental beliefs and values that we hold, and those things seem sticky, constant. But it's easier to get movement on something fundamental."

    As for whether this should alarm the layperson, Epley shrugged. "Even deeply religious people will point out they have had moments of doubt," he said.


  • #2283
    Turtwig
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,578 ✭✭✭✭Turtwig


    Pushtrak wrote: »
    http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-religion-analytical-thinking-20120427,0,5374010.story

    Read more at the link. I'll also post the concluding bit of the article...

    *Cough* *five posts up from yours*

    (Or four posts up on the previous page if you're awesome.:D)


  • #2284
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,458 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Via /.:

    See what Dublin would look like with an extra 7m of sea level:

    http://flood.firetree.net/?ll=53.3642,-6.2468&z=4

    Discovery crashes planes for curiosity's sake:

    http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2012/04/discovery-channel-crashes-plane-for-documentary.html

    Primordial soup available near Oslo:

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/47225834#.T55-CNntPCp


  • #2285
    Dades
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,583 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    robindch wrote: »
    Via /.:

    See what Dublin would look like with an extra 7m of sea level:

    http://flood.firetree.net/?ll=53.3642,-6.2468&z=4
    I'll have a close-to-seafront property if we get a 7m rise...

    .. ker-CHING! :pac:


  • #2286
    Pushtrak
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,640 ✭✭✭Pushtrak


    Dades wrote: »
    I'll have a close-to-seafront property if we get a 7m rise...

    .. ker-CHING! :pac:
    Evilution will have to give me gills or I'm fecked.


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  • #2287
    magicbastarder
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 52,218 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    interesting that o'connell street seems untouched by a 6m rise.


  • #2288
    Sonics2k
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,034 ✭✭✭Sonics2k


    It's a shame it's not another 20m :pac:


  • #2289
    joseph brand
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,540 ✭✭✭joseph brand


    True size of Africa.

    http://flowingdata.com/2010/10/18/true-size-of-africa/

    Antarctica

    http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/Antarctica/ComparativeSize.jpg

    Texas- Europe

    http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l5tqi4g02Y1qz8guyo1_500.jpg

    British Isles-Antarctica

    http://scentofpine.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/antarctica_map.jpg


  • #2290
    smokingman
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,773 ✭✭✭smokingman


    robindch wrote: »
    Via /.:

    See what Dublin would look like with an extra 7m of sea level:

    http://flood.firetree.net/?ll=53.3642,-6.2468&z=4

    Looks like I'm safe as long as it's not between 50 and 60 metres :)
    "Build your house on a hill son, 'tis the only way..."

    Suddenly my Dads old fashioned words have discovered some climatological meaning! :cool:


  • #2291
    Gbear
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,775 ✭✭✭✭Gbear


    Dades wrote: »
    I'll have a close-to-seafront property if we get a 7m rise...

    .. ker-CHING! :pac:

    You can zoom out and scroll around the place.

    Look at the Netherlands with +7 :eek:

    I have to say I wonder is it accurate.

    7m is about 23ft. Ignoring the Netherlands, it doesn't seem to be that serious, particularly around cork.

    I would've thought half the city would be under water.


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  • #2292
    shizz
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,506 ✭✭✭shizz


    I'm guessing it's just going by terrain altitude. Look at Australia after i think 20m? The middle of it s flooded.


  • #2293
    Delirium
    Moderators Posts: 52,024 ✭✭✭✭Delirium


    Highly Religious People Are Less Motivated by Compassion Than Are Non-Believers
    "Love thy neighbor" is preached from many a pulpit. But new research from the University of California, Berkeley, suggests that the highly religious are less motivated by compassion when helping a stranger than are atheists, agnostics and less religious people.

    In three experiments, social scientists found that compassion consistently drove less religious people to be more generous. For highly religious people, however, compassion was largely unrelated to how generous they were, according to the findings which are published in the most recent online issue of the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science.

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



  • #2294
    Mark Hamill
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,834 ✭✭✭Mark Hamill


    Saw this on the "Photo's that shook the world" thread:
    7124516455_e96136074b_b.jpg

    150 gigapixel image of a section of the Milky Way, comprised of a billion suns like our own. It represents less than 1% of the galaxy.

    Zoom in to see each star.

    http://djer.roe.ac.uk/vsa/vvv/iipmooviewer-2.0-beta/vvvgps5.html


  • #2295
    recedite
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,989 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    Lizard found with a placenta*

    * this upgrade not normally available to reptiles


  • #2296
    joseph brand
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,540 ✭✭✭joseph brand


    recedite wrote: »
    Lizard found with a placenta*

    * this upgrade not normally available to reptiles

    Also from that site:

    Does Rain Come From Life in the Clouds?
    The size and composition of each particle flash across Prather’s monitor. The specks at the heart of those ice crystals are high in aluminum, iron, silicon, and titanium, the chemical signatures of dust not from California but from faraway deserts in Asia or even Africa. There’s something else in the crystals too: carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus, telltale signs of biological cells...

    Does this mean that there's microbes, bacteria or living cells high above us?


  • #2297
    Sarky
    Closed Accounts Posts: 31,967 ✭✭✭✭Sarky


    Bacteria live everywhere.


  • #2298
    magicbastarder
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 52,218 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    bill hicks writes to someone who is not a fan


  • #2299
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,458 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Patrick Moore hasn't quite got over WWII:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2137652/Patrick-Moore-says-hates-Germans-70-years-Nazi-bomb-killed-fianc-e.html


  • #2300
    Genghiz Cohen
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,182 ✭✭✭Genghiz Cohen


    Mark Hamill wrote: »
    Saw this on the "Photo's that shook the world" thread:
    7124516455_e96136074b_b.jpg

    150 gigapixel image of a section of the Milky Way, comprised of a billion suns like our own. It represents less than 1% of the galaxy.

    Zoom in to see each star.

    http://djer.roe.ac.uk/vsa/vvv/iipmooviewer-2.0-beta/vvvgps5.html

    203180.jpg

    I found him!


  • #2301
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,458 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    The Russian church still has money. The exchange rate is roughly 40 rubles to one euro:

    http://englishrussia.com/2012/05/01/the-plant-of-the-russian-orthodox-church/


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  • #2302
    Sarky
    Closed Accounts Posts: 31,967 ✭✭✭✭Sarky


    robindch wrote: »
    Patrick Moore hasn't quite got over WWII:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2137652/Patrick-Moore-says-hates-Germans-70-years-Nazi-bomb-killed-fianc-e.html

    That's kind of disappointing to me. I'm quite fond of Patrick Moore, but that kind of stuff makes it hard to look up to him.


  • #2303
    magicbastarder
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 52,218 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    he's well known for his 'old fashioned' opinions.
    he's not too fond of uppity women, if i remember correctly.


  • #2304
    recedite
    Closed Accounts Posts: 13,989 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    ‘A German general said to me at the end of the war, “You won two wars. You won’t win the third. And that’s the economic war.” I hope he’s wrong
    How could Germans take control of Europe's finances? Oh wait.....


  • #2305
    Turtwig
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,578 ✭✭✭✭Turtwig


    Our Oldest Ancestor.


  • #2306
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,458 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2012/0501/1224315408779.html
    Irish Times wrote:
    THE GOVERNMENT is expected to agree today to back legislation giving humanists the same status as organised religions and civil registrars in conducting marriage ceremonies. Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton is due to ask her ministerial colleagues to support the Civil Registration (Amendment) Bill at this morning’s Cabinet meeting. The legislation was introduced in the Seanad as a Private Members’ Bill by Trinity College Senator Ivana Bacik and is due to pass final stages in the Upper House tomorrow.

    [...]

    There had been “no real progress” until the change of government last year, when Ms Bacik agreed to take up their cause. “As the law stands presently a couple cannot have a legally binding, nonreligious marriage ceremony on a Saturday, as the State registrars work only Monday to Friday,” he added. The proportion of couples choosing a non-religious, civil wedding ceremony in Ireland has increased from 6 per cent in 1996 to more than 23 per cent in 2006, according to the Central Statistics Office. Humanism is defined as “an ethical philosophy of life, based on a concern for humanity, which combines reason with compassion”. The HAI has nine accredited celebrants who conducted 153 marriage ceremonies last year.


  • #2307
    Mark Hamill
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,834 ✭✭✭Mark Hamill


    Its very simple - the government should just have a system where any couple, over 18, and acting of their own free will, can get registered on a civil marriage register (and then have the same rights/responsibilities any married couple currently has). Then people can have whatever private religious/non-religious/Klingon etc ceremony they want. If the government only cares about the civil register and has no say about the private ceremony, then we wont need to constantly have to get humanist weddings or gay marriages or whatever added to the law books as separate, possibly lesser, entities.


  • #2308
    magicbastarder
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 52,218 CMod ✭✭✭✭magicbastarder


    Mark Hamill wrote: »
    Its very simple - the government should just have a system where any couple, over 18, and acting of their own free will, can get registered on a civil marriage register (and then have the same rights/responsibilities any married couple currently has). Then people can have whatever private religious/non-religious/Klingon etc ceremony they want.
    the system does allow this (assuming the couple are not same sex).
    what it doesn't allow is for you to have the two together in the same ceremony, unless you're religious.


  • #2309
    Turtwig
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,578 ✭✭✭✭Turtwig


    Wallpaper fodder.:D


  • #2310
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 25,611 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Jernal wrote: »
    Wallpaper fodder.:D

    Wonder how much it'd be to get that printed as a poster.


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  • #2311
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,458 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Latest "persecuted" christian loses case:

    http://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2012/05/latest-persecuted-christian-case-dismissed-by-employment-tribunal

    Reading the report, I can't help but think of a recent, but now sadly permanently departed, poster:
    NSS wrote:
    However, when Sue James, current chief executive of Derby's hospitals was called to give evidence, she revealed that Dr Drew produced a "toxic environment" at the hospital by constantly raising complaints against his co-workers. Mrs James said: "For two and a half years we had a relationship that wasn't working." [...] "It was about the verbosity and length of his emails. He deconstructed every sentence and sent it to so many people." Mrs James said she was soon being sent numerous emails from Dr Drew complaining about the report's findings. She said: "I was the chief executive running the hospital and David was taking up one day of my personal time a week. We needed to move forward."


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