What can science not explain?

24-03-2016 10:25PM

By some coincidence todays Sci Show is all about Neanderthals and what we know about them.

XLR 8 · 24-03-2016 10:30PM

ceecee14 wrote: »

How can Salmon come in from the Atlantic Ocean and find its way miles up the tiny little stream it was born on..

Also, how come we can make crazy things like USB Memory sticks, CDs, Spaceships that can make it to Mars, bit no cure for cancer?

There's no money in a cure.

Wibbs · 24-03-2016 11:02PM

EndaHonesty wrote: »

How many species extinctions are Australian Aborigines responsible for?

I know I said earlier, but in case some readers think you may have valid points, rather than an "argument" based around "you're wrong!!!

Link Uno

Link Dos

As is noted there is quite the bit of politicals attached to the question. Understandable, given how appallingly native Australians have been treated*, but it looks pretty damned conclusive that they were a major factor in the Oz extinction event. Just like every other modern human group moving into virgin territory.

*treated sounds way too benevolent. Apartheid SA at times was a liberal paradise by comparison. And that's before we get to the Tasmanians..

ScumLord · 25-03-2016 02:08AM

Wibbs wrote: »

One interesting thing about them is though they were serious level apex predators they didn't cause any wide scale large animal extinctions in all the time they were around. They hit a prey/predator ratio equilibrium and it stuck, like any other apex predator.

We don't. Even without direct datable evidence like tools in situ you can pretty much track our progress across the world by the sudden extinctions of animals. So if an area only has evidence so far found of a later date, yet there's a sudden unexplained die off of animals before that date, then keep digging chances are you'll find us. Australian Aborigines are often seen as "one with nature" and all that stuff, yet they wiped out a shítload of species soon after they got there

Bunny rabbits and frogs are causing an extinction level event in Australia (I know it's technically our fault but still, bunny rabbits), that ecosystem just can't take a hit. For a country that has some of the most deadly animals on the planet it has some major weaknesses. But it goes to show we can't really hold the extinctions that followed early human expansions against the people of the time. They were probably no more aware of the damage they were doing than the rabbits in Australia. We've only been fully aware of our impact for a relatively short amount of time.

Native north Americans seemed to have struck a balance after a shaky start once humans expanded into that continent. Climate change has also been a major influence on many of the extinctions we had a hand in, we were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Capt'n Midnight · 25-03-2016 03:28AM

ScumLord wrote: »

Native north Americans seemed to have struck a balance after a shaky start once humans expanded into that continent.

No I don't believe in this harmony with nature stuff.

North America had camels and llamas and horses and giant sloths and "cheetahs" and mammoths and mastodons and tapirs and giant beavers and cave lions and glyptodons and sabre tooth cats and huge armadillos and short faced bears and lots of large birds.

In North America the big animals now are pretty much bison, moose, elk, caribou, deer, pronghorn, muskox, bighorn sheep, mountain goat. All save the pronghorns descended from Asian ancestors that had evolved with human predators

We pretty much wiped out the megafauna (stuff bigger than a cow) everywhere we went apart from Africa.

Lots of islands had big animals Malta, New Zealand , Madagascar. All the places with pygmy elephants/mammoths.

PMBC · 25-03-2016 12:59PM

What came before the Big Bang - if you agree with BB
How/why light behaves as a particle and a wave
Why space time is curved positively
Why there was more matter than anti-matter at the BB

PMBC · 25-03-2016 01:13PM

Dughorm wrote: »

How? That sounds like blind faith to me - I think blind faith in anything be it science, politics or religion is a bad thing.

No.
'Blind Faith' was an excellent musical group in the 70s.
OK. You're too young to remember that.
Was Clapton a member? I'm too old to remember.

ScumLord · 25-03-2016 03:17PM

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

No I don't believe in this harmony with nature stuff.

North America had camels and llamas and horses and giant sloths and "cheetahs" and mammoths and mastodons and tapirs and giant beavers and cave lions and glyptodons and sabre tooth cats and huge armadillos and short faced bears and lots of large birds.

In North America the big animals now are pretty much bison, moose, elk, caribou, deer, pronghorn, muskox, bighorn sheep, mountain goat. All save the pronghorns descended from Asian ancestors that had evolved with human predators

We pretty much wiped out the megafauna (stuff bigger than a cow) everywhere we went apart from Africa.

Lots of islands had big animals Malta, New Zealand , Madagascar. All the places with pygmy elephants/mammoths.

The likes of the giant sloth were on the way out from what I'm reading, they're an example of an animal evolving down a dead end where it's too depended on a particular environment. We pushed it over the edge, we pushed many species over the edge but it could be argued the extinction of those species was only a matter of time, either another animal would turn up or a natural disaster would wipe them out.

I don't know that we could say humans specifically targeted the largest animals they could find in any new environment.

When hunter humans arrive the environment has to find a new balance. Native Americans eventually found that balance until Europeans showed up. It's possible native Americans choose a hunter gatherer lifestyle after experiencing civilized society.

Capt'n Midnight · 25-03-2016 11:20PM

ScumLord wrote: »

The likes of the giant sloth were on the way out from what I'm reading

But what about all the others ? or that local extinctions happen around the same time humans arrive in a previously isolated area, worldwide, over tens of thousands of years ?

Manatees, polar bears, anacondas, alligators and crocs are semi aquatic and somewhat shielded from humans.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_South_American_mammals

While South America currently has no megaherbivore species weighing more than 1000 kg, prior to this event it had a menagerie of about 25 of them (consisting of gomphotheres, camelids, ground sloths, glyptodonts, and toxodontids – 75% of these being 'old-timers'), dwarfing Africa's present and recent total of 6

The list of extinct animals from Oz too includes some impressive stuff long legged land crocs, huge lizards including what may have been the largest venomous animal ever.

Tigger99 · 25-03-2016 11:28PM

Science can't explain love love love. Couldn't be arsed going though seven pages of grumpy Internet people disagreeing with each other to see if this has been mentioned already.

I wish you all love and plenty of lovely shags. Internet might well be a happier place then.

This post is brought to you by wine.

Wibbs · 25-03-2016 11:52PM

Tigger99 wrote: »

This post is brought to you by wine.

The finest bro/chick science of all, brought to you by the finest wines! *Withnail voice*

Capt'n Midnight · 26-03-2016 12:32PM

Tigger99 wrote: »

Science can't explain love

Chocolate contains
theobromine, a heart stimulant, dilates blood vessels

anandamide, "joy, bliss, delight", (like THC)
phenethylamine, a natural amphetamine

and caffeine.

Most people here are already in a long term relationship with caffeine.
"coffee doesn't ask silly questions, coffee understands"
"come here coffee and lie to me about how much we are going to get done today."

ScumLord · 26-03-2016 06:52PM

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

But what about all the others ? or that local extinctions happen around the same time humans arrive in a previously isolated area, worldwide, over tens of thousands of years ?

I'm not saying these things didn't happen but you have to take into account the time period too. Our second expansion came as a direct result of the end of the ice age. New lands were opened up by land bridges (I know we travelled by boat too but I think for the most part we spread by land). I doubt we were the only animals to make the journey. There could have been many species entering environments like the Americas causing all sorts of damage. Bugs and birds could have made the journey too attacking the environment for the bottom end up.

But these kind of things are inevitable on our planet. Ecosystems get used to one way of life, then something happens to change that way of life and it wipes out multiple species. If cats made it to many of the polynesian islands instead of humans they would have had the same effect on the local bird populations. Humans are a large mammal, of course any new environment they step into is going to be under pressure, but that's how life works.

It's not a phenomenon unique to human expansion. It's just more evident because we're looking for human influence and humans are so awesome at being alive.

Bongalongherb · 27-03-2016 07:14PM

If you are German speaking you will understand what they are saying, but I remember a documentary a long time ago translated to english in regards to this lady that is soo magnetic she can stick an old heavy Iron to her body plus multiple metal objects with different weight.

How can a human being hold/contain so much personal gravity/magnetism ? I remember this before but science didn't know the answer and I never heard from it again. Can any-one explain how a person can be so magnetic ?. True science is the hard effort of explanation to a scientific problem, still no answers on this one.

Information in the comments section.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W2h03jlrMU

Capt'n Midnight · 28-03-2016 11:35AM

Bongalongherb wrote: »

How can a human being hold/contain so much personal gravity/magnetism ?

LOL reminded me of this

Yo momma's so fat, she's got smaller fat women orbiting around her.

Bongalongherb · 02-04-2016 11:57PM

That's funny

LordSutch · 11-06-2016 05:26PM

kneemos wrote: »

What can science not explain?

God.
Love.

12Phase · 11-06-2016 07:16PM

Science is still struggling to explain Donald Trump's hair.

764dak · 12-06-2016 12:04AM

Philosophy

Samaris · 12-06-2016 12:07AM

An awful lot of these have explanations. "I don't understand this" doesn't actually mean that no-one does. And even the things that science hasn't yet explained; generally they -will- be explained according to the natural laws of the universe that "science" attempts to interpret and connect the dots with.

ScumLord · 12-06-2016 09:27PM

LordSutch wrote: »

God.
Love.

Both can be explained, probably a thousand different ways.

God is a primitive attempt at explaining life, the universe and everything.

Love is a biological mechanism for enforcing necessary bonding between animals that live in large groups and depend on group cooperation. We like to think it's unique to humans but there are plenty of animals that show somewhat similar behaviour. How important love is to any species, seems to be as much related to the length of time it takes to raise a competent offspring as anything else.

Grayson · 12-06-2016 09:29PM

12Phase wrote: »

Science is still struggling to explain Donald Trump's hair.

Some people are doing pioneering work.

764dak · 12-06-2016 09:41PM

Samaris wrote: »

An awful lot of these have explanations. "I don't understand this" doesn't actually mean that no-one does. And even the things that science hasn't yet explained; generally they -will- be explained according to the natural laws of the universe that "science" attempts to interpret and connect the dots with.

In mathematics and logic there are statements that are unable to be proved or disproved (disproving is just proving something is false). They are called undecidable.

Why do you assume science can explain everthing?

What can science not explain?

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