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The Bad Astronomer
Skeptic Friend
137 Posts |
 Posted - 08/24/2001 : 21:37:41 [Permalink]
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The cat thread was turning into a flamefest, mostly on JW's part, throwing out Nazi references. There were some replies that were borderline insults back to JW.
Hmmm, I was about to say "I'm sorry, but when that happens I delete them", but you know, I'm not sorry. I've really had about enough of that kind of crap on my board. I will try very hard to get a new board up and running by mid-October. It has to wait until a big deadline passes at work.
*****
The Bad Astronomer
http://www.badastronomy.com
"With tremendous respect to [the] BA, the problem isn't getting scientists to talk, the problem can be getting them to shut up." |
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Rift
Skeptic Friend
USA
333 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 01:45:32 [Permalink]
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Yeah, JW crossed the line (doesn't he always) when he started in on all the bad things scientists have caused (and none of his examples were caused by scientists in my opinion.) Usually I go off the deep end on JW but I thought I handled myself rather nicely.
quote:
I got the impression while following that now deceased thread that most of the people were describing the same thing from opposite ends, like blind men feeling the trunk and tail of the elephant.
That's why I felt this was a constructive thread. Not sure why JW got all insultive and acidic like he always does, we were actually making headway. He said to forget about the cat, I said to forget about the cat, we finally agreed. :) I haven't heard that Hawking quote before. And I've not read or run into people that have taken Schrodinger's cat 'too far' like JW and I guess some big guns in physics. But after this exchange with JW I want to go reach for my gun too, poor little kitty.
I never saw his response to my telling him he needed to take several years of math to understand it without the analogy, lol. I never had trouble with Schrodinger's cat, and I admit I brought it up with JW this time. He said something about putting it in a glass box (missing the point that it is a thought experiment). JW is too literal, and this last exchange made me re-evaluate him. I use to think he was dangerous. Now I think he is just a bitter, confused old man who's mostly harmless.
"Goddammit! The world is just filling up with more and more idiots! And the computer is giving them access to the world! They're
spreading their stupidity! At least they were contained before--now they're on the loose everywhere!"? |
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Lisa
SFN Regular
USA
1223 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 10:48:05 [Permalink]
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Rift, I just read your post over at BA. I can only hope everyone else on that board read it too. It would be funny if everyone quit responding to Piper. I wonder how he would react? Like a spoiled two year old who suddenly finds he's not the center of attention? If all the other posters behave themselves, I guess we'll find out.
Did anyone else see ComputerOrg's post regarding deletion of posts? I think comparing Phil to a Nazi was waaaay out of line. If I'm having a party and someone is behaving like an asshole, I have every right to tell them to shut up or get out. Same applies to Phil's board.
Lisa
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Zandermann
Skeptic Friend
USA
431 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 18:37:57 [Permalink]
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And now for something completely different:
Does anyone else find Rosen's talking to himself about Velikovsky a little spooky?
And Lisa...yeah, Comp_Org continues to delight in stirring up the hornet's nest just to see what will happen. "Out of line" doesn't begin to cover it.
"If in the last few years you haven't discarded a major opinion or acquired a new one, check your pulse. You may be dead." |
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Rift
Skeptic Friend
USA
333 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 21:50:47 [Permalink]
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Hmmm, I've had my hands full trying to have a civil conversation with JW to click on any thread with "Velikovsky" in it. :P I'll have to check it out.
I still don't understand the fascination for Velikovsky. Why the cult following and all that?
"Goddammit! The world is just filling up with more and more idiots! And the computer is giving them access to the world! They're
spreading their stupidity! At least they were contained before--now they're on the loose everywhere!"? |
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Piltdown
Skeptic Friend
USA
312 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 22:50:41 [Permalink]
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quote:
I still don't understand the fascination for Velikovsky. Why the cult following and all that?
According to many skeptical critics, pseudoscientists love Velikooksky because the scientific establishment of the time essentially bungled its collective response to him. http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/vlesson.html
Pseudoscientists interpret this as a conspiracy of suppression, as did Velikovsky himself. This lends credibility to their claims of a present-day conspiracy of scientific suppression, a claim that is essential to the marketing of all sorts of pseudoscience.
The "Velikovsky Affair" was one of the scientific community's first serious challenges from a modern and superficially plausible pseudoscience. http://www.skepdic.com/velikov.html
Skeptics learned many hard lessons from it. On the other hand, it has been a model and a constant inspiration for pseudoscience. Note how often Velikovskian ideas, and the closely related notions of Sitchin, appear in wacko posts at the BA Board. Velikovsky was not a creationist, but creationist astronomical nonsense often echoes his ideas, and uses present-day Velikovsky apologists as sources. Velikovskian ideas of electromagnetic force and the alleged mutability of natural law over time were especially evident in the recent rash of messages from "gravity denialists."
Abducting UFOs and conspiring against conspiracy theorists since 1980. |
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Chippewa
SFN Regular
USA
1496 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 23:32:07 [Permalink]
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Howdy there,
Here's my JW story.
Almost two years ago, I was having some fun on the BA's BB happily posting and "discussing" topics with intelligent people, when I innocently described the "balloon analogy" to someone. This “JW” clown suddenly showed up and insulted me repeatedly. That was the old, and (believe it or not) less mellow JW, where every post contained mean-spirited anti-Einstein references that were highly insulting. (I'm a great admirer of Einstein and his achievements, so it really pissed me off.) There were long threads where JW would drone on and on about how Einstein was “wrong” and how he “backed down” and “wasn't a man” and “made mistakes” (though no math, and no illustrations of these so-called “mistakes.”) – Then JW would babble wherever he could about his ridiculous “fireworks model” of the universe. Scores of people would try to explain what they knew of the Big Bang cosmology, to no avail. He would accuse us all of believing we literally lived on a balloon. (My last explanation to him was today! That's it, why did I bother? No more!)
I remember a year ago I posted a link to a Berkeley professor's essay about the reasons some people hated Albert Einstein. (JW's anti-Einstein tirade was creating long threads at that time.) (Of course, anti-Semitism was one of the reasons the professor sited, but there were others, including scientists who did not “hate” him as much as disagreed with him.) JW pounced again, following me around like a schoolyard bully, wherever I posted, claiming I was "afraid of the truth" and not "a man." (I don't want to know what this sexual hang-up about manhood is that he has.)
For I while I started posting (when I had something to say,) under a different moniker, and “Chip” became my second name on that board.
Well, I finally had enough and royally flamed “Jay Dubya.” Broke from the astronomy topic in a post there, and called him a phony, who was pretending to be a journalist. He left for a while. (That's why he rarely responds to "Chip.") Fortunately, there are so many other interesting astronomy topics that JW quickly recedes into the realm of “mini anomalies.” (Where did I hear that before?) Anyway, for a while I was sometimes posting under my "office" name - from my office server, and sometimes under "Chip" from my home server. I could of argued with myself and created an entertaining thread! (Won't do that!) I'm sticking with one name now on that board. So you see, for a while JW actually drove me to internet schizophrenia! I think he's a pompous ass. – Chip (-;
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Trish
SFN Addict
USA
2102 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 08:01:39 [Permalink]
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Hey Chip! Welcome to SFN. Glad to see you over here too.
BTW, Einstein is one of my daughters favorites too.
He's YOUR god, they're YOUR rules, YOU burn in hell! |
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Zandermann
Skeptic Friend
USA
431 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 11:39:06 [Permalink]
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Hey there Chip! Good to see you here! And thanks for the JW story; it's hard to believe that he used to be *more* hard-headed.
With regard to Velikovsky...thanks for the analysis, Piltdown. It appears that the same sorts of folks flock to V as congregate around Tesla and magnetic bracelets and moon landing hoaxes and mini-anomalies...the folks who believe "The X-Files" is nonfiction but that "Nova" and quantum mechanics are fiction.
Yikes!
"If in the last few years you haven't discarded a major opinion or acquired a new one, check your pulse. You may be dead." |
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rubysue
Skeptic Friend
USA
199 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 11:51:36 [Permalink]
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Hey, ljbrs!!
Concerning your post on the BABB:
http://www.badastronomy.com/wwwboard/messages/12692.html
I was on the launch support team for Cassini (as was Karl, apparently - I've sent him an email to ask him about that), so I know quite a bit about this mission and can vouch that it did go into a hyperbolic interplanetary trajectory (and we could see it almost to park orbit). I consider the days leading up to the launch and the launch itself (which was spectacular and occurred at about 0444am EDT on 10/15/97) to be awesome experiences second only to seeing the launch of Apollo 15.
My boss actually had to fly to Hawaii a few days before the launch to testify in federal district court in an unsuccessful lawsuit that was trying to stop this mission because of the RTGs and then he flew directly to Florida (talk about jet lag).
The paranoid nutcases were out in force in Cocoa Beach and the surrounding areas prior to this launch. We were all instructed to be very quiet and low-key when we went out for meals and to keep our bar activities to a minimum. Think about this - try doing your job and keeping your temper when every comment you hear sounds like piper squared or multiple JWs spreading hysteria that the world was going to end because of the 72 pounds of plutonium on this spacecraft (Piltdown said it best in his reply to your post over on the BABB about these no-nothing luddites).
By the way, have you heard of Dr. Michio Kaku? He is a "respected" physics professor at NYU and the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton who, unfortunately, equates the use of RTGs and other nuclear power sources in interplanetary spacecraft with nuclear weapons proliferation. Kaku has the "inside" track with news agencies and major journalists and will likely have a great influence on preventing the launch of any future missions that will require RTGs (e.g., anything to the outer solar system, including missions to Europa, Pluto, etc.). We came very, very close to not being able to launch Cassini because of paranoid lunatics like Kaku (I don't care if he is a respected physicist - I have no respect for someone who tells lies). It will be a real shame if future outer system missions are jeopardized because of this nonsense. Did you also know that these cretins sued AFTER the launch of Cassini because the spacecraft used a Venus-Venus-Earth-Jupiter gravity assist trajectory and they wanted to force NASA to fire the spacecraft engines before the Earth flyby and send this $2.4 Billion dollar mission into useless deep space? Fortunately, they lost that suit, too, and the Earth flyby was without incident (as expected).
Sorry I've gone on and on about this - it may help explain a little bit more about why I can't tolerate the crackpots.
rubysue
If your head is wax, don't walk in the sun.
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rubysue
Skeptic Friend
USA
199 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 16:43:10 [Permalink]
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As a follow-up to my own post, let me make it clear that there are risks associated with RTGs. However, NASA and their contractors spend millions of dollars performing detailed fault tree analyses to determine and mitigate as many low-probability failure modes as possible that could cause a concern during RTG manufacture, installation, launch and any gravity-assist earth flybys (spelling?). There have been 25-30 US spacecraft launched that have total or partial nuclear power sources on board, with designs tested, evaluated, analyzed and proven over 40 years. Here's a good description of RTGs from the Galileo site:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/messenger/oldmess/RTGs.html
rubysue
If your head is wax, don't walk in the sun.
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Espritch
Skeptic Friend
USA
284 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 20:31:35 [Permalink]
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Rubysue, thanks for the link. I have to admit that when I first read news reports talking about how much plutonium Cassini was carrying, it worried me a little. The press reports I read didn't provide any information on what kinds of precautions had been taken to protect the environment in the event of an accident. Glad to see that somebody at NASA actually gave the issue some thought. 
That's the problem with the media, they don't generally seem to feel any need to provide any real context for these kinds of stories.
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Torsten
New Member
Canada
16 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 22:42:50 [Permalink]
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rubysue said:
quote:
I was on the launch support team for Cassini (as was Karl, apparently - I've sent him an email to ask him about that),
and
quote:
Kaku has the "inside" track with news agencies and major journalists and will likely have a great influence on preventing the launch of any future missions that will require RTGs
Aha! Now a number of things make sense!
Some time ago someone who will remain unnamed (and isn't posting these days anyway) was rambling on about this and that and mentioning Michio Kaku. I think Kaku's done work in string theory and published a book on it. Anyway, as I recall, Karl was taking exception to the poster's remarks, and concluded one post with "And I'm not a fan of Michio Kaku either".
When Cassini did its Earth flyby, there were a number of posts about the safety of that procedure with respect to the RTGs. At that time, Karl defended the safety of the mission and commented that he'd watched his friends load those devices. He had even watched the launch with his family.
Now I understand!
huh? |
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Torsten
New Member
Canada
16 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 23:16:07 [Permalink]
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Zandermann asked
"Does anyone else find Rosen's talking to himself about Velikovsky a little spooky?"
This may provide some insight. In the day's of the BABB being overrun by geocentrists, Rosen used to post as "Wicked Son". He would get into the same sort of discussions with them as you've seen him do with JW on SR. I asked him about it at another board.
I have one of the archives of that board. Part of his reply was:
"I am sure a lot of other threads are generated by compulsive people pushing each others buttons. However, just because I am compulsive doen't mean that I am wrong. And fighting Bouw provided an incredible review of relativity :-) "
He finished with:
"I hope that our little spat didn't chase away others from the forums. But I get so mad!"
I think Rosen is really bothered by the fact that such twits as the geocentrists and Velikovskian catastrophists get as much attention as they do. I cringe a bit seing all those posts, but I think his behaviour is about as spooky as anyone taking on obvious trolls time after time when we really should know better.
huh? |
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Chippewa
SFN Regular
USA
1496 Posts |
Posted - 08/27/2001 : 00:30:50 [Permalink]
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quote:
Hey Chip! Welcome to SFN. Glad to see you over here too.
BTW, Einstein is one of my daughters favorites too.
He's YOUR god, they're YOUR rules, YOU burn in hell!
Thank you everybody. The way the Bad Astronomy board has been going recently, I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone, being picked on by a totalitarian regime (of one). It's nice to be among the sane for a change.(-;
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