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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard
3192 Posts |
Posted - 03/09/2005 : 13:47:41
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4333801.stm
What a baffling award.
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"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History
"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini |
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Siberia
SFN Addict
Brazil
2322 Posts |
Posted - 03/09/2005 : 13:54:11 [Permalink]
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quote: Mr Townes said many people did not realise that science involves faith.
This made me twitch. |
"Why are you afraid of something you're not even sure exists?" - The Kovenant, Via Negativa
"People who don't like their beliefs being laughed at shouldn't have such funny beliefs." -- unknown
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Plyss
Skeptic Friend
Netherlands
231 Posts |
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filthy
SFN Die Hard
USA
14408 Posts |
Posted - 03/09/2005 : 14:54:15 [Permalink]
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At least he doesn't let superstition interfere with his science.
I wonder what "religious institutions" he plans to donate a portion of his prize to.
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"What luck for rulers that men do not think." -- Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945)
"If only we could impeach on the basis of criminal stupidity, 90% of the Rethuglicans and half of the Democrats would be thrown out of office." ~~ P.Z. Myres
"The default position of human nature is to punch the other guy in the face and take his stuff." ~~ Dude
Brother Boot Knife of Warm Humanitarianism,
and Crypto-Communist!
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TG
Skeptic Friend
USA
121 Posts |
Posted - 03/09/2005 : 16:24:17 [Permalink]
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quote: Previous winners have included Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Billy Graham and the late Mother Teresa.
Billy Graham and Mother Teresa??? quote: ... recent winners have been scientists
Although he's done more to quote: advance spiritual knowledge
than any of those mentioned, I gather Richard Dawkins was not in the running. |
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
Posted - 03/09/2005 : 16:29:45 [Permalink]
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quote: Originally posted by TG Although he's done more to quote: advance spiritual knowledge
than any of those mentioned, I gather Richard Dawkins was not in the running.
True, but I have a feeling Dawkins has advanced spritual knowledge in the opposite direction they would have liked it to have gone.
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
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woolytoad
Skeptic Friend
313 Posts |
Posted - 03/09/2005 : 16:32:22 [Permalink]
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quote: Originally posted by Siberia
quote: Mr Townes said many people did not realise that science involves faith.
This made me twitch.
That's correct in a sense. The scientific method is self correcting, but that's assuming scientists do their job correctly. Scientists will falsify data and results too sometimes. You know what they say about egos. But that's not like having faith in a deity though.... |
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Ricky
SFN Die Hard
USA
4907 Posts |
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