epepke wrote:

Calilasseia wrote:It's all part of the business of dishonestly treating science as a branch of apologetics, all the better to keep the shekels flowing from the idiot inbreeds.

Dramatically put, but yes. The more I see of these people, the more I am convinced that it is a radically different system of thought.

Start with the idea that the Bible is right as primary. Ignore the idea that reality is real. Then science just becomes a way of supporting what one already knows of the Truth from the Bible. Ignore science entirely, or use it as a means of illustrating the Bible.

It is futile to go chasing reality. What science does is to test our delusions about reality by making models of natural phenomena. This non-realist approach at least insures that claims are subjected to scrutiny and tested via an agreed means. Religion merely claims reality in an untestable way. Thus even the most innocuous religions cause harm, by "forcing" science and its friends to engage in a non-issue like reality.

According to bible the Earth is the centre of the universe.

Darwinsbulldog wrote:

epepke wrote:

Calilasseia wrote:It's all part of the business of dishonestly treating science as a branch of apologetics, all the better to keep the shekels flowing from the idiot inbreeds.

Dramatically put, but yes. The more I see of these people, the more I am convinced that it is a radically different system of thought.

Start with the idea that the Bible is right as primary. Ignore the idea that reality is real. Then science just becomes a way of supporting what one already knows of the Truth from the Bible. Ignore science entirely, or use it as a means of illustrating the Bible.

It is futile to go chasing reality. What science does is to test our delusions about reality by making models of natural phenomena. This non-realist approach at least insures that claims are subjected to scrutiny and tested via an agreed means. Religion merely claims reality in an untestable way. Thus even the most innocuous religions cause harm, by "forcing" science and its friends to engage in a non-issue like reality.

Very nice Poe.

epepke wrote:

Darwinsbulldog wrote:

epepke wrote:

Calilasseia wrote:It's all part of the business of dishonestly treating science as a branch of apologetics, all the better to keep the shekels flowing from the idiot inbreeds.

Dramatically put, but yes. The more I see of these people, the more I am convinced that it is a radically different system of thought.

Start with the idea that the Bible is right as primary. Ignore the idea that reality is real. Then science just becomes a way of supporting what one already knows of the Truth from the Bible. Ignore science entirely, or use it as a means of illustrating the Bible.

It is futile to go chasing reality. What science does is to test our delusions about reality by making models of natural phenomena. This non-realist approach at least insures that claims are subjected to scrutiny and tested via an agreed means. Religion merely claims reality in an untestable way. Thus even the most innocuous religions cause harm, by "forcing" science and its friends to engage in a non-issue like reality.

Very nice Poe.

Not a POE. Think about it.

He redeemed himself a little bit for acknowledging his error later. (although he just couldn't resist throwing some feeble parting shots as well . Classic fallacies such as 'Newton believed in God, therefore he did good physics because he believed in God' . )Photo courtesy of PZ Myers' blog. Please don't ban this post. I'm not sure how copyright law works around here.
Full credit to Pharyngula and Ray Comfort

Acknowledges the mistake, then makes it all over again. "Invisible gravity in space"? What does "visible" gravity look like? And he still thinks there is some mysterious divine force holding the earth in place. Because I guess there is some supermassive object at the "bottom" of the universe whose gravity would pull us down there if Baby Jesus wasn't holding us in place.

Is this really a biblical insight now? Did the bible scribes really intend to tell us, that while there is a force holding the earth in a stable orbit in space, that force would definitely be invisible. Why is that an important distinction to make?

Then there's a question of why the divinely inspired scribes decided that of all the insights into physics they could give us, this was a priority.

Up until today, I was on the many who believed that there is zero gravity in space.

Well that's the pitfall of just believing stuff, RayRay, you end up looking like a fucking idiot.

While there is invisible gravity in space, this massive Earth hangs on nothing.

Do you genuinely think you've found a 'gotcha' there RayRay? If there's gravity in space then what's stopping the Earth from falling? Checkmate, atheists!

Doesn't "hanging", whether on something or on nothing, imply that the Earth is stationary?

Evolving wrote:Ah, I think he has seen films of astronauts apparently weightless and assumes this is so because they are outside the Earth's gravitational field, instead of in free fall.

Astronauts are not outside the Earth's gravitational field.

It's just that they are in orbit.

Yes.

In free fall, in fact.

Evolving wrote:Yes.

In free fall, in fact.

Sure.

Evolving wrote:Yes.

In free fall, in fact.

Which means the only force acting on them is gravity.

I remember reading an article on John Kennedy Jr's fatal air crash, which theorized that it resulted from his ignoring the information from his instruments which told him he was falling. A pilot offered to demonstrate to the reporter how this could happen by going into a full dive while the reporter kept his eyes closed. The reporter sat back and waited a minute, feeling as if he wasn't moving at all, but just as he was about to say "Anytime you're ready" he suddenly felt himself violently jolted back into his seat as the pilot pulled out of the dive they had been in and told him "We just fell 1000 feet."

Weaver wrote:

Evolving wrote:Ah, I think he has seen films of astronauts apparently weightless and assumes this is so because they are outside the Earth's gravitational field, instead of in free fall.

Astronauts are not outside the Earth's gravitational field.

It's just that they are in orbit.

It's basically throwing yourself at the ground and missing.

BlackBart wrote:

Weaver wrote:

Evolving wrote:Ah, I think he has seen films of astronauts apparently weightless and assumes this is so because they are outside the Earth's gravitational field, instead of in free fall.

Astronauts are not outside the Earth's gravitational field.

It's just that they are in orbit.

It's basically throwing yourself at the ground and missing.

Yep.

There is an art, or rather a knack, to it.

Let's put him out the airlock and see if he is correct?

Mayb he can swim back.

BlackBart wrote:

Weaver wrote:

Evolving wrote:Ah, I think he has seen films of astronauts apparently weightless and assumes this is so because they are outside the Earth's gravitational field, instead of in free fall.

Astronauts are not outside the Earth's gravitational field.

It's just that they are in orbit.

It's basically throwing yourself at the ground and missing.

Eventually your orbit will decay and you won't miss.

BlackBart wrote:

Weaver wrote:

Evolving wrote:Ah, I think he has seen films of astronauts apparently weightless and assumes this is so because they are outside the Earth's gravitational field, instead of in free fall.

Astronauts are not outside the Earth's gravitational field.

It's just that they are in orbit.

It's basically throwing yourself at the ground and missing.

If Ray tries this I wish him every success.

Just to address any misconception that may have arisen from mentioning orbits (and to give me a chance to pontificate on physics again...):

Free fall is, as Shrunk pointed out, a technical term meaning that gravity is the only force affecting you (all other forces are of negligible strength). Any object in space that is not being impelled by some thrusting thing like a rocket or an ion drive is in free fall in this sense; it doesn't matter which trajectory it is on.

If you are in a spacecraft that is in free fall, and you take that spacecraft as your frame of reference, then there is no preferred direction within that frame, as there is while standing on the ground: you can float equally readily in any direction you like within that frame of reference and it will seem to you as if you have no weight.

A spacecraft on the way to the Moon is in free fall, and so are the people inside it. Consequently, those people will experience what seems to be weightlessness.

It was my conjecture (and Comfort seems to bear this out in his second post, in which he reports on the corrections he has received) that it was seeing footage like this that misled him into thinking that there is no gravity in space.