pantheory

"Good atheist/agnostic rebuttals for Kent Hovind's answer in this video." ? That God is above and superior to "all" of physical and biological reality is not an intellectual answer. It relates to the argument of the "God of the gaps" whereby whatever cannot be otherwise explained, "God did it," which is neither intellectual nor scientific. Although he stated that God created time, space, and matter at the same time gives some detail to his answer, but the primary question given to him of "where did God come from?" was not addressed or answered by Kent Hovind. He implied that God is outside of physical time and space and has existed for an eternity within the spiritual realm. Saint Augustine had two answers to those who asked the question of what was God doing before he created the heavens and the Earth. He said that God was preparing Hell for those who asked such questions. But on a more serious note he said that God was eternal and that his existence before our universe was that of heavenly pursuits beyond our understandings of a spiritual existence without time. Science can never prove the non-existence of such a spiritual realm or of a God of any kind no more than it can disprove the Easter Bunny. Science simply asks where is the evidence for the existence of such entities? Real science would never seriously address such questions concerning the spiritual realm since they are neither intellectual nor scientific.

Yes, two very interesting articles concerning two new possible insights into the origins of life.

Having faith can be a good thing if that faith is justifiable and can be backed up by strong evidence, such as faith in a family member. Yes, faith in science theory sometimes may not be a good thing either, but faith in the scientific method is totally justifiable. For instance, many science theories today are partially or totally wrong IMO, especially in Physics, but science in generally has brought us into the modern age enabling us to have much better and healthier lives than our forefathers. One of the primary characteristics about science is that it is self correcting. In time what might be wrong in science theory today will be changed as more certain evidence becomes available. An example of very good science and theory today is Darwin's theory of natural selection. There is a mountain of evidence to support it. Yes, evolution also has almost countless minor hypothesis that accompany it, a number of which will likely change over time. But this says nothing negative about science or the theory of natural selection in that science theory is the result of evidence. When new evidence is presented, theory will necessarily change over time. Religion, on the other hand, chugs along regardless of contrary evidence. True, some drop out of the faith based upon the lack of evidence or contrary evidence, but many or most never question their almost blind faith.

Although most spiral galaxies appear to be on a flat plane, a number of them may be similarly twisted but undetectable from our perspective. The Milky Way seems to be one of the twisted ones.

Although this idea has been around for decades now, it has recently surfaced as a great many scientists are now taking the idea seriously. I saw several of these articles and papers concerning lava tubes on the Moon and on Mars as being possible places to find indigenous microbial life, but more likely than this these lava tubes can be good places to start our colonization of these worlds, with surface outposts above the tubes. Here are just some of the related links: https://www.lpi.usra.edu/decadal/leag/AndrewWDagaFINAL.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martian_lava_tube https://www.geekwire.com/2019/rover-teams-practice-spelunking-moon-mars-california-lava-tu bes/ https://www.inverse.com/article/36777-mars-moon-human-colony-lava-tubes https://science.howstuffworks.com/lava-tubes-on-earth-could-prepare-us-for-life-on-moon-an d-mars.htm https://www.airspacemag.com/space/mars-caves-180959123/ https://www.space.com/41921-exploring-lava-tubes-for-moon-landings.html https://phys.org/news/2017-09-lava-tubes-hidden-sites-future.html https://www.zmescience.com/science/geology/lava-tunnels-mars-moon-26092017/ https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/mars-lava-tubes/ https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/22058/20190523/astronauts-to-use-lava-tubes-for-luna r-accommodations.htm https://news.yahoo.com/rover-teams-practice-spelunking-moon-024434125.html A very promising idea indeed. This sure seems like the easiest way to start sizable colonies both on the Moon and on Mars.

Although I haven't seen a poll of such percentages, not just a small minority of scientists around the world, usually in fields other than the physical sciences, such as the biological sciences and the humanities for instance, believe in God. But where is the evidence for their rational consideration of such beliefs. Of course the answer is that usually there aren't any other than imaginary, and that their personal beliefs are usually contradictory. Their desire to look good for their relatives and society trumps logic. The usual retort by such persons to such questioning are that their personal spiritual experiences and supposed evidence for miracles justify their beliefs. Such persons are nearly always born into and grow up with their religion before they became scientists whereby their retained religious beliefs are forged by social pressures and tradition which they want to maintain. One religious "approach to this conflict is to argue that science deals with the natural world, while religion deals with the spiritual realm; however, this is something of a circular argument as it assumes a priori the existence of the latter. Another approach is to argue that science deals with “how” questions, while religion deals with “why” questions, but many philosophers would argue that “why” questions comprise the domain of the philosopher, not the theologian." Of course science at its best IMO should also be able to answer the "why" questions as well, not just philosophy. Below is a link which discusses such reasoning or lack thereof, while the first paragraph also includes my own take on the subject. What are your thoughts? https://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/where-s-the-evidence-a-scientist-s-struggle-with-religion-1.3608241

Good article and insights. The holistic thinking approach is a good one IMO. To trust in intuition alone without rational consideration can often be a mistake as would trusting in rational considerations alone when your gut feelings (intuition) suggest otherwise. Men often scoff at a woman's intuition but it often turns out to be correct.

Their DNA was associated with southern Italians which was an admixture of various warring kingdoms of Indigenous Italians of the time, immigrant Greeks and Macedonians, according to the article.

From my brief research it looks like the principal god of the Philistines was Dagon whose ancestors migrated to Palestinian shores from Crete. The religion was believed to have originally come from Mesopotamia. Dagon was the god of fertility, bountiful crops, harvest, and abundance in general. Dagon figured prominently in the Philistine concepts of death and the afterlife. In addition to his major role in Philistine religion, Dagon was also worshiped as the primary god of fruitfulness and tranquility in the more general society of the Canaanite peoples of the surrounding areas. He was worshiped by fisherman as the god that provided a plentiful catch, sometimes depicted as a fish-god. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagon

Genetic evidence form 10 individuals buried in the old Philistine city and port of Ashkelon indicate that these individuals, and likely the Philistines of the Bible in general, had their genetic origins from southern Europe. As bronze age cities went through wars and disruptions about 3000 years ago groups of migrants moved to the Eastern Mediterranean in the areas which are now Turkey, Lebanon and Syria, areas which they shared with the Phoenicians. In time these new cities conquered developing cities in what is now Israel and the middle east in general. This extended population became known as the Philistines. The ancient Hebrews that occupied Israel and Judea at the time of the Biblical Philistines trace much of their DNA origins to Mesopotamia and present day populations in Syria, and the Arabs of Irag. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ancient-dna-origins-philistines-bible-europe-israel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_on_Jews

The theromet Don't know much about a Penguin's body temperature or excretions but I do know that most Penguins live in Antarctica. As to thermometers, they were invented in the early 1700's in the middle of the little ice age in western Europe. This new invention probably came in handy during the winters, for those that could afford them, and for their servants who had the decision making task of when to stoke the fires.

As a result of global warming funding, an ancient rocky structure related to a major newly discovered geologic fault line and zone has been discovered at the heart of the Ross ice shelf in Eastern Antarctica. This discovery will help geologists determine where ice will melt and where it will stay frozen. The additional ice melting and possible sea rise as a result of this new-found fault and related ice fractures and splitting, would be unrelated to any global warming. But for global warming estimates an adjustment would need to be made to any possible ice loss in this area thought to be the result of global warming. Whether this newly found fault line and zone is more active now than it was in known geologic history is still unknown. This discovery is related to, but separate from the well-known volcanic activity under Antarctica. There is still debate as to whether Antarctica is gaining, losing, or having about the same amount of ice over the recent decades as more accurate measurements are made. This can relate to the global warming debate when some highly respected scientists of NASA are predicting global cooling in the coming decades instead. "According to new research published May 27 in the journal Nature Geo-science, this boundary protects the ice shelf's grounding line, the point at which it is thick enough to extend all the way to the sea floor. The geology created by the boundary keeps warm, melt-promoting ocean water away from that part of the shelf. But the ocean circulation driven by that same geology drives intense summer melt along the shelf's easterly edge." "We could see that (this) geological boundary was making the seafloor on the East Antarctic side much deeper than the West, and that affects the way the ocean water circulates under the ice shelf," study leader Kirsty Tinto, a research scientist at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, said in a statement" concerning the related study, paper, and photos. Antarctica: The Ice-Covered Bottom of the World] https://www.livescience.com/65588-ancient-rocky-structure-beneath-antarctica.html https://moneymaven.io/mishtalk/economics/amidst-global-warming-hysteria-nasa-expects-global-cooling-SJDpCv3V4EqKSOY11A378Q/ https://cornwallalliance.org/2019/02/climate-reality-forces-doomsday-alarmists-to-restructure-warming-narrative/

Yeah, pretty interesting stuff, I never really bought into the idea of our earliest ancestors being big hunters. I think it was more like chimps today in that they mostly gathered like chimps do today, and were predators only of small animals, grub, reptiles, things that we could catch on the ground, and scavenging carrion from other animal kills and natural animal deaths. Some humans today, especially children, teenagers and young adults, can climb trees fairly well. Our early ancestors were probably better at it than modern humans. Maybe not as good as chimps since there climbing muscles were not as big as chimps, their arms not as long, but they still could probably climb better than modern humans on an average. Climbing is a good defense against many larger predators, up trees, climbing rocks and steep hills and rock faces where they could grab on. Like small animals today, hiding is also a good defense against predictors, such as in caves, holes, a thicket, and elsewhere. Being able to throw rocks well and fashion spears not only enabled early humans to hunt bigger game, but it also would have been a good protection against other humans trying to steel food, women, territory, or to cannibalize. Looking at modern and ancient jaws and teeth, we see the dental structure of grinding teeth like an herbivore rather than big canine and other sharp teeth of a carnivore. Human jaws also can move side to side for grinding what we eat, like herbivores and chimps.

The Delusion of American Religion. This link talks about religion but it's more a debate concerning the correctness of religious social ideas, which is more political rather than science. Not at all sure how politics might fit into this forum or where different ideas of it should fit or be allowed. But I'll take a short stab at it anyway in this science vs. religion forum. Unfortunately the U.S. does not have a clear separation of church and state in its constitution, even though many believe it does. Neither do many other big counties. For this reason religious zealots get involved in governments around the world and often screw things up that IMO would most often be much better off without them. In the U.S. I disagree with right wing governmental religious ideas, and left wing spending ideas. I would like to see less military spending and more NASA spending. I look at religion as a minus and science as a plus, although I think both have goods and bads within them Religious thinking is often more than a hundred years in the past, and science thinking looks forward to a better future and understanding for humanity -- far better IMO.

Musicmatters, I looked at your links. They are not directly related to any identified scientific studies. I think that it is important to realize that the paranormal is not accepted by mainstream science, especially quantum entanglement or anything in physics. Even if there were such research, nearly all in science, and most in psychology would consider a paranormal conclusion as bogus. I believe there are far better and realistic conclusions to synchronicity than the paranormal. I would expect this perception directly relates to intrusive thoughts, as you identified this symptom of your psychological condition.