Atlassian $5 licences
gommo April 20th, 2009
Atlassian are selling $5 5-user licences to Jira and Confluence until the end of the week. All proceeds go to Room to Read
Get yours now
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Response to Evolution indoctrination at OU
gommo February 12th, 2009
I saw this posted on http://www.tulsabeacon.com/?p=1358 It’s so horrendous that I had to respond.
Evolution indoctrination at OU
What is the difference between education and indoctrination?
Education = Showing someone how to think
Indoctrination = Telling them what to think
The line between conveying information with an open mind and a mindset that parallels religion is being crossed this year at The University of Oklahoma with a 12-month celebration of the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin.
While devoting huge resources to a campaign to “prove” that evolution is not a theory, the scientific brain trust at OU will virtually ignore parallel theories of the origin of man - including Creation Science and Intelligent Design.
Science does not ‘prove’ anything. I suggest you get some ‘education’. Proof is the realm of mathematics, that is all. Science gives us theories to understand the observed facts. A theory is testable and falsifiable, which is what Darwin’s theory is, please tell me how I could test and falsify Creation Science and/or Intelligent Design???
OU will trot out Oxford professor Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, to try to convince students and the public that there is no God and science has all the answers.
Darwin became infamous 150 years ago when he wrote The Origin of Species. He speculated that all life evolved from lower forms and that men were derived from the apes.
We aren’t ‘derived’ from apes, we are apes. We share a common ancestor with all apes. The evidence is there, its in the fossil record as well as our DNA. I suggest you look at your own Chromosome #2. Again, sir (or madam, you fail to put a name to this filth), I suggest some education
His unproven theories were all that the humanist movement needed to attack the Bible and any belief system that hints at the existence of a supreme being.
There you go again with ‘unproven’. All theories are unproven in science. They are our best model at understanding the evidence.
OU has a website devoted to this worship of Darwin and evolution. It’s clear from the content of that website that organisers believe that evolution is a fact and that if other theories are mentioned, they will be discounted or ridiculed.
Evolution is a fact, things evolve, end of story. You say it below, ‘Do things Change? Certainly’ Therefore evolution is an observed fact. Darwin’s theory aims to explain that fact.
Do things change? Certainly. But species don’t evolve into other species. Dogs don’t turn into cats. Monkeys don’t turn into men.
Again, some education. There a numerous examples of speciation. It has been observed.
‘Dogs don’t turn into cats‘ - I’d hope not otherwise Darwin’s theory would be falsified.
‘Monkeys don’t turn into men‘ - Again, stop with these straw man arguments, you will never find an evolutionary biologists suggesting so. We share a common ancestor! Your argument is like saying that you don’t believe you are related to your cousin because you have never seen your cousin give birth to yourself.
In fact, even secular scientists are doubting the viability of evolution concerning the origin of life.
Please give me a name of an evolutionary biologist who doubts the evolutionary concept of common descent? You can’t! Stop lying you disgraceful ignoramus. Have you heard of the 10 commandments?
‘concerning the origin of life‘ - Evolution says nothing about the origin of life. Again again, get an education. Repeat after me, EVOLUTION HAS NO POSITION ON THE ORIGIN OF LIFE!!!! It is concerned with the complexity of life, Abiogenesis is the category of theories for the origin of life. Nothing to do with Darwin
The laws of thermodynamics and common sense tell us that things don’t get better - they deteriorate.
Education again, please. Don’t use big words you have no understanding about. By your logic above nothing gains in complexity it always deteriorates. So a baby growing to an adult is deterioration is it? The laws of thermodynamics require a closed system, our earth is anything but a closed system you dimwit.
The biggest case against Darwin’s evolution is the fossil record. There are no viable transition fossils when there should be millions if you buy into his theory.
Where is the missing link? There isn’t one in the fossil record.
Explain what fossil you would like to see? Fish with legs? We have them? Whales with legs? Yep got them too. Every fossil we see is transitional? What else can it be? We are all linked on the great big tree of life? If you don’t agree, or think there is some major barrier that differentiates species, then please explain what is that barrier? What mystical force defines one species from another? Species are a convenient abstraction we place on living organisms to categorise them. Just like we categorise stages of growth (toddler, teenager, adult). Please show me where you have observed a toddler turning into an adult?
Evolution science is not really science but a religion. That is why it cannot stand honest scrutiny or tolerate other views. It takes more faith to believe that men came from monkeys or a primal soup struck by lightning than it does to believe that God created the Earth and mankind in seven days.
Too many things to shoot down there. Science is based on evidence, it is falsifiable and testable. It makes predictions. Religion is based on faith, which is a way of belief that involves not requiring evidence. Some people can live with that, others can’t. I choose to demand evidence as that has worked very well in the last few hundred years. I’m typing on this computer, using the Internet, sitting in A/C, wearing glasses and just took a headache tablet.
Religion in 19 years of following it, gave me nothing.
Simply show me Australopithecus or Kenyanthropus fossils in Australia and you will convince me of the error in common descent. I on the other hand could not produce any evidence that would convince you that your faith is wrong. That is because it does not rely on evidence. Common descent however, demands evidence, has mountain loads of it, and lists potential falsifications that would destroy it in a heart beat. However, no such evidence has been forthcoming.
Both are religious beliefs. Oklahoma students should be exposed to both theories (including Intelligent Design). Instead, the public school system in Oklahoma has bowed to the pressure of secular humanists and insisted that there is only one theory to explain the origin of man - evolution.
ID is not a theory as I mentioned above, and has also been proven as such in a court of law. So stop your whining.
Incidentally, the origin of life cannot be proven by the scientific method, which requires observation and testing. No one was around when life began and no scientist - no matter how many degrees he or she has - has been able to recreate life in the laboratory.
There you go again, jumping between origin of man and origin of life as if they are the same thing. Lucky science is not so casual with its methods.
Here’s the worst aspect of this story. State tax dollars are going to support the celebration of a mad scientist who infected the world with a new religion that teaches that God cannot exist.
OU has stacked the deck for humanism and against other religions. Creationism and Intelligent Design should get equal time in this huge “celebration” of Charles Darwin.
There is a God and that belief is held by the vast majority of Oklahoma taxpayers. Withholding that truth from our students does them a disservice and damages our society.
‘There is a God’ - Please show us the evidence? Also, is that God you refer to, a Christian God? Are you so lucky to have been born in a country that happens to primarily believe in the real God. What about Zeus, Thor, Ra ? How do you know your version of God is more valid then any other culture’s version of God? Please, again, show us the evidence
When we tell our college students that they are nothing more than animals, why do we act surprised when they act like animals?
Get off your pedastool. So people never behaved badly before Darwin? Stop pushing your responsibility as a human being onto everyone else. Oh that’s right, I forgot, your a christian, and that means always after a scapegoat. If it isn’t Jesus it’s Satan, anything to prevent taking responsibility for your own actions. Pathetic.
Goddamned
gommo July 30th, 2008
Great Lyrics
Goddamned
I’m marching to Zion, a camera in my hand.
I hear people cryin’, dyin’ for this blood-stained land.
The streets of old Jerusalem are lined with souvenirs and those buying them.
It sounds cold but I cannot see how this theme park has shaped history.
‘Cause virgins don’t have babies
And water, it isn’t wine
And there’s a holy spirit, maybe
But she would never rent a room with walls built by mankind.
Mary and Mohammed are screaming through the clouds
For you to lay your goddamned arms down
Rip your bigot roots up from the earth and salt the goddamned ground
Stand in line patiently to super-charge your rosary
Or stuff your prayers inside this wall.
We once had God trapped in this great hall
But we’ve been cast out from this place
They say a prophet floated from here to outer space.
Am I crazy?
Maybe it’s me, but this all sounds like mythology.
‘Cause virgins don’t have babies
And water, it isn’t wine
And there’s a holy spirit, maybe
But she would never rent a room with walls built by mankind
Mary and Mohammed are screaming through the clouds
For you to lay your goddamned arms down
Rip your bigot roots up from the earth and salt the goddamned ground
Zeus was afraid of his girlfriend so he swallowed her in bed
And he bore forth Athena when they cracked open his head
Her brother tried to rape her, Athena got away
And when his seed hit the ground the grass gave birth that day
Now we all freely admit this story’s clearly bullshit
No one will lay down their life or start a war for it
So throw your stones and pray
You’ll be rewarded some day
I hope it all goes your way
But something tells me no one’s coming to save you
No one’s coming to save you
No one’s coming to save you
Save yourself
From turning earth into hell
No one’s coming to save you
No one’s coming to save you
No one’s coming to save you
No one’s coming to save you
Mary and Mohammed are screaming through the clouds
For you to lay your goddamned arms down
Rip your bigot roots up from the earth and salt the goddamned ground.
CITCON Session Day
gommo June 30th, 2008
Saturday was the main day of the conference. Sessions go for 1 hour (5 session times in the day) and there were 5 sessions that ran in parallel. This made it hard to decide what I actually wanted to go to and I found it particularly harder than this year with many quality sessions. The CITCON wiki will slowly be updated this week from notes taken in those sessions. It can be found @ http://www.citconf.com/wiki/index.php?title=CITCONAsiaPacific2008Sessions
Some pics are already surfacing too - http://flickr.com/photos/talios/sets/72157605892492402/
The best part about CITCON is just socialising with the talented people that attend. Everyone is dead keen on agile and continuous integration (obviously because they gave up their weekends). Being from Newcastle means I’m not surrounded or have frequent access to this type of talent and I think it’s important to take the things learned from these events and adapt my development processes for the better.
I’ll be helping organise next years event so hopefully we can make it even bigger and better.
Arrived @ CITCON
gommo June 28th, 2008
Arrived at CITCON on Friday night for the session scoping night. CITCON is run in an Open Spaces format which means there is no agenda, the responsibility of running a good conference is up to the attendees. The only rule is the ‘Rule of Two Feet’. If your not getting value out of a session, standup and go to another one.
There were a few familiar faces from CITCON 2007 in Sydney but by far the majority where new people from Melbourne. CITCON 2008 Melbourne was also the largest CITCON worldwide to date, beating out Sydney for the top honour. This is great news for Australia as its indicating there is a lot of interest for this type of development as well as demonstrating the amount of talent we have here.
After the topics for Saturday were proposed there was a social hour and then about 12 of us headed off for a local pub. It took us so long to find a decent one that didn’t have $30 cover charges that we lost 2 guys along the way 
I woke up a little worse for wear on Sat morning ready for the sessions.
CITCON Melbourne, 2008
gommo June 26th, 2008
I’m off to Melbourne tomorrow for CITCON, 2008 and hoping to pick up as much valuable information about Continuous Integration and Testing as possible. Last year, my team was still in the early steps of adopting many of these strategies. A year on, and hopefully I have something to bring to the table this year.
It looks like being a full conference so looking forward to meeting lots of new faces.
In Big Bucks Ben We Trust
gommo March 4th, 2008
The Steelers extended Ben Roethlisberger’s contract today to an 8-year, $102 MILLION dollar deal. That’s the largest contract ever for a Steeler and makes a massive statement that the Rooney’s are giving the keys to the Steelers to Big Ben. Let’s hope this helps bring another couple of Superbowl trophies to Pittsburgh.
Some interesting statistics from this
- He gets $25.2 million for just signing the contract
- Using his stats for last year this equates to $31,875 per pass attempt and $398,437.50 per touchdown.
I guess they felt sorry for him getting sacked so much last year. At least he’ll be able to pay for insurance
Good on you Ben. Here we go Steelers, here we go !
Hitting the ball fat
gommo February 11th, 2008
I found a nice article in my mailbox today about ‘hitting the ball fat’ (Golf talk that is). I wanted to bookmark it but thought I’d throw it on here instead for any other keen golfers.
http://www.iseekgolf.com/golfinstruction/7046-hitting-the-ball-fat