Can face masks help slow the spread of the coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) that causes COVID-19? Yes. Face masks combined with other preventive measures, such as getting vaccinated, frequent hand-washing and physical distancing, can help slow the spread of the virus. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends fabric masks for the general public. People who haven’t been fully vaccinated should continue to wear face masks in indoor public places and outdoors where there is a high risk of COVID-19 transmission, such as crowded events or large gatherings. The CDC says that N95 masks should be reserved for health care providers. How do the different types of masks work? Medical masks Also called surgical masks, these are loosefitting disposable masks. They're meant to protect the wearer from contact with droplets and sprays that may contain germs. A medical mask also filters out large particles in the air when the wearer breathes in. To make medical masks more form-fitting, knot the ear loops where they attach to the mask. Then fold and tuck the unneeded material under the edges.

An N95 mask is a type of respirator. It offers more protection than a medical mask does because it filters out both large and small particles when the wearer inhales. Because N95 masks have been in short supply, the CDC has said they should be reserved for health care providers. Health care providers must be trained and pass a fit test before using an N95 mask. Like surgical masks, N95 masks are intended to be disposable. However, researchers are testing ways to disinfect and reuse them. Some N95 masks, and even some cloth masks, have valves that make them easier to breathe through. Unfortunately, these masks don't filter the air the wearer breathes out. For this reason, they've been banned in some places. A cloth mask is intended to trap respiratory droplets that are released when the wearer talks, coughs or sneezes. It also acts as a barrier to protect the wearer from inhaling droplets released by others.

The most effective cloths masks are made of multiple layers of tightly woven fabric like cotton. A mask with layers will stop more droplets from getting through your mask or escaping from it. How to get the most from your mask; The effectiveness of cloth and medical masks can be improved by ensuring that the masks are well fitted to the contours of your face to prevent leakage of air around the masks' edges. Masks should be snug over the nose, mouth and chin, with no gaps. You should feel warm air coming through the front of the mask when you breathe out. You shouldn't feel air coming out under the edges of the mask. Masks that have a bendable nose strip help prevent air from leaking out of the top of the mask. Some people choose to wear a disposable mask under their cloth mask. In that case, the cloth mask should press the edges of the disposable mask against the face. Don't add layers if they make it hard to breathe or obstruct your vision. Proper use, storage and cleaning of masks also affects how well they protect you. Follow these steps for putting on and taking off your mask: Wash or sanitize your hands before and after putting on your mask. Place your mask over your mouth and nose and chin. Tie it behind your head or use ear loops. Make sure it's snug.,Don't touch your mask while wearing it. If you accidentally touch your mask, wash or sanitize your hands. If your mask becomes wet or dirty, switch to a clean one. Put the used mask in a sealable bag until you can get rid of it or wash it. Remove the mask by untying it or lifting off the ear loops without touching the front of the mask or your face.

Wash your hands immediately after removing your mask.

Regularly wash cloth masks in the washing machine or by hand. (They can be washed along with other laundry.)

And don't forget these precautions: Don't put masks on anyone who has trouble breathing or is unconscious or otherwise unable to remove the mask without help. Don't put masks on children under 2 years of age. Don't use face masks as a substitute for physical distancing. What about face shields? The CDC doesn't recommend using face shields instead of masks because it's unclear how much protection shields provide. However, wearing a face mask may not be possible in every situation. If you must use a face shield instead of a mask, choose one that wraps around the sides of your face and extends below your chin.

Do you still need to wear a facemask after you’re fully vaccinated? After you're fully vaccinated, the CDC recommends that it's ok not to wear a mask except where required by a rule or law. However, if you are in an area with a high number of new COVID-19 cases in the last week, the CDC recommends wearing a mask indoors in public and outdoors in crowded areas or when you are in close contact with unvaccinated people. If you are fully vaccinated and have a condition or are taking medications that weaken your immune system, you may need to keep wearing a mask. You're considered fully vaccinated 2 weeks after you get a second dose of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine or 2 weeks after you get a single dose of the Janssen/Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine. In the U.S., everyone also needs to wear a mask while on planes, buses, trains and other forms of public transportation. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends medical masks for health care workers as well as for anyone who has or may have COVID-19 or who is caring for someone who has or may have COVID-19.``

 

www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-dep...

 

The Covid-19 pandemic seems to have sorted us into three types based on our attitudes toward masking: Call them nervous maskers, never-maskers and uncertain maskers. The first feel guilty or nervous about unmasking, so they tend to default to wearing masks; the second feel angry and resentful about being told to mask, so they often refuse entirely. And the third group is just trying to do the right thing without a lot of certainty one way or another. Winter is coming, with its continued battles against delta or mu or another variant. We have better protections now (vaccinations, natural antibodies) but also are returning to higher-risk environments (nightclubs, offices, schools). To complicate matters, there are additional factors to consider such as waning immunity from vaccines and the potential of a bad flu season.

Fortunately, there have been a number of important studies on the efficacy of masking over the past 18 months. The good news is that the research suggests most of us can actually de-mask without guilt or worry in many instances — and not just outdoors. It tells us, for example, that plexiglass dividers are in most cases useless or worse. But relaxed refuseniks need a rethink, too — we shouldn’t be ditching masks entirely. On the contrary, the more people adopt a policy of tactical masking, taking situational factors into account, the lower the infection risk and the more freedoms we can enjoy again. As the probability of infection increases, mask wearers lower the risk of catching the virus compared with no masking. For N95 or FFP2 masks, the protection is far greater. Note: Relative reduction in risk-of-infection figures are for an infection probability of 4%.

It’s no wonder we’re either nervous, angry or confused about masks when you consider how masking guidance and conventions have been all over the map. It seems amazing now that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization and various governments had warned against using masks in the early days of the pandemic. When Thomas Nitzsche, mayor of Jena, Germany, made the decision to require masks in public in early April 2020, his city became one of the first to do so. Infections dropped by up to 75% over the next few weeks. In May, the CDC said fully vaccinated people no longer needed to wear masks in most public settings. Two months later, as delta variant cases rose, the CDC revised that guidance. Now seven U.S. states — Hawaii, Illinois, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington — require most people to wear masks indoors in public places. Some states, including Texas and Florida, bar local authorities from imposing Covid-19 restrictions, including mask-wearing. In places that view masking as an affront to liberty, university professors can’t even ask students to wear masks during office hours without putting their jobs at risk. In England, there was a general lifting of restrictions in July, though U.K. Health Secretary Sajid Javid said last week that masking may become mandatory again in some indoor settings this winter, depending mainly on whether hospitalizations from Covid spike. While masks are required on public transport, I’d say about half or fewer comply during my journeys. Many offices require workers to mask while walking around, but few Tory lawmakers are wearing them in the House of Commons. Scotland still requires masks to be worn in shops and restaurants while not seated, as well as on public transport. Berlin requires the medical-grade FFP2 masks on public transport. Certain regions of France also have masking requirements in place. But if you care about what the evidence says (and some people don’t), the jury is in: Masks help a lot. Take, for example, the study that shows most U.S. states that had high mask usage in one month avoided high Covid rates in the subsequent month, even after adjusting for masking policy, social-distancing policy and demographic factors. The majority of states with low mask usage ended up with high Covid case rates. Note: Low mask adherence means states that fall below the 25th percentile; high adherence are those states above the 75th percentile. Study analyzed data from April to October 2020.

The largest study yet on the effectiveness of masking, posted online in pre-print earlier this month, was a randomize trial conducted in 600 villages across Bangladesh covering a population of more than 340,000 adults. It offered strong evidence that masks, and surgical masks in particular, reduce virus transmission. Researchers found that a 29 percentage-point increase in mask adoption led to an 11% reduction in symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 prevalence, where surgical masks were distributed; and a 35% reduction in people over 60. Symptom reductions using surgical masks were not statistically significant in younger age groups. While vaccines have largely broken the link between infections and hospitalizations (and death), they haven’t eliminated the need for mask-wearing. Data released last week showed that two doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine were 67% effective against delta-variant infections (compared with 80% for two doses of Pfizer/BioNTech’s). Infections can still be nasty; long Covid remains another reason for vigilance. Not only can fully vaccinated people catch and transmit the virus, but it is unvaccinated adults who are more mask-resistant. Since it’s estimated that around half of all transmissions come from asymptomatic persons, masks are still key to preventing infections. But masking shouldn’t be performative, as it often is with those uncertain maskers who just want to show they are being thoughtful. Which masks we wear, and especially how they fit, is important. Mind the Gap . While N95s offer a higher level of protection, a well-fitted surgical mask blocks most particles.

More particles get through mask; Of course, not all masks are created equal, as a recent study published in the journal Nature highlighted. The authors measured the thermal behavior of face masks in real time during inhalation and exhalation to determine the relationship between the fabric structure of the masks and their performance. Their experiment helped shed light on how aerosol-containing bacteria and coronaviruses penetrate three different kinds of masks — reusable face masks, disposable surgical masks and the N95 — and how we can evaluate air filtration performance.Reusable masks have longer, thicker fibers with a larger average pore diameter. Unsurprisingly, they have

higher levels of permeability, with the surgical mask coming second, followed by the F95 (similar to the FFP2 in Europe). Those findings should even help manufacturers create a new generation of masks that offer more breathability while also improving filtration. The CDC doesn’t recommend scarves and other headwear because they tend to be made from loosely woven fabrics. Loosely Denser fabrics such as cotton with a 600 thread count compared with cotton that is woven with 80 threads per inch, are much more effective. Mixed fabrics also tend to have better results. A study on masks with and without gaps shows that leaks can significantly reduce their effectiveness. In addition to materials, layering them can also improve efficacy. New lab evidence on different kinds of masks showed that a three-ply surgical mask blocked 42% of particles from a simulated cough; a three-ply cloth mask was pretty similar. But the protection jumped to 92% when a cloth mask was worn over a surgical mask. Comfort is important to being able to wear a mask for long periods of time. In addition to metal nose-bridge strips that can help a mask stay on better, straps that tie behind the head and mask extenders can help reduce soreness around the ears. Insertable filters can be replaced when masks get wet.

Masks will also help prevent more vaccine-resistant variants from emerging as well as higher rates of flu infections, which can also cause serious illness and even death. Even so, the research strips away some of the mask myths and can help all categories of maskers — nervous, nevers and uncertains — be more tactical and aware. To know whether a mask is a must-have, a good idea or entirely superfluous, check the risk factors the way you might a weather report in the mountains: How densely packed and how well-ventilated is the space you are entering? Will you be moving around or stationary? It’s certainly good to mask up in an elevator or on public transport where people are pretty close together. It’s probably not necessary in an open-planned, well-ventilated office, provided people observe a measure of social distancing. Then be mindful of the infection and vaccination rates where you are. If you are in Broward County, Florida, where 70% of over-18s are vaccinated, you’d be justified in having a more relaxed approach; drive next door to Glades County, where only 31% are vaccinated and infection rates are high, and you’ll want to be more vigilant. Similarly only 16% of over-65s in King County, Texas, are vaccinated compared with 70% next door in Knox County, where the CDC recommends even vaccinated people mask. By moving beyond the “hygiene theater” of practices that don’t offer much benefit while also accepting that there are many different levels of risk tolerance and factors that increase or lower situational risk, we can treat masking a little like checking the weather forecast. Some days require a little more covering up than others.

 

www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2021-opinion-how-to-wear-face-...

Drypool Bridge has been given a makeover, representative of the Venn diagram, used in the fields of set theory, probability, logic, statistics, and computer science. The Venn diagram was introduced by John Venn, 1834-1923, mathematician and philosopher, born Kingston upon Hull, the son of the rector of the parish of Drypool. Venn is commemorated at the University of Hull by the Venn building, constructed in 1928.

 

commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Drypool_Bridge,_Kingston_...(geograph_5482685).jpg

New book! Epic Landscape Photography: The Principles of Fine Art Nature Photography!

 

www.facebook.com/epiclandscapephotography/

 

instagram.com/elliotmcgucken

 

Join my new 45EPIC fine art landscapes page on facebook!

facebook.com/mcgucken

 

Working on a couple photography books! 45EPIC GODDESS PHOTOGRAPHY: A classic guide to exalting the archetypal woman. And 45EPIC Fine Art Landscape Photography!

 

More on my golden ratio musings: facebook.com/goldennumberratio

instagram.com/goldennumberratio

 

Greetings all! I have been busy finishing a few books on photography, while traveling all over--to Zion and the Sierras--shooting fall colors. Please see some here: facebook.com/mcgucken

instagram.com/elliotmcgucken

 

Let me know in the comments if you would like a free review copy of one of my photography books! :)

 

Titles include:

The Tao of Epic Landscape Photography: Exalt Fine Art with the Yin-Yang Wisdom of Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching!

 

The Golden Number Ratio Principle: Why the Fibonacci Numbers Exalt Beauty and How to Create PHI Compositions in Art, Design, & Photography

facebook.com/goldennumberratio

 

And I am also working on a book on photographing the goddesses! :) More goddesses soon!

 

Best wishes on your epic hero's odyssey!:)

 

instagram.com/45surf

 

I love voyaging forth into nature to contemplate poetry, physics, the golden ratio, and the Tao te Ching! What's your favorite epic poetry reflecting epic landscapes? I recently finished a book titled Epic Poetry for Epic Landscape Photographers:

 

www.facebook.com/Epic-Poetry-for-Epic-Landscape-Photograp...

 

Did you know that John Muir, Thoreau, and Emerson all loved epic poetry and poets including Shakespeare, Milton, Homer, and Robert Burns?

 

I recently finished my fourth book on Light Time Dimension Theory, much of which was inspired by an autumn trip to Zion!

 

www.facebook.com/lightimedimensiontheory/

 

Via its simple principle of a fourth expanding dimension, LTD Theory provides a unifying, foundational *physical* model underlying relativity, quantum mechanics, time and all its arrows and asymmetries, and the second law of thermodynamics. The detailed diagrams demonstrate that the great mysteries of quantum mechanical nonlocality, entanglement, and probability naturally arise from the very same principle that fosters relativity alongside light's constant velocity, the equivalence of mass and energy, and time dilation.

 

Follow me on instagram!

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Join my new 45EPIC fine art landscapes page on facebook!

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My familiar sight when looking in this direction used to include a humongous pine tree about 30 feet beyond the fence until a few weeks ago, but it had gotten so big that it was on the verge of being blown down during our windy seasons and I had no interest in that probability, so unfortunately the tree had to go. I'll miss it. I live in Southern California so I hope this fog clears out before tomorrow's Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl Game.

 

Happy New Year everybody!

  

From the blurb on the dustjacket:

 

“With this new departure – a ‘special’ in ‘The Young Traveller Series’ – we present a book for young people in which space science is taken out of the realms of fiction and fantasy into those of fact and probability.

 

“. . . It is by the foremost authority on the subject (and lately Chairman of the British Interplanetary Society) . . . Man’s curiosity about worlds beyond his own is unlimited. Arthur Clarke tells us of the history of this curiosity from the visions of de Bergerac in 1656, through the prophesies of Verne and Wells, to recent experiments of sending animals into space by rocket, and man’s deepening knowledge of life on other planets. . .

 

“There is an account of the solar system; of what life would mean on a space station; of the solutions which must be found before space travel becomes a practical reality; and of the engineering problems connected with rocket construction. Thirty-two plates and six diagrams prepared especially for the book combine to make a volume to be recommended as an authoritative, reliable and exciting account of the problems of man’s greatest adventure, the conquest of space.”

 

The cause of this MESs is when you loose the trust with the ppl YOU are working with....

 

Trust is both and emotional and logical act. Emotionally, it is where you expose your vulnerabilities to people, but believing they will not take advantage of your openness. Logically, it is where you have assessed the probabilities of gain and loss, calculating expected utility based on hard performance data, and concluded that the person in question will behave in a predictable manner. In practice, trust is a bit of both. I trust you because I have experienced your trustworthiness and because I have faith in human nature.

  

The Anomaly is a Risky Proposition

 

The deep space anomaly presents a formidable challenge and an irresistible allure. A direct trajectory towards its enigmatic core carries a perilous 45% probability of incurring catastrophic structural damage to any vessel. This alarming statistic translates to a high fatality risk for the crew, a grim reality that weighs heavily on the minds of those contemplating such a voyage.

 

Despite the profound dangers, the anomaly continues to beckon with a "tantalising, almost magical energy and travel solution." Whispers among the scientific community suggest that unlocking its secrets could revolutionise interstellar travel, offering capabilities far beyond current understanding. This potential for groundbreaking advancements, instantaneous jumps across vast cosmic distances or the harnessing of previously unknown forms of energy, fuels the audacious ambition to confront the anomaly head-on. The stakes are immense, promising either unparalleled technological leaps or utter destruction.

 

Podcast:

www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXaHuXMcUMrhIzfjKlj9clJCOf...

 

Meta TV

www.facebook.com/watch/100063480315046/1020837046583872/

 

Blogger:

www.jjfbbennett.com/2025/07/the-anomaly.html

 

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#art #Spacestation #scifi #fictionalworld #story #arthouse #futuristic #spaceadventure #Sanctuary #Revitalisation #Retro #art #metaart

Mutations = genetic, copying mistakes.

 

The progressive, evolution story

is one huge MISTAKE

which, ironically,

depends on MISTAKES

as its mechanism ...

Mistake

- upon mistake

- upon mistake

- upon mistake

So that the entire, human genome

is created from billions of mistakes.

 

If, after reading this, you still believe in the progressive evolution story - you will believe anything.

  

EVOLUTION .....

What is the truth about Darwinian, progressive (microbes to human) evolution?

Although we are told it is an irrefutable, scientific fact .....

the real fact is, as we will show later, there is no credible mechanism for such progressive evolution.

 

So what was the evolutionary idea that Darwin popularised?

 

Put simply ...

Darwin believed that there was unlimited variability in the gene pool of all living things, which would enable the transformation of the first, self-replicating, living cell, through many years of natural selection, into every living thing, including humans.

 

However, the changes possible were well known by selective breeders to be strictly limited.

 

This is because the changes seen in selective breeding are due to the shuffling, deletion and emphasis of genetic information already existing in the gene pool (micro-evolution). There is no viable mechanism for creating new, beneficial, genetic information required to create entirely new body parts ... anatomical structures, biological systems, organs etc. (macro-evolution).

 

Darwin rashly ignored the limits which were well known to breeders (even though he selectively bred pigeons himself, and should have known better). He simply extrapolated the strictly limited, minor changes observed in selective breeding to major, unlimited, progressive changes able to create new structures, organs etc. through natural selection, over an alleged multi-million year timescale.

 

Of course, the length of time involved made no difference, the existing, genetic information could not increase of its own accord, no matter how long the timescale. Natural selection can only select from what is available, i.e. what is already in the gene pool.

 

That was a gigantic flaw in Darwinism, and opponents of Darwin's ideas tried to argue that changes were limited, as selective breeding had demonstrated.

But because Darwinism had acquired a status more akin to an ideology than purely, objective science, belief in the Darwinian idea outweighed the verdict of observational and experimental science, and classical Darwinism became firmly established as scientific orthodoxy for nearly a century.

 

Opponents continued to argue all this time, that Darwinism was unscientific nonsense, but they were ostracised and dismissed as cranks, weirdoes or religious fanatics.

 

Finally however, it was discovered that the opponents of Darwin were perfectly correct - and that constructive, genetic changes (progressive, macro-evolution) require new, additional, genetic information.

 

This looked like the ignominious end of Darwinism, as there was no credible, natural mechanism able to create new, constructive, genetic information. And Darwinism should have been heading for the dustbin of history.

 

Darwin's idea that a single, celled microbe could transform itself into a human and every other living thing, through natural selection over millions of years, had always been totally bonkers. That it is, or ever could have been, regarded as a great 'scientific' theory, beggars belief.

 

However, rather than ditch the whole idea, the vested interests in Darwinism had become so great, with numerous, lifelong careers and an ideological agenda which had become dependant on the Darwinian belief system, a desperate attempt was made to rescue it from its justified demise.

A mechanism had to be invented to explain the origin of new, constructive information.

 

That invented mechanism was 'mutations'. Mutations are ... literally, genetic, copying MISTAKES.

 

The general public had already been convinced that classical Darwinism was a scientific fact, and that anyone who questioned it was a crank, so all that had to be done, as far as the public was concerned, was to give the impression that the theory had simply been refined and updated in the light of modern science.

 

The fact that classical Darwinism had been wrong all along, and was fatally flawed from the outset was kept quiet. This meant that the opponents of Darwinism, who had been right all along, and were the real champions of science, continued to be vilified as cranks and scorned by the mass media and establishment. Ideology and vested interests took precedence over common sense and proper science.

 

The new developments were simply portrayed as the evolution and development of the theory. The impression was given that there was nothing wrong with the idea of progressive (macro) evolution, it had simply 'evolved' and 'improved' in the light of greater knowledge.

 

A sort of progressive evolution of the idea of evolution.

 

This new, 'improved' Darwinism became known as Neo-Darwinism.

 

So what is Neo-Darwinism? And did it really solve the fatal flaws of the Darwinian idea?

 

Neo Darwinism is progressive, macro evolution - as Darwin had proposed, but based on the incredible idea that random mutations (accidental, genetic, copying mistakes) selected and preserved by natural selection, can provide the constructive, genetic information capable of creating entirely new features, anatomical structures, organs, and biological systems. In other words, it is macro-evolution based on a belief in the total progression from microbes to man through billions of random, genetic, copying MISTAKES, accumulated over millions of years.

 

However, there is no evidence for it whatsoever, and it should be classified as unscientific nonsense which defies logic, the laws of probability, the law of cause and effect and Information Theory.

 

Mutations are not good, they are something to be feared, not celebrated as an agent of improvement or progression.

The vast majority of mutations are harmful, they cause illness, cancer and deformities, which is not at all surprising. It is precisely what we would expect from mistakes.

If you throw a spanner into the works of a machine, you would be daft to expect it to improve the operation of the machine. However, evolutionists ignore such common sense and propose that something (which, similarly, would be expected to cause damage) caused billions of constructive improvements in complexity, design and function, ultimately transforming microbes into men, and every other, living thing.

 

The proof of the pudding is in the eating ....

Ironically, evolutionists fear mutations just as much as everyone else. You can bet your bottom dollar that you won't get evolutionists volunteering to subject themselves or their families to mutagenic agents in order to 'improve' humanity. You certainly won't get evolutionists deliberately going to live near chemical or nuclear plants - in order to give their idea of progressive evolution by mutations a helping hand. No way!

 

Evolutionists know perfectly well that mutations are very risky and are most likely to be harmful, certainly not something anyone should desire.

Yet, perversely, they still present them as the (magical) agent responsible for creating the constructive, genetic information which, they claim, progressively transformed the first living cells into every living thing that has ever lived, including humans. They present and teach that extraordinary belief as though it is an irrefutable fact.

If we don't believe the progressive evolution fantasy, or dare to question it, we are branded as unscientific, ignorant, uneducated, backward thinking cranks or fanatics.

Incredible!

I suppose, one way to try to stifle opposition to a crazy idea, is to insult or ridicule those who oppose it. The story of the 'Emperor's New Clothes' comes to mind.

 

It is understandable that people are sometimes confused, because they know that 'micro'-evolution is an observable fact, which everyone accepts. Evolutionists cynically exploit that confusion by citing obvious examples of micro-evolution such as: the Peppered Moth, Darwin's finches, so-called superbugs etc., as evidence of macro-evolution.

 

Of course such examples are not evidence of macro-evolution at all. The public is simply being hoodwinked and lied to, and it is a disgrace to science. There are no observable examples or evidence of macro-evolution and no examples of a mutation, or a series of mutations capable of creating new, anatomical structures, organs etc. and that really is a fact.

It is no wonder that W R Thompson stated in the preface to the 1959 centenary edition of Darwin's Origin of the Species, that ... the success of Darwinism was accompanied by a decline in scientific integrity.

 

Micro-evolution is simply the small changes which take place, through natural selection or selective breeding, but only within the strict limits of the built-in variability of the existing gene pool (existing, genetic information). Any constructive changes outside the extent of the existing gene pool requires a credible mechanism for the creation of new, beneficial, genetic information, that is essential for macro evolution.

 

Micro evolution does not involve or require the creation of any new, genetic information. So micro evolution and macro evolution are entirely different. There is no connection between them at all, whatever evolutionists may claim.

 

Once people fully understand that the differences they see in various dogs breeds, for example, are merely an example of limited micro-evolution (selection of existing genetic information) and nothing to do with progressive macro-evolution, they begin to realise that they have been fed an incredible story.

A dog will always remain a dog, it can never be selectively bred into some other creature, the extent of variation is constrained by the limitations of the existing, genetic information in the gene pool of the dog genus, and evolutionists know that.

 

To clarify further ...

Neo-Darwinian, macro evolution is the ludicrous idea that everything in the genome of humans and every living thing past and present (apart from the original genetic information in the very first living cell) is the result of an accumulation of billions of random, genetic copying mistakes..... mutations accruing upon previous mutations .... on and on - and on.

 

In other words ...

Neo-Darwinism proposes that the complete genome (every scrap of genetic information in the DNA) of every living thing, or that has ever lived, was created by an incredibly, long series of random mistakes added to previous, random mistakes.

 

If we look at the whole picture ...

we soon realise that what is actually being proposed by evolutionists is that, apart from the original information in the first living cell (and evolutionists have yet to explain how that original information magically arose?) - every additional scrap of genetic information for all - the biological features, anatomical structures, systems and processes that exist, or have ever existed in living things, such as:

skin, bones, bone joints, shells, flowers, leaves, wings, scales, muscles, fur, hair, teeth, claws, toe and finger nails, horns, beaks, nervous systems, blood, blood vessels, brains, lungs, hearts, digestive systems, vascular systems, liver, kidneys, pancreas, bowels, immune systems, senses, eyes, ears, complementary sex organs, sexual reproduction, sperm, eggs, pollen, the process of metamorphosis, marsupial pouches, marsupial embryo migration, mammary glands, hormone production, melanin etc. .... have been created from scratch, by an incredibly long series of small, accumulated and randomly, occurring mistakes ... i.e. a random mistake accruing upon a previous, random mistake - upon a previous, random mistake - upon a previous, random mistake - over and over again, billions of times.

 

This notion is so incredible, we must emphasise once again what it actually means -

It means that all the body parts, systems and biological processes of all living things are the result of literally billions of random, genetic MISTAKES, accumulated over many (alleged) millions of years. This amazing thing occurred from one, original, living cell, which, it is claimed (without any evidence), spontaneously arose, entirely of its own volition, from sterile matter, in some imagined, primordial, soup scenario (contrary to the well established and unfalsified Law of Biogenesis).

Consider this ...

If, for example, there is no genetic information (constructional instructions) for bones (or any other body part) in the alleged, original, living cell, how could copying mistakes of the limited information in such a single cell produce such entirely, new constructive information? That's right, it simply couldn't, it is sheer fantasy.

 

Incredibly, what we are asked to believe is that something like a vascular system, or reproductive organs, developed in small, random, incremental steps, with every step being the result of a copying mistake, and with each step being able to provide a significant survival or reproductive advantage in order to be preserved and become dominant in the gene pool. Utterly incredible!

 

If you believe that ... you will believe anything.

 

Even worse, evolutionists have yet to cite a single example of a positive, beneficial, mutation which adds constructive information to the genome of any creature. Yet they expect us to believe that we have been converted from an original, single living cell into humans by an accumulation of billions of beneficial mutations.

 

Conclusion:

 

Progressive, microbes-to-man evolution is impossible - there is no credible mechanism to produce all the new, genetic information which is essential for that to take place.

 

The progressive, evolution story is an obvious fairy tale presented as scientific fact.

 

However, nothing has changed - those who dare to question the new 'improved', neo-Darwinian version of progressive evolution are still portrayed as idiots, retards, cranks, weirdoes, anti-scientific ignoramuses or religious fanatics.

Want to join the club?

 

What about the fossil record?

 

The formation of fossils...

Books explaining how fossils are formed frequently give the impression that it takes many years of build up of layers of sediment to bury organic remains, which then become fossilised.

 

Therefore many people don't realise that this impression is erroneous, because it is a fact that all good, intact fossils require rapid burial in sufficient sediment to prevent decay or predatory destruction.

 

So, it is evident that rock containing good, undamaged fossils was laid down rapidly, sometimes in catastrophic conditions.

The very existence of intact fossils is a testament to rapid burial and sedimentation.

 

You don't get fossils from slow burial. Organic remains don't just sit around on the sea bed, or elsewhere, waiting for sediment to cover them a millimetre at a time, over a long period.

Unless they are buried rapidly, they would soon be damaged or destroyed by predation and/or decay.

The fact that so many sedimentary rocks contain fossils, indicates that the sediment that created them was normally laid down within a short time.

 

Another important factor is that many large fossils (tree trunks, large fish, dinosaurs etc.) intersect several or many strata (sometimes called layers) which clearly indicates that multiple strata were formed simultaneously in a single event by grading/segregation of sedimentary particles into distinct layers, and not stratum by stratum over long periods of time or different geological eras, which is the evolutionist's, uniformitarian interpretation of the geological column.

 

In view of the fact that many large fossils required a substantial amount of sediment to bury them, and the fact that they intersect multiple strata (polystrate fossils), how can any sensible person claim that strata or, for that matter, any fossil bearing rock, could have taken millions of years to form?

What do laboratory experiments and field studies of recent, sedimentation events show? sedimentology.fr/

 

You don't even need to be a qualified sedimentologist or geologist to come to that conclusion, it is common sense.

 

Rapid formation of strata - some recent, field evidence:

www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/sets/72157635944904973/

 

What about the idea that radiometric dating confirms vast ages for the fossil record:

Carbon dating cannot be used for the claimed, long timescale assigned to fossils by evolutionists as the maximum age it can be used for is less than 50.000 years. Sedimentary rocks also cannot be dated radiometrically. Evolutionists have to rely on the odd occasion where there is an igneous rock intrusion into a sedimentary deposit to which they apply radiometric dating. However, the dates obtained this way are not reliable, for the reason outlined below:

"As regards radiometric dating, I refer to Prof. Aubouin, who says in his Précis de Géologie: "Each radioactive element disintegrates in a characteristic and constant manner, which depends neither on the physical state (no variation with pressure or temperature or any other external constraint) nor on the chemical state (identical for an oxide or a phosphate)."

Rocks form when magma crystallizes. Crystallisation depends on pressure and temperature, from which radioactivity is independent. So, there is no relationship between radioactivity and crystallisation.

Consequently, radioactivity doesn't date the formation of rocks. Moreover, daughter elements contained in rocks result mainly from radioactivity in magma where gravity separates the heavier parent element, from the lighter daughter element. Thus radiometric dating has no chronological signification." Dr. Guy Berthault www.sciencevsevolution.org/Berthault.htm

 

All creatures and plants alive today, which are found as fossils, are the same in their fossil form as the living examples, in spite of the fact that the fossils are claimed to be millions of years old. So all living things today could be called 'living fossils' inasmuch as there is no evidence of any evolutionary changes in the alleged multi-million year timescale. The fossil record shows either extinct species or unchanged species, that is all.

When no evidence is cited as evidence:

www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/15157133658

 

The Cambrian Explosion.

Trilobites and other many creatures appeared suddenly in some of the earliest rocks of the fossil record, with no intermediate ancestors. This sudden appearance of a great variety of advanced, fully developed creatures is called the Cambrian Explosion. Trilobites are especially interesting because they have complex eyes, which would need a lot of progressive evolution to develop such advanced features However, there is no evidence of any evolution leading up to the Cambrian Explosion, and that is a serious dilemma for evolutionists.

 

Trilobites are now thought to be extinct, although it is possible that similar creatures could still exist in unexplored parts of deep oceans.

 

See fossil of a crab unchanged after many millions of years:

www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/12702046604/in/set-72...

 

Fossil museum: www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/sets/72157641367196613/

 

What about all the claimed scientific evidence that evolutionists have found for evolution?

The evolutionist 'scientific' method has resulted in a serious decline in scientific integrity, and has given us such scientific abominations as:

 

Piltdown Man (a fake),

 

Nebraska Man (a pig),

 

South West Colorado Man (a horse),

 

Orce man (a donkey),

 

Embryonic Recapitulation (a fraud),

 

Archaeoraptor (a fake),

 

Java Man (a giant gibbon),

 

Peking Man (a monkey),

 

Montana Man (an extinct dog-like creature)

 

Nutcracker Man (an extinct type of ape - Australopithecus)

 

The Horse Series (unrelated species cobbled together),

 

Peppered Moth (faked photographs)

 

The Orgueil meteorite (faked evidence)

 

Ida - the newly discovered (2009), hominid, 'missing link' (an extinct lemur),

Etc. etc.

 

Anyone can call anything 'science' ... it doesn't make it so.

All these examples were trumpeted by evolutionists as scientific evidence for evolution.

Do we want to trust evolutionists claims about scientific evidence, when they have such an appalling record?

 

Just how good are peer reviews of scientific papers?

www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6154/60.full

 

Want to publish a science paper?

www.nature.com/nature/journal/v434/n7036/full/nature03653...

 

www.nature.com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gib...

 

Piltdown Man was even used in the famous, Scopes Trial as positive evidence for evolution.

Piltdown Man reigned for over 40 years, as a supreme example of evidence of human evolution, before it was exposed as a crudely, fashioned fake.

Is that 'science'?

 

The ludicrous Hopeful Monster Theory and so-called Punctuated Equilibrium (evolution in big jumps followed by long periods of stasis) were invented by evolutionists as a desperate attempt to explain away the lack of fossil evidence for evolution. They are proposed methods of evolution which, it is claimed, need no fossil evidence. They are actually an admission that the required fossil evidence does not exist.

 

The Piltdown Man fake... it survived as alleged proof of evolution for over 40 years in evolution textbooks and was taught in schools and universities, it survived peer reviews etc. and was claimed as irrefutable, scientific evidence for evolution at the famous Scopes Trial..

 

A pig, a horse and a donkey saga...

The pig ...

Nebraska Man, this was a single tooth of a peccary (a type of pig). It was trumpeted as scientific evidence for the evolution of humans, and highly imaginative, artist's impressions of an complete, ape-like man appeared in newspapers magazines etc. All based on a single tooth. Such 'scientific' evidence is enough to make any genuine, scientist weep.

 

The horse ....

South West Colorado Man, was based on another single tooth ... of a horse this time! ... also proclaimed as 'scientific' evidence for human evolution.

 

The donkey ...

The Orce Man saga - a tiny fragment of skullcap was presented to the media as a human ancestor, accompanied by the familiar hype and hullaballoo. Embarrassingly, a symposium planned to discuss this supposed, ape-man had to be cancelled at short notice when it was 'discovered' that it was most likely from a donkey!

But, even if it was human, such a tiny fragment of skull is certainly not any evidence of human evolution, as had been claimed.

 

Embryonic Recapitulation - The 19th century, evolutionist zealot Ernst Haeckel (who inspired Hitler's, Darwinian, master race policies) published fraudulent drawings of embryos, and his theory was enthusiastically accepted by evolutionists as proof of progressive evolution. Even after he was exposed as a fraudster, evolutionists still continued to use his fraudulent evidence in books and publications on evolution, including school textbooks, until very recently.

 

Archaeoraptor - A so-called, feathered dinosaur from the Chinese, fossil faking industry. It managed to fool credulous evolutionists, because it was exactly what they were looking for. The evidence fitted the wishful thinking.

 

Java Man - Dubois, the man who discovered Java Man and declared it a human ancestor ..... eventually admitted that it was actually a giant gibbon. However, that spoilt the evolution story which had been built up around it. So, evolutionists were reluctant to get rid of it and still maintained it was a human ancestor. It later turned out that Dubois had also 'forgotten' to mention he had found the bones of modern humans at the same site.

 

Peking Man, made up from monkey skulls which were found in an ancient, limestone burning, industrial site, where there were crushed monkey skulls and modern human bones. Drawings were made of Peking Man, but the original skull conveniently disappeared. So, that allowed evolutionists to continue to use it as evidence without fear of it ever being debunked.

 

The Horse Series - fossils of unrelated species cobbled together, They were from different continents and were in no way a proper series of intermediates, They had different numbers of ribs etc. and the very first in the line, is similar to a creature alive today - the Hyrax.

 

Peppered Moth - moths were glued to trees in order to fake photographs for the peppered moth evidence. They don't normally rest on trees in daytime. In any case, the selection of a trait which is part of the variability of the existing, gene pool, is NOT progressive evolution. It is just an example of normal, natural selection within limits, which no-one disputes.

 

The Orgueil meteorite, organic material, and even plant seeds, were embedded and glued into the Orgueil meteorite and disguised with coal dust to make them look like part of the original meteorite, in a fraudulent attempt to fool the world into believing in the discredited idea of spontaneous generation of life (abiogenesis), which is essential for progressive evolution to get started. The reasoning being that, if it could be shown that there was life in space, spontaneous generation must have happened there. And hence, abiogenesis could be declared by evolutionists as a scientific fact.

 

'Missing link' Ida - Hyped up by evolutionists (including the renowned, wildlife documentary, presenter Sir David Attenborough) in 2009 as a newly discovered, “missing link” of human evolution. This allegedly, 47-million-year-old fossil was discovered in Germany. However, it is now obvious that Ida is not evidence of primate (or human) evolution at all, it is simply an extinct type of lemur.

 

Is macro evolution even science? The honest answer to that question has to be an emphatic - NO!

 

The accepted definition of science is: that which can be demonstrated and observed and repeated. Progressive evolution cannot be proved, or tested; it is claimed to have happened in the past, and, as such, it is not subject to the scientific method. It is merely a belief, based primarily on preconceptions.

 

Of course, there is nothing wrong with having beliefs, especially if there is a wealth of evidence to support them, but they should not be presented as scientific fact. As we have shown, in the case of progressive evolution, there is a wealth of evidence against it. Nevertheless, we are told by evolutionist zealots that microbes-to-man evolution is a fact and likewise the spontaneous generation of life from sterile matter (so-called abiogenesis). They are deliberately misleading the public on both counts. Progressive evolution is not only not a fact, it is not even proper science.

 

You don't need a degree in rocket science to understand that Darwinism has damaged and undermined science.

However, what does the world's, most famous, rocket scientist (the father of modern rocket science) have to say?

 

Wernher von Braun (1912 – 1977) PhD Aerospace Engineering

 

"In recent years, there has been a disturbing trend toward scientific dogmatism in some areas of science. Pronouncements by notable scientists and scientific organizations about "only one scientifically acceptable explanation" for events which are clearly outside the domain of science -- like all origins are -- can only destroy the curiosity of those who must carry on the future work of science. Humility, a seemingly natural product of studying nature, appears to have largely disappeared -- at least its visibility is clouded from the public's viewpoint.

 

Extrapolation backward in time until there are no physical artifacts of certainty that can be examined, requires sophisticated guessing which scientists prefer to refer to as "inference." Since hypotheses, a product of scientific inference, are virtually the stuff that comprises the cutting edge of scientific progress, inference must constantly be nurtured. However, the enthusiasm that encourages inference must be matched in degree with caution that clearly differentiates inference from what the public so readily accepts as "scientific fact." Failure to keep these two factors in balance can lead either to a sterile or a seduced science. 'Science but not Scientists' (2006) p.xi"

 

And the eminent scientist, William Robin Thompson (1887 - 1972) Entomologist and Director of the Commonwealth Institute of Biological Control, Ottawa, Canada, who was asked to write the introduction of the centenary edition of Darwin's 'Origin', wrote:

 

"The concept of organic Evolution is very highly prized by biologists, for many of whom it is an object of genuinely religious devotion, because they regard it as a supreme integrative principle. This is probably the reason why the severe methodological criticism employed in other departments of biology has not yet been brought to bear against evolutionary speculation." 'Science and Common Sense' (1937) p.229

 

“As we know, there is a great divergence of opinion among biologists … because the evidence is unsatisfactory and does not permit any certain conclusion. It is therefore right and proper to draw the attention of the non-scientific public to the disagreements about evolution. But some recent remarks of evolutionists show that they think this unreasonable ......

This situation, where scientific men rally to the defence of a doctrine they are unable to define scientifically, much less demonstrate with scientific rigor, attempting to maintain its credit with the public by the suppression of criticism and the elimination of difficulties, is abnormal and unwise in science.”

 

Prof. W. R. Thompson, F.R.S., introduction to the 1956 edition of Darwin's 'Origin of the Species'

 

"When I was asked to write an introduction replacing the one prepared a quarter of a century ago by the distinguished Darwinian, Sir Anthony Keith [one of the "discoverers" of Piltdown Man], I felt extremely hesitant to accept the invitation . . I am not satisfied that Darwin proved his point or that his influence in scientific and public thinking has been beneficial. If arguments fail to resist analysis, consent should be withheld and a wholesale conversion due to unsound argument must be regarded as deplorable. He fell back on speculative arguments."

 

"He merely showed, on the basis of certain facts and assumptions, how this might have happened, and as he had convinced himself he was able to convince others."

 

"But the facts and interpretations on which Darwin relied have now ceased to convince."

 

"This general tendency to eliminate, by means of unverifiable speculations, the limits of the categories Nature presents to us is the inheritance of biology from The Origin of Species. To establish the continuity required by the theory, historical arguments are invoked, even though historical evidence is lacking. Thus are engendered those fragile towers of hypothesis based on hypothesis, where fact and fiction intermingle in an inextricable confusion."—*W.R. Thompson, "Introduction," to Everyman’s Library issue of Charles Darwin, Origin of Species (1958 edition).

 

"The evolution theory can by no means be regarded as an innocuous natural philosophy, but rather is a serious obstruction to biological research. It obstructs—as has been repeatedly shown—the attainment of consistent results, even from uniform experimental material. For everything must ultimately be forced to fit this theory. An exact biology cannot, therefore, be built up."—*H. Neilsson, Synthetische Artbildng, 1954, p. 11

 

www.trueorigin.org/

 

Berkeley University law professor, Philip Johnson, makes the following points: “(1) Evolution is grounded not on scientific fact, but on a philosophical belief called naturalism; (2) the belief that a large body of empirical evidence supports evolution is an illusion; (3) evolution is itself a religion; and, (4) if evolution were a scientific hypothesis based on rigorous study of the evidence, it would have been abandoned long ago.”

 

DNA.

The discovery of DNA should have been the death knell for evolution. It is only because evolutionists tend to manipulate and interpret evidence to suit their own preconceptions that makes them believe DNA is evidence FOR evolution.

 

It is clear that there is no natural mechanism which can produce constructional, biological information, such as that encoded in DNA.

Information Theory (and common sense) tells us that the unguided interaction of matter and energy cannot produce constructive information.

 

Do evolutionists even know where the very first, genetic information in the alleged Primordial Soup came from?

Of course they don't, but with the usual bravado, they bluff it out, and regardless, they rashly present the spontaneous generation of life as a scientific fact.

However, a fact, it certainly isn't .... and good science it certainly isn't.

 

Even though evolutionists have no idea whatsoever about how the first, genetic information originated, they still claim that the spontaneous generation of life (abiogenesis) is an established scientific fact, but this is completely disingenuous. Apart from the fact that abiogenesis violates the Law of Biogenesis, the Law of Cause and Effect and the Second Law of Thermodynamics, it also violates Information Theory.

 

Evolutionists have an enormous problem with explaining how the DNA code itself originated. However that is not even the major problem. The impression is given to the public by evolutionists that they only have to find an explanation for the origin of DNA by natural processes - and the problem of the origin of genetic information will have been solved.

That is a confusion in the minds of many people that evolutionists cynically exploit,

Explaining how DNA was formed by chemical processes, explains only how the information storage medium was formed, it tells us nothing about the origin of the information it carries.

 

To clarify this it helps to compare DNA to other information, storage mediums.

For example, if we compare DNA to the written word, we understand that the alphabet is a tangible medium for storing, recording and expressing information, it is not information in itself. The information is recorded in the sequence of letters, forming meaningful words.

You could say that the alphabet is the 'hardware' created from paper and ink, and the sequential arrangement of the letters is the software. The software is a mental construct, not a physical one.

The same applies to DNA. DNA is not information of itself, just like the alphabet it is the medium for storing and expressing information. It is an amazingly efficient storage medium. However, it is the sequence or arrangement of the amino acids which is the actual information, not the DNA code.

So, if evolutionists are ever able to explain how DNA was formed by chemical processes, it would explain only how the information storage medium was formed. It will tell us nothing about the origin of the information it carries.

Thus, when atheists and evolutionists tell us it is only a matter of time before 'science' will be able to fill the 'gaps' in our knowledge and explain the origin of genetic information, they are not being honest. Explaining the origin of the 'hardware' by natural processes is an entirely different matter to explaining the origin of the software.

Next time you hear evolutionists skating over the problem of the origin of genetic information with their usual bluff and bluster, and parroting their usual nonsense about science being able to fill such gaps in knowledge in the future, don't be fooled. They cannot explain the origin of genetic information, and never will be able to. The software cannot be created by chemical processes or the interaction of energy and matter, it is not possible. If you don't believe that. then by all means put it to the test, by challenging any evolutionist to explain how genetic information (not DNA) can originate by natural means? I can guarantee they won't be able to do so.

 

It is true to say - the evolution cupboard is bare when it come to real, tangible evidence.

 

For example:

1. The origin of life is still a mystery, evolutionists have failed to demonstrate that the Law of Biogenesis (which rules out the spontaneous generation of life), and has never been falsified, is not universally valid.

 

2. They have no explanation of where the first, genetic information came from. Information Theory rules out an orign of such, constructive information by natural processes.

 

3. They assume (without any evidence) that matter is somehow intrinsically predisposed to produce life whenever the environmental conditions for life permit.

 

4. They deny that there is any purpose in the universe, yet completely contradict that premise by assuming the above intrinsic predisposition of matter to produce life, as though matter is somehow endowed with a 'blueprint' for the creation of life.

 

5. They have no credible mechanism for the increase of genetic information required for progressive evolution and increasing complexity.

 

6. They have failed to produce any credible, intermediate, fossil examples, in spite of searching for over 150 years. There should be millions of examples, yet there is not a single one which is a watertight example.

 

7. They regularly publish so-called evidence which, when properly examined, is discovered to be nothing of the sort: Example ... Orce Man (the skullcap of a donkey!).

 

8. They use dubious dating techniques, such as circular reasoning in the dating of fossils and rocks.

 

9. They discard any evidence - radiocarbon dating, sedimentation experiments, fossils etc. that doesn't fit the preconceptions.

 

10. They frequently make the claim that there has to be life on other planets, simply on the assumption (without evidence) that life spontaneously generated and evolved on Earth which they take it for granted is a proven fact.

 

11. They cannot produce a single, credible example of a genuinely, beneficial mutation, yet billions would be required for microbes to human evolution.

 

There is much more, but that should suffice to debunk the incessant hype and propaganda that microbes-to-human evolution is an established, irrefutable fact.

It should be enough to put an end to the greatest fraud that has been foisted on the public in scientific history.

 

Evolutionism is not science.

Science is the method through which theories are tested and re-tested. However, today evolution is guarded against such scrutiny and taught uncritically in our public schools. This pervasive defense of naturalism has led students to view Darwinism as the only accepted explanation for the diversity of life on Earth. This presentation will encourage critical thinking of scientific interpretations, and examine the bedrock evidence for the theory of evolution. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZE6hm2kpYiY&list=TLGGI4E1iBi7...

 

We are constantly told by evolutionists that the majority of scientists accept progressive evolution (as though that gives it credence) ... but most scientists, don't actually study evolution in any depth, because it is outside their field of expertise. They simply trust what they are taught in school, and mistakenly trust the integrity of evolutionists to present evidence objectively.

That is another great MISTAKE!

 

Evolutionism: The Religion That Offers Nothing.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=znXF0S6D_Ts&list=TLqiH-mJoVPB...

The Statistician’s Dilemma

 

The statistician attended a birthday party

The princess got a Barbie and a pony

Everybody was supposed to be happy

The parent looked on anxiously

 

The statistician took a trip overseas

Wandered through streets that tourists miss

Watched children played in the underbelly

Where no one is supposed to be happy

 

Crunch his figures, do his maths

Calculate probability

Found no correlativity

Happiness is not measured in toys

 

It may be measured against something called love

But love itself cannot be measured against anything…

 

Read more in -

a1000reasons.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-statisticians-dilem...

Just one more photo of the Yorkshire Lesser White-fronted Goose, this time with its head up. This is a rare goose in the wild, but it is kept in captivity, so any appearances in Britain are usually tainted with the probability that they are escapees, including this one. Greater White-fronted Goose was given the name Anser albifrons which translates as white-fronted goose. Lesser Whitefront has the name A. erythropus, which means red-footed (orange wasn't a colour back then as it was classed as a shade of red) though its yellow eyering would have been the feature that I would have named it after if it had been me. The scientific names always remind me of an amusing conversation I had with the the late Jeffery Boswell, who was a colleague of mine at RSPB ( www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/aug/27/jeffery-boswall ) You may remember his TV series of Wildlife Safaris to Ethiopia and Argentina in the 1970s. He was a great wit and raconteur and used to invent amusing names for birds. He had me in stitches once when he referred to Y-fronted Geese, then he added the scientific name "Anser cumfifrons". With great comic timing he went on to talk about the Lesser Y-fronted Goose "Anser indecenta".

There's a high probability I will never pilot another plane from Palm Springs, CA to Grand Canyon, AZ again. We were living in a Palm Desert mobilehome park on Hwy-74 at the time and had left our Piper PA28 parked at Victoria Airport (CYYJ)

We decided to rent an airplane and make the 280 mile flight to Grand Canyon Airport and return on a nice, clear day.

Firstly, I had to pay a visit to the Riverside, CA General Aviation Pilot Licensing Officer and obtain a US pilot's license after showing him my Canadian pilot's licence (PPL). No tests were required. 🇺🇸

Then, I had to pay (as in $) a visit to the local, Palm Springs FBO (Fixed Base Operator) to rent an airplane.

To qualify for a rental, I had to take a checkride with a CFI (Chief Flight Instructor) which entailed renting said aircraft and paying an hourly rate for the CFI to ride in the righthand seat. I was checked-out-in-type but took another, duel-ride to become more comfortable flying this upgraded PA28 aircraft.

 

And you thought all one had to do was walk into an airplane rental office and rent an airplane just like at Avis Car Rental. Not quite.

 

Now, none-of-the-above is needed. Just fire-up MicroSoft Flight Simulator (MSFS) and go!

Elaiussa Sebaste was an ancient Roman town located 55 km (34 mi) from Mersin in the direction of Silifke in Cilicia on the southern coast of Anatolia (in modern-day Turkey). Elaiussa, meaning olive, was founded in the 2nd century B.C. on a tiny island attached to the mainland by a narrow isthmus in Mediterranean Sea.

 

Besides the cultivation of olives, the settlement here of the Cappadocian king Archelaus during the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus played a role in the development of the city. Founding a new city on the isthmus, Archelaus called it Sebaste, which is the Greek equivalent word of the Latin "Augusta". The city entered a golden age when the Roman Emperor Vespasian purged Cilicia of pirates in 74 AD. Towards the end of the 3rd century AD however its importance began to wane, owing in large part to incursions by the Sassanian King Shapur I in 260 and later by the Isaurians. The ancient sources tell the history of city’s existence and how the churches and basilicas survived into the late Roman and early Byzantine periods. When its neighbour Corycus began to flourish in the 6th century AD, Elaiussa Sebaste was slowly obliterated from the stage of history.

 

The island that was the site of the first settlement here, where excavations have been underway since 1995 headed by Italian archeologist Eugenia Equini Schneider, is almost completely buried under sand. The original settlement, at a location that provided security for the harbors on either side, is a peninsula today. The ruins of a bath, a cistern, a defense wall and a breakwater can be seen on the side overlooking the western bay of the peninsula. But the most important remains unearthed in the city are a bath whose floor is paved with mosaics and a small basilica on a circular base.

  

A building on the main street of city (east of the theater)

On the opposite side of the highway that divides Elaiussa and Sebaste today stands a theater dating to the 2nd century AD, an extremely small structure with only 23 rows of seats, whose steps and decorations unfortunately succumbed to centuries of plunder. Next to the theater is the agora, built in all great probability during the imperial period. At the entrance of the agora, which is surrounded by a semi-destroyed defense wall once rose two monumental fountains in the shape of lions. Inside the agora stands a large church, its floor is covered by sand to protect the mosaic pavement. Elaiussa’s only temple stands outside the city on a hill overlooking the sea. Only two of the Corinthian columns of this temple, which had 12 on the long and 6 on the short side originally, are standing today. A large bath complex among the lemon groves between the temple and the agora was built by a technique characteristic of the ancient Roman period and little used in Anatolia.

 

The ruins of Elaiussa Sebaste also harbor the richest and most impressive necropolis among the cities of ancient Cilicia. The "Avenue of Graves", located on a hill to the north of the city, preserves close to a hundred graves of various shapes and sizes scattered among the lemon trees. The aesthetic forms of these monumental graves of Cilicia Tracheia are remarkable.

 

The ancient aqueducts that carried water to the ruins from the Lamos ("Lemon") river also adorn the city’s two entrances. The aqueduct to the west of the city in particular is in relatively good condition. Centuries ago these aqueduct, as delicate as necklaces, actually formed a canal system that ran all the way to Corycus.

 

A lidded sarcophagus lies on a small rise exactly opposite the aqueduct. Known as "the Grave of the Princess", this sarcophagus is a prime example of the Anatolian tomb tradition.

Cape Baboon

 

Bärenpavian

 

Kruger National Park is one of the largest game reserves in Africa. It covers an area of 19,485 km2 (7,523 sq mi) in the provinces of Limpopo and Mpumalanga in northeastern South Africa, and extends 360 km (220 mi) from north to south and 65 km (40 mi) from east to west. The administrative headquarters are in Skukuza. Areas of the park were first protected by the government of the South African Republic in 1898, and it became South Africa's first national park in 1926.

 

To the west and south of the Kruger National Park are the two South African provinces of Limpopo and Mpumalanga. In the north is Zimbabwe, and to the east is Mozambique. It is now part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park, a peace park that links Kruger National Park with the Gonarezhou National Park in Zimbabwe, and with the Limpopo National Park in Mozambique.

 

The park is part of the Kruger to Canyons Biosphere an area designated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as an International Man and Biosphere Reserve (the "Biosphere").

 

The park has nine main gates allowing entrance to the different camps.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

The chacma baboon (Papio ursinus), also known as the Cape baboon, is, like all other baboons, from the Old World monkey family. It is one of the largest of all monkeys. Located primarily in southern Africa, the chacma baboon has a wide variety of social behaviors, including a dominance hierarchy, collective foraging, adoption of young by females, and friendship pairings. These behaviors form parts of a complex evolutionary ecology. In general, the species is not threatened, but human population pressure has increased contact between humans and baboons. Hunting, accidents, and trapping kill or remove many baboons from the wild, thereby reducing baboon numbers and disrupting their social structure.

 

Due to hybridization between different baboon (Papio) populations across Africa, authors have occasionally grouped the entire radiation as a single species, the hamadryas baboon, Papio hamadryas. Arbitrary boundaries were then used to separate the populations into subspecies. Other authors considered the chacma baboon a subspecies of the yellow baboon, Papio cynocephalus, though it is now recognised as a separate species, Papio ursinus. The chacma baboon has two or three subspecies, depending on which classification is followed. Grubb et al. (2003) listed two subspecies,[4] while Groves (2005) in Mammal Species of the World listed three. This article follows Groves (2005) and describes three distinct subspecies. In the Grubb et al. (2003) paper, P. u. raucana was believed to be synonymous with P. u. ursinus.

 

Papio ursinus ursinus Kerr, 1792 – Cape chacma (found in southern South Africa)

 

P. ursinus griseipes Pocock, 1911 – Gray-footed chacma (found in northern South Africa to southern Zambia)

 

P. ursinus raucana Shortridge, 1942 – Ruacana chacma (found from Namibia to southern Angola, but not accepted by all authorities as distinct.

 

The chacma baboon is perhaps the longest species of monkey, with a male body length of 50–115 cm (20–45 in) and tail length of 45–84 cm (18–33 in). It also one of the heaviest; the male weighs from 21 to 45 kg (46 to 99 lb) with an average of 31.8 kg (70 lb). Baboons are sexually dimorphic, and females are considerably smaller than males. The female chacma weighs from 12 to 25 kg (26 to 55 lb), with an average of 15.4 kg (34 lb). It is similar in size to the olive baboon, averaging slightly higher in mean body mass, and of similar weight to the more compact mandrill, the males of which weigh on average about 1 kg (2.2 lb) more than a chacma baboon, the females weigh 3 kg (6.6 lb) less than the female chacma. While the mandrill is usually crowned the largest of all modern monkeys, going on total length and average (but not maximum) body weight between the sexes, the chacma baboon appears to be the largest extant monkey. The chacma baboon is generally dark brown to gray in color, with a patch of rough hair on the nape of its neck. Unlike the males of northern baboon species (the Guinea, hamadryas, and olive baboons), chacma males do not have a mane. Perhaps the most distinctive feature of this baboon is its long, downward-sloping face. The canine teeth of male chacma baboons have a mean length of 3.86 ± 0.30 cm (1.52 ± 0.12 in) at the time they emigrate from their natal troop. This is the time of greatest tooth length as the teeth tend to wear or be broken thereafter.

 

The three subspecies are differentiated by size and color. The Cape chacma is a large, heavy, dark-brown, and has black feet. The gray-footed chacma is slightly smaller than the Cape chacma, lighter in color and build, and has gray feet. The Ruacana chacma generally appears to be a smaller, less darkly colored version of the Cape chacma.

 

The chacma baboon inhabits a wide array of habitats including woodland, savanna, steppes, and subdesert, from the grassy alpine slopes of the Drakensberg to the Kalahari desert. During the night the chacma baboon needs hills, cliffs, or large trees in which to sleep. During the day water availability may limit its range in arid areas. It is found in southern Africa, ranging from South Africa north to Angola, Zambia, and Mozambique. The subspecies are divided across this range. The Cape chacma is found in southern South Africa; the gray-footed chacma, is present from northern South Africa, through the Okavango Delta in Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique (south of the Zambezi), to southwest Zambia; and the Ruacana chacma is found in northern Namibia and southern Angola.

 

The chacma baboon is omnivorous with a preference for fruits, while also eating insects, seeds, grass, smaller vertebrate animals, and fungi (the desert truffle Kalaharituber pfeilii); at the Cape of Good Hope in particular, it is also known for taking shellfish and other marine invertebrates. It is generally a scavenger when it comes to game meat, and rarely engages in hunting large animals. One incident of a chacma baboon killing a human infant has been reported, but the event is so rare, the locals believed it was due to witchcraft. Normally, chacma baboons will flee at the approach of humans, though this is changing due to the easy availability of food near human dwellings.

 

The chacma baboon usually lives in social groups, called troops, which are composed of multiple adult males, adult females, and their offspring. Occasionally, however, very small groups form that consist of only a single adult male and several adult females. Chacma troops are characterized by a dominance hierarchy. Female ranking within the troop is inherited through the mother and remains relatively fixed, while male ranking is often in flux, especially when the dominant male is replaced. Chacmas are unusual among baboons in that neither males nor females form strong relationships with members of the same sex. Instead, the strongest social bonds are often between unrelated adult males and females. Infanticide is also common compared to other baboon species, as newly dominant males will often attempt to kill young baboons sired by the previously dominant male. Baboon troops possess a complex group behavior and communicate by means of body attitudes, facial expressions, vocalizations and touch.

 

The chacma baboon often sleeps in large groups on cliffs or in trees at night to avoid predators. The morning dispersal from the sleeping site is synchronized, with all members leaving at the same time. In most cases, dispersal is initiated by a single individual, and the other members of the group decide whether or not to follow. At least five followers must be recruited for a successful dispersal initiation, and not all initiation attempts are successful. Surprisingly, the initiator's dominance status shows little correlation with successful initiation of departure; more-dominant individuals are no more likely to lead a successful departure than subordinate individuals. One study has shown that while the success rate of dispersal initiation attempts is relatively constant across all sexes, male are more likely to attempt initiation than females, and lactating females are less likely to attempt initiation than females without dependent offspring. A separate study has achieved slightly different results. While dominance hierarchy does not play a significant role in initiating the morning dispersal, social affiliation does. Chacma baboons that play a more central role in the group (as measured by grooming behavior and time spent with other members) are more likely to be followed during the morning dispersal. This study concluded that group members are more likely to follow the behavior of individuals with which they are closely affiliated.

 

Dominance does play a role in group foraging decisions. A dominant individual (usually the alpha male) leads the group to easily monopolized resources. The group usually follows, even though many subordinate members cannot gain access to that particular resource. As in morning dispersal, the inclination of group members to follow the leader is positively associated with social interactions with that dominant individual.

 

Collective foraging behavior, with many individuals taking advantage of the same resource at once, has also been observed. However, this behavior can be chiefly attributed to shared dietary needs rather than social affiliation. Pregnant females, who share similar dietary needs, are more likely to synchronize their behavior than fertile females. Foraging synchronization decreases in areas with lower food density.

 

Adoption behavior has been observed in chacma baboons. Orphaned baboons whose mothers have disappeared or died are often too small to care for themselves. In one study of nine natural orphans and three introduced orphans, all but one orphan were adopted by another member of the group. The individual that was not adopted was 16 months old, four months older than the next oldest orphan, and was old enough to survive on its own. Adoption behavior includes sleeping close to the orphaned infant, grooming and carrying the orphan, and protecting it from harassment by other members of the troop. Both males and females care for infants, and care does not depend on the infant's sex. Additionally, all caregivers are prereproductive, only four or five years of age. The two major theories explaining this behavior are kin selection, in which caregivers take care of potentially related orphans, and parental practice, in which young caregivers increase their own fitness by using an orphan to practice their own parental skills.

 

Males and female chacma baboons often form relationships referred to as "friendships". These cooperative relationships generally occur between lactating females and adult males. The females are believed to seek out male friendships to gain protection from infanticide. In many baboon species, immigrant alpha males often practice infanticide upon arrival in a new troop. By killing unrelated infants, the new male shortens the time until he can mate with the females of the troop. A female with dependent offspring generally does not become sexually receptive until she weans her offspring at around 12 months of age. However, a mother usually becomes sexually receptive shortly after the death of her offspring.

 

This protection hypothesis is supported by studies of stress hormones in female baboons during changes in the male hierarchy. When an immigrant male ascends to the top of the male dominance hierarchy, stress hormones in lactating and pregnant females increases, while stress hormones in females not at risk of infanticide stay the same. Additionally, females in friendships with males exhibit a smaller rise in stress hormones than do females without male friends.

 

The benefits of friendship to males are less clear. A male is more likely to enter into friendships with females with which he has mated, which indicates males might enter into friendships to protect their own offspring and not just to protect that female's future reproductive success. These friendships may play a role in the mating system of chacma baboons. A female will often mate with several males, which increases the number of potential fathers for her offspring and increases the chances she will be able to find at least one friend to protect her infants.

 

Female chacma baboons have been observed to compete with each other for male friends. This may be the result of one male having a high probability of paternity with multiple females. These competitions are heavily influenced by the female dominance hierarchy, with dominant females displacing subordinate females in friendships with males. Generally, when a more-dominant female attempts to make friends with an individual which is already the friend of a subordinate female, the subordinate female reduces grooming and spatial proximity to that male, potentially leaving her offspring at higher risk of infanticide.

 

The chacma baboon is widespread and does not rank among threatened animal species. However, in some confined locations, such as South Africa's Southern Cape Peninsula, local populations are dwindling due to habitat loss and predation from other protected species, such as leopards and lions. Some troops have become a suburban menace, overturning trash cans and entering houses in their search for food. These troops can be aggressive and dangerous, and such negative encounters have resulted in hunting by frustrated local residents. This isolated population is thought to face extinction within 10 years.

 

The chacma is listed under Appendix II of CITES as it occurs in many protected areas across its range. The only area in South Africa where they are monitored is in the Cape Peninsula, where they are protected.

 

Observations by those working hands-on in South Africa's rehabilitation centers have found this species is damaged by human intervention; troop structures are influenced, and over the years a significant loss in numbers has occurred. Because they live near human habitats, baboons are shot, poisoned, electrocuted, run over, and captured for the pet industry, research laboratories and muthi (medicine).[32] Despite this, assessors working for the IUCN believe there are no major threats that could result in a range-wide decline of the species.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Der Kruger-Nationalpark (deutsch häufig falsch Krüger-Nationalpark) ist das größte Wildschutzgebiet Südafrikas. Er liegt im Nordosten des Landes in der Landschaft des Lowveld auf dem Gebiet der Provinz Limpopo sowie des östlichen Abschnitts von Mpumalanga. Seine Fläche erstreckt sich vom Crocodile-River im Süden bis zum Limpopo, dem Grenzfluss zu Simbabwe, im Norden. Die Nord-Süd-Ausdehnung beträgt etwa 350 km, in Ost-West-Richtung ist der Park durchschnittlich 54 km breit und umfasst eine Fläche von rund 20.000 Quadratkilometern. Damit gehört er zu den größten Nationalparks in Afrika.

 

Das Schutzgebiet wurde am 26. März 1898 unter dem Präsidenten Paul Kruger als Sabie Game Reserve zum Schutz der Wildnis gegründet. 1926 erhielt das Gebiet den Status Nationalpark und wurde in seinen heutigen Namen umbenannt. Im Park leben 147 Säugetierarten inklusive der „Big Five“, außerdem etwa 507 Vogelarten und 114 Reptilienarten, 49 Fischarten und 34 Amphibienarten.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Der Bärenpavian oder Tschakma (Papio ursinus) ist eine Primatenart aus der Gattung der Paviane innerhalb der Familie der Meerkatzenverwandten (Cercopithecidae). Er lebt im südlichen Afrika.

 

Mit einer Kopfrumpflänge von bis zu 115 Zentimetern, wozu noch ein bis zu 71 Zentimeter langer Schwanz kommt, und einem Gewicht von 15 bis 31 Kilogramm bilden sie die größte und schwerste Pavianart. Ihr Fell ist an der Oberseite dunkelbraun oder grau gefärbt, die Unterseite ist heller, die Hände und Füße sind meist schwarz. Die langgezogene, unbehaarte Schnauze ist dunkelviolett oder schwarz gefärbt, ebenso die Sitzschwielen. Die Fellfärbung und die Größe sind nach Region variabel, so gibt es eine Population mit grauen Pfoten; besonders kleine Exemplare kommen zum Beispiel in der Kalahari vor.

 

Die Männchen sind deutlich größer und schwerer als die Weibchen und haben auch längere Eckzähne, im Gegensatz zu den übrigen Pavianarten fehlt ihnen aber die Mähne an den Schultern und am vorderen Rücken.

 

Bärenpaviane leben im südlichen Afrika, genauer in Angola, Botswana, Mosambik, Namibia, Südafrika und Sambia. Sie bewohnen sowohl Steppen und Savannen als auch offene Waldgebiete, sind jedoch auf das Vorhandensein von Wasser angewiesen.

 

Wie alle Paviane leben sie in Gruppen, meistens in gemischten Gruppen, in manchen Regionen (zum Beispiel im gebirgigen Südafrika) dominieren jedoch die Einmännchengruppen (siehe Gruppenverhalten der Paviane). Die Bärenpaviane zeigen ein komplexes Gruppenverhalten und kommunizieren mittels Körperhaltungen, Gesichtsausdrücken, Lauten und durch Körperkontakte. Bärenpaviane sind Allesfresser; sie haben eine Vorliebe für Früchte, nehmen jedoch auch Blätter, Insekten, Samen und kleinere Wirbeltiere zu sich.

 

Die Fortpflanzung kann das ganze Jahr über erfolgen, die Weibchen weisen während der fruchtbaren Phase eine ausgeprägte Regelschwellung auf. Innerhalb der gemischten Gruppen kann sich prinzipiell jedes Männchen mit jedem Weibchen paaren. Das führt zu teilweise erbitterten Auseinandersetzungen unter den Männchen um das Paarungsvorrecht.

 

Nach einer rund 180-tägigen Tragzeit bringt das Weibchen meist ein einzelnes Jungtier zur Welt, das zunächst schwarz gefärbt ist. Mit rund einem Jahr werden die Jungen entwöhnt, mit drei bis fünf Jahren tritt die Geschlechtsreife ein. Das Höchstalter eines Tieres in menschlicher Obhut betrug 45 Jahre, in freier Wildbahn ist die Lebenserwartung deutlich geringer.

 

Bärenpaviane sind weit verbreitet und zählen nicht zu den bedrohten Tierarten. Manchmal gelten sie als Plage, da sie Plantagen verwüsten.

 

In Uitenhage war in der zweiten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts ein Bärenpavian namens Jack Assistent eines körperbehinderten Streckenwärters.

 

(Wikipedia)

September 21, 2012:

 

This panorama here is a capture of a sub-supercell thunderstorm which was in rural Southern Champaign County near Philo, or about 6-8 miles away from Urbana, Illinois. Definitely one of my wildest days of this said "chase season" in Illinois; this late summer and fall have been the "spring" of our season since we've had such a horrible drought in the area.

 

12/09/2012 EDIT:

 

Finally to add some more information on this day, I was feeling really sick and had a pretty bad cold although nothing stopped me this afternoon (09/21/2012) from witnessing some stormin' goodies in rural East Central Illinois. The SPC had a small-scale slightly enhanced risk area prior to a mesoscale discussion issued within the early afternoon hours regarding the probability that severe weather was likely. I happily scooted northbound along Route 130 from Coles County to Champaign County to witness a strengthening outflow dominant sub-supercell thunderstorm just in the outskirts of Urbana, near Philo.

 

I panorma'd this sucker and since this day I consider it to be one of my best shelf cloud captures yet of 2012.

 

Greetings mate! I love voyaging forth to Zion National Park to contemplate poetry, physics, the golden ratio, and the Tao te Ching! What's your favorite epic poetry reflecting epic landscapes? I recently finished a book titled Epic Poetry for Epic Landscape Photographers:

 

www.facebook.com/Epic-Poetry-for-Epic-Landscape-Photograp...

 

Did you know that John Muir, Thoreau, and Emerson all loved epic poetry and poets including Shakespeare, Milton, Homer, and Robert Burns?

 

How inspiring the grandeur of Zion is! It reminds us of those entities greater than ourselves, such as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Light Time Dimension Theory!

 

I recently finished my fourth book on Light Time Dimension Theory, much of which was inspired by an autumn trip to Zion!

 

www.facebook.com/lightimedimensiontheory/

 

Via its simple principle of a fourth expanding dimension, LTD Theory provides a unifying, foundational *physical* model underlying relativity, quantum mechanics, time and all its arrows and asymmetries, and the second law of thermodynamics. The detailed diagrams demonstrate that the great mysteries of quantum mechanical nonlocality, entanglement, and probability naturally arise from the very same principle that fosters relativity alongside light's constant velocity, the equivalence of mass and energy, and time dilation.

 

Follow me on intsagram!

instagram.com/elliotmcgucken

 

Join my new 45EPIC fine art landscapes page on facebook!

facebook.com/mcgucken

 

Fresh snow! More on my golden ratio musings: The Golden Number Ratio Principle: Why the Fibonacci Numbers Exalt Beauty and How to Create PHI Compositions in Art, Design, & Photography facebook.com/goldennumberratio

 

Best wishes on your epic hero's odyssey!:)

 

instagram.com/45surf

 

Zion National Park Winter Fine Art Photography 45EPIC Dr. Elliot McGucken Fine Art Landscape and Nature Photography

In my 100 Strangers Project (yes, I'm way past 100 strangers and usually don't post my photos to the group any more) I've always tried to keep a certain balance: I wanted to create a cross section of society - highly subjective, of course, and very much interfered with by other aspects, but a cross section nonetheless.

 

However, it became quickly clear that elder women are somewhat underrepresented in my Project. (The term „elder women“ is only used as a differentiation from „very young women“ here.)

 

But why are elder women underrepresented? As I've already said when I explained my „PoD – Probability of Denial“, the main and most obvious reason is that elder women will usually decline participating in my project. And that makes me more reluctant to ask elder women than any other group of strangers. (Btw, my next stranger will demonstrate that this is statistics at best and that there's no way to tell how specific people will react to my approach until I've actually asked them.)

 

I can think of a few reasons why elder women might be more likely to decline my request, and some of them have to do with society's perceptions, I guess. Eventually, another reason might be that elder women have certain reservations when dealing with men in their late 30s, especially when those men ask for a photo.

 

Anyway, I've been thinking about all of this once more and I decided to change the ratio a little by focusing on elder women. So, when I found a little time again to go out looking for strangers I did concentrate on elder women – but only to come home with three more rejections.

 

I didn't let that stop me; just a couple of days later, I set out again for elder women. Well, the photo of Tini clearly demonstrates that I failed again.

 

What happened? I was roaming the streets of Stuttgart, looking for elder women to photograph, when suddenly Tini passed by. Next thing I know I was following Tini, happily abandoning my initial goal. But before I could catch up with Tini she went inside a shoe store.

 

This wasn't the first time I waited in front of a store for someone to come out. However, after a few minutes I realized that the combination of „woman“ and „shoes“ might quite easily mean I would have to wait for what might feel like an eternity. Some fellow 100 Strangers photographers came to my mind, especially the ones somewhere in Australia that seem to raid shops in search of strangers on a regular basis – and I decided to break new ground: I went inside, found Tini and approached her right there.

 

No, was Tini's first answer when I asked her for a photo. I explained what my Project was about. No, she said again, but this time she added: I always look stupid on photos.

 

I tried swaggering: You haven't seen my photos yet...

 

What, Tini, asked, here inside the shoe store? - If you're ok with that, I'd like to take you outside, I answered, the light's better there.

 

Tini agreed. On our way out she threatened me: Don't you dare messing up! I believe she wasn't entirely joking...

 

So, finally, meet Tini. Tini is an engineer working for a well-known company in Esslingen. When I commented that I supposed she'd stand out among the other engineers, she laughed and said that was only on the appearance and that in fact, she was totally square.

 

After a short chat I got the feeling that Tini wanted to move on, so I thanked her and let her go back inside the store.

 

Still curious to learn more about Tini? Then you might wanna visit her (German) blog – she posted there about our encounter, too: See here.

 

Thank you, Tini!

 

---

 

You can find my original set of 100 Strangers here.

 

The ongoing series of 100 Strangers and Beyond can be seen here.

 

Find out more about the project at the group page 100 Strangers.

Walking along Low petergate towards York minster.

 

York Minster as been in the news today as the pop singer Ellie Goulding got married there this afternoon , there were lots of celebrities in attendance as is usual at these kind of events. I was a bit surprised, considering my recent success in Explore, that I wasn’t asked to be the official photographer for the big day😂😂😂, the happy couple would have got free exposure on Flickr, which everybody knows is far more productive than appearing in Hello magazine😉 and an high probability of featuring in Explore, sadly Ellie decided a photographer who had experience of photographing weddings was far more important😆, I did offer her 100 free 6\4 prints but even that failed to change her mind😂😂.

 

For those interested here is how the daily mail covered it.

 

www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-7414221/Ellie-Gould...

Have you been led up the garden path of lies?

 

EVOLUTION .....

What is the truth about Darwinian, progressive (microbes to human) evolution?

Although we are told it is an irrefutable, scientific fact .....

the real fact is, as we will show later, there is no credible mechanism for such progressive evolution.

 

So what was the evolutionary idea that Darwin popularised?

Put simply ...

Darwin believed that there was unlimited variability in the gene pool of all living things, which would enable the transformation of the first, self-replicating, living cell, through many years of natural selection, into every living thing, including humans.

However, the changes possible were well known by selective breeders to be strictly limited.

 

This is because the changes seen in selective breeding are due to the shuffling, deletion and emphasis of genetic information already existing in the gene pool (micro-evolution). There is no viable mechanism for creating new, beneficial, genetic information required to create entirely new body parts ... anatomical structures, biological systems, organs etc. (macro-evolution).

 

Darwin rashly ignored the limits which were well known to breeders (even though he selectively bred pigeons himself, and should have known better). He simply extrapolated the strictly limited, minor changes observed in selective breeding to major, unlimited, progressive changes able to create new structures, organs etc. through natural selection, over an alleged, multi-million year timescale.

 

Of course, the length of time involved made no difference, the existing, genetic information could not increase of its own accord, no matter how long the timescale. Selection, natural or otherwise, doesn’t create any new, genetic information. It merely ‘selects’ from that which already exists.

 

That was a gigantic flaw in Darwinism, and opponents of Darwin's ideas tried to argue that changes were limited, as selective breeding had demonstrated. But because Darwinism had acquired a status more akin to an ideology than purely, objective science, belief in the Darwinian idea outweighed the verdict of observational and experimental science, and classical Darwinism became firmly established as scientific orthodoxy for nearly a century.

 

Opponents continued to argue all this time, that Darwinism was unscientific nonsense, but they were ostracised and dismissed as cranks, weirdoes or religious fanatics.

 

Finally however, it was discovered that the opponents of Darwin were perfectly correct - and that constructive, genetic changes (progressive, macro-evolution) require new, genetic information.

 

This looked like the ignominious end of Darwinism, as there was no credible, natural mechanism able to create new, constructive, genetic information. And Darwinism should have been heading for the dustbin of history,

 

However, rather than ditch the whole idea, because the vested interests in Darwinism had become so great, with numerous, lifelong careers and a naturalistic ideology entirely dependant on the Darwinian belief system, a desperate attempt was made to rescue it from its justified demise.

 

A mechanism had to be invented to explain the origin of new, constructive information.

 

That invented mechanism was 'mutations'. Mutations are ... literally, genetic, copying MISTAKES.

 

The general public had already been convinced that classical Darwinism was a scientific fact, and that anyone who questioned it was a crank. So, all that had to be done, as far as the public was concerned, was to give the impression that the theory had simply been refined and updated in the light of modern science.

 

The fact that classical Darwinism had been wrong all along, and was fatally flawed from the outset was kept quiet. This meant that the opponents of Darwinism, who had been right all along, and were the real champions of science, continued to be vilified as cranks and scorned by the mass media and establishment.

 

The new developments were simply portrayed as the evolution and development of the theory. The impression was given that there was nothing wrong with the idea of progressive (macro) evolution, it had simply 'evolved' and 'improved' in the light of greater knowledge.

 

A sort of progressive evolution of the idea of evolution.

 

This new, 'improved' Darwinism became known as Neo-Darwinism.

 

So what is Neo-Darwinism? And did it really solve the fatal flaws of the Darwinian idea?

 

Neo Darwinism is progressive, macro evolution - as Darwin had proposed, but based on the ludicrous idea that random mutations (accidental, genetic, copying mistakes) favoured by natural selection, can provide the constructive, genetic information capable of creating entirely new features, anatomical structures, organs, and biological systems. In other words, it is macro-evolution based on a belief in the total progress from microbes to human through billions of random, genetic, copying MISTAKES, over millions of years.

 

However, there is no evidence for it whatsoever. It should be recognised as unscientific nonsense which defies logic, the laws of probability and Information Theory.

 

Sometimes people are confused, because they know that 'micro'-evolution is an observable fact, which everyone accepts. It is a disgrace that evolutionists cynically exploit that confusion by citing obvious examples of micro-evolution, such as: the Peppered Moth, Darwin's finches, so-called superbugs etc., as evidence of macro-evolution.

 

Of course, such examples are not evidence of macro-evolution at all. The public is being hoodwinked and lied to, and it is a disgrace to science. There are no observable examples or evidence of macro-evolution and no examples of a mutation, or a series of mutations capable of creating new anatomical structures, organs etc. and that is a fact. It is no wonder that W R Thompson stated in the preface to the 1959 centenary edition of Darwin's Origin of the Species, that ... the success of Darwinism was accompanied by a decline in scientific integrity.

 

Micro-evolution is simply the small changes which take place, through natural selection or selective breeding, but only within the strict limits of the existing variability of the gene pool. Any constructive changes outside the extent of the existing, gene pool requires a credible mechanism for the creation of new, beneficial, genetic information. That is essential for macro evolution.

 

Micro evolution does not involve or require the creation of any new, genetic information. So micro evolution and macro evolution are entirely different things. There is no connection between them at all, whatever evolutionists may claim. Micro evolution is an observable fact. Macro evolution is an invented mechanism based on unsubstantiated assumptions.

 

Once people fully understand that the differences they see in various dogs breeds, for example, are merely an example of limited micro-evolution (selection of existing genetic information) and nothing to do with progressive macro-evolution, they begin to realise that they have been fed an incredible story.

A dog will always remain a dog, it can never be selectively bred into some other creature, the extent of variation is constrained by the limitations of the existing, genetic information in the gene pool of the dog genus, and evolutionists know that.

 

To explain further.... Neo-Darwinian, macro evolution is the ridiculous idea that everything in the genome of humans and every living thing past and present (apart from the original genetic information in the very first living cell) is the result of the accumulation of billions of genetic, copying mistakes..... an incredibly long, incremental line of mutations. Mutations built upon previous mutations ... on, and on and on.

 

In other words, Neo-Darwinism proposes that the complete genome (every scrap of genetic information in the DNA) of every living thing that has ever lived was created by a long accumulation of mistakes ... mistakes added to previous mistakes. Mistakes of mistakes, of mistakes, billions of times over.

 

If we look at the whole picture we soon realise that what is actually being proposed by evolutionists is that, apart from the original information in the first living cell (and evolutionists have yet to explain how that original information magically arose?) - every additional scrap of genetic information for all - the biological features, anatomical structures, systems and processes that exist, or have ever existed in living things, such as:

skin, bones, bone joints, shells, flowers, leaves, wings, scales, muscles, fur, hair, teeth, claws, toe and finger nails, horns, beaks, nervous systems, blood, blood vessels, brains, lungs, hearts, digestive systems, vascular systems, liver, kidneys, pancreas, bowels, immune systems, senses, eyes, ears, sex organs, sexual reproduction, sperm, eggs, pollen, the process of metamorphosis, marsupial pouches, marsupial embryo migration, mammary glands, hormone production, melanin etc. .... have been created from scratch, by an incredibly long series of small, accumulated mistakes.

That is ... every body part, system and process of all living things are the result of literally billions of genetic MISTAKES accumulated over many millions of years. Which means the complete genome of every living thing is one, MASSIVE MISTAKE. Wow! And they call that science?

 

What we are being asked to believe is that something like a vascular system, or reproductive organs, developed in small, random, incremental steps, with every step being the result of a copying mistake, and with each step being able to provide a significant survival or reproductive advantage in order to be preserved and become dominant in the gene pool. Incredible!

 

If you believe that ... you will believe anything.

 

Even worse, evolutionists have yet to cite a single example of a positive, beneficial, mutation which adds constructive information to the genome of any creature. Yet they expect us to believe that we have been converted from an original, single living cell into humans by an accumulation of billions of beneficial mutations (mistakes).

 

Conclusion:

Progressive, microbes-to-man evolution is impossible - there is no credible mechanism to produce all the new, genetic information which is essential for that to take place.

 

The evolution story is an obvious, fairy tale, cynically presented as scientific fact.

 

However, nothing has changed - those who dare to question Neo-Darwinism are still portrayed as idiots, retards, cranks, weirdoes, anti-scientific ignoramuses or religious fanatics.

 

Want to join the club?

 

What about the fossil record?

 

The formation of fossils.

Books explaining how fossils are formed frequently give the impression that it takes many years of build up of layers of sediment to bury organic remains, which then become fossilised.

 

Therefore many people don't realise that this impression is erroneous, because it is a fact that all good, intact fossils require rapid burial in sufficient sediment to prevent decay or predatory destruction.

 

So it is evident that rock containing good, undamaged fossils was laid down rapidly, sometimes in catastrophic conditions.

 

The very existence of intact fossils is a testament to rapid burial and sedimentation.

 

You don't get fossils from slow burial. Organic remains don't just sit around on the sea bed, or elsewhere, waiting for sediment to cover them a millimetre at a time, over a long period.

 

Unless they are buried rapidly, they would soon be damaged or destroyed by predation and/or decay.

 

The fact that so many sedimentary rocks contain fossils, indicates that the sediment that created them was normally laid down within a short time.

 

Another important factor is that many large fossils (tree trunks, large fish, dinosaurs etc.) intersect several or many strata (sometimes called layers) which clearly indicates that multiple strata were formed simultaneously in a single event by grading/segregation of sedimentary particles into distinct layers, and not stratum by stratum over long periods of time or different geological eras, which is the evolutionist's, uniformitarian interpretation of the geological column.

 

In view of the fact that many large fossils required a substantial amount of sediment to bury them, and the fact that they intersect multiple strata (polystrate fossils), how can any sensible person claim that strata or, for that matter, any fossil bearing rock, could have taken millions of years to form?

What do laboratory experiments and field studies of recent, sedimentation events show? sedimentology.fr/

 

You don't even need to be a qualified sedimentologist or geologist to come to that conclusion, it is common sense.

 

Rapid formation of strata - some recent, field evidence:

www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/sets/72157635944904973/

 

All creatures and plants alive today, which are found as fossils, are the same in their fossil form as the living examples, in spite of the fact that the fossils are claimed to be millions of years old. So all living things today could be called 'living fossils' inasmuch as there is no evidence of any evolutionary changes in the alleged multi-million year timescale. The fossil record shows either extinct species or unchanged species, that is all.

When no evidence is cited as evidence:

www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/15157133658

 

The Cambrian Explosion.

Trilobites and other many creatures appeared suddenly in some of the earliest rocks of the fossil record, with no intermediate ancestors. This sudden appearance of a great variety of advanced, fully developed creatures is called the Cambrian Explosion. Trilobites are especially interesting because they have complex eyes, which would need a lot of progressive evolution to develop such advanced features However, there is no evidence of any evolution leading up to the Cambrian Explosion, and that is a serious dilemma for evolutionists.

 

Trilobites are now thought to be extinct, although it is possible that similar creatures could still exist in unexplored parts of deep oceans.

 

See fossil of a crab unchanged after many millions of years:

www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/12702046604/in/set-72...

 

Fossil museum: www.flickr.com/photos/101536517@N06/sets/72157641367196613/

 

What about all the claimed scientific evidence that evolutionists have found for evolution?

The evolutionist 'scientific' method has resulted in a serious decline in scientific integrity, and has given us such scientific abominations as:

 

Piltdown Man (a fake),

 

Nebraska Man (a pig),

 

South West Colorado Man (a horse),

 

Orce man (a donkey),

 

Embryonic Recapitulation (a fraud),

 

Archaeoraptor (a fake),

 

Java Man (a giant gibbon),

 

Peking Man (a monkey),

 

Montana Man (an extinct dog-like creature)

 

Nutcracker Man (an extinct type of ape - Australopithecus)

 

The Horse Series (unrelated species cobbled together),

 

Peppered Moth (faked photographs)

 

The Orgueil meteorite (faked evidence)

 

Etc. etc.

 

Anyone can call anything 'science' ... it doesn't make it so.

 

All these examples were trumpeted by evolutionists as scientific evidence for evolution.

 

Do we want to trust evolutionists claims about scientific evidence, when they have such an appalling record?

 

Just how good are peer reviews of scientific papers?

www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6154/60.full

 

Want to publish a science paper?

www.nature.com/nature/journal/v434/n7036/full/nature03653...

 

www.nature.com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gib...

 

Piltdown Man and Nebraska Man were even used in the famous, Scopes Trial as positive evidence for evolution.

 

Piltdown Man reigned for over 40 years, as a supreme example of human evolution, before it was exposed as a crudely, fashioned fake.

 

Is that 'science'?

 

The ludicrous Hopeful Monster Theory and so-called Punctuated Equilibrium (evolution in big jumps) were invented by evolutionists as a desperate attempt to explain away the lack of fossil evidence for evolution. They are proposed methods of evolution which, it is claimed, need no fossil evidence. They are actually an admission that the required fossil evidence does not exist.

 

Piltdown Man... it survived as alleged proof of evolution for over 40 years in evolution textbooks and was taught in schools and universities, it survived peer reviews etc. and was used as supposed irrefutable evidence for evolution at the famous Scopes Trial..

_____________________________________________

A pig, a horse and a donkey!

 

The pig ....

Nebraska Man, this was a single tooth of a peccary. it was trumpeted as scientific evidence for the evolution of humans. Highly imaginative artists impressions of an ape-like man appeared in newspapers magazines etc.

Having been 'discovered' 3 years prior to the Scopes Trial, it was resurrected, and given renewed publicity, shortly before the trial - presumably, in order to influence the trial and convince the public of the scientific evidence for evolution.. Such 'scientific' evidence is enough to make any genuine, respectable scientist weep.

 

The horse ....

South West Colorado Man, another tooth .... of a horse this time... also presented as scientific evidence for human evolution.

 

The donkey ....

Orce man, loudly proclaimed by evolutionists to be scientific evidence of an early hominid, based on the discovery of a tiny fragment of skullcap. This is now believed to have most likely come from a donkey, but even if it was human. such a tiny fragment is certainly not any evidence of human evolution, as it was claimed. A symposium which had been planned to discuss this alleged human 'missing link' had to be embarrassingly cancelled when it was identified as being very similar to a donkey skull.

_________________________________________

 

Embryonic Recapitulation, the evolutionist zealot Ernst Haeckel (who was a hero of Hitler) published fraudulent drawings of embryos and his theory was readily accepted by evolutionists as proof of evolution. Even after he was exposed as a fraudster, evolutionists still continued to use his fraudulent evidence in books and publications on evolution, including school textbooks, until very recently.

 

Archaeoraptor, A so-called feathered dinosaur from the Chinese fossil faking industry. It managed to fool credulous evolutionists, because it was exactly what they were looking for. The evidence fitted the wishful thinking.

 

Java Man, Dubois, the man who discovered Java Man and declared it a human ancestor ..... admitted much later that it was actually a giant gibbon, however, that spoilt the evolution story which had been built up around it, so evolutionists were reluctant to get rid of it, and still maintained it was a human ancestor. Dubois had also 'forgotten' to mention that he found the bones of modern humans at the same site.

 

Peking Man, made up from monkey skulls which were found in an ancient limestone burning industrial site where there were crushed monkey skulls and modern human bones. Drawings were made of Peking Man, but the original skull conveniently disappeared. So that allowed evolutionists to continue to use it as evidence without fear of it ever being debunked.

 

The Horse Series, unrelated species cobbled together, They were from different continents and were in no way a proper series of intermediates, They had different numbers of ribs etc. and the very first in the line, is similar to a creature alive today - the Hyrax.

 

Peppered Moth, moths were glued to trees to fake photographs for the peppered moth evidence. They don't normally rest on trees in daytime. In any case, the selection of a trait which is part of the variability of the existing gene pool, is not progressive evolution. It is just normal, natural selection within limits, which no-one disputes.

 

The Orgueil meteorite, organic material and even plant seeds were embedded and glued into the Orgueil meteorite and disguised with coal dust to make them look like part of the original meteorite, in a fraudulent attempt to fool the world into believing in the discredited idea of spontaneous generation of life, which is essential for progressive evolution to get started. The reasoning being that, if it could be shown that there was life in space, spontaneous generation must have happened there and could therefore be declared by evolutionists as being a scientific fact.

 

Is macro evolution even science? The answer to that has to be an emphatic - NO!

 

The usual definition of science is: that which can be demonstrated and observed and repeated. Evolution cannot be proved, or tested; it is claimed to have happened in the past, and, as such, it is not subject to the scientific method. It is merely a belief.

 

Of course, there is nothing wrong with having beliefs, especially if there is a wealth of evidence to support them, but they should not be presented as scientific fact. As we have shown, in the case of progressive evolution, there is a wealth of evidence against it. Nevertheless, we are told by evolutionist zealots that microbes to man evolution is a fact and likewise the spontaneous generation of life from sterile matter. They are deliberately misleading the public on both counts. Evolution is not only not a fact, it is not even proper science.

 

You don't need a degree in rocket science to understand that Darwinism has damaged and undermined science.

However, what does the world's, most famous, rocket scientist (the father of modern rocket science) have to say?

 

Wernher von Braun (1912 – 1977) PhD Aerospace Engineering

 

"In recent years, there has been a disturbing trend toward scientific dogmatism in some areas of science. Pronouncements by notable scientists and scientific organizations about "only one scientifically acceptable explanation" for events which are clearly outside the domain of science -- like all origins are -- can only destroy the curiosity of those who must carry on the future work of science. Humility, a seemingly natural product of studying nature, appears to have largely disappeared -- at least its visibility is clouded from the public's viewpoint.

 

Extrapolation backward in time until there are no physical artifacts of certainty that can be examined, requires sophisticated guessing which scientists prefer to refer to as "inference." Since hypotheses, a product of scientific inference, are virtually the stuff that comprises the cutting edge of scientific progress, inference must constantly be nurtured. However, the enthusiasm that encourages inference must be matched in degree with caution that clearly differentiates inference from what the public so readily accepts as "scientific fact." Failure to keep these two factors in balance can lead either to a sterile or a seduced science. 'Science but not Scientists' (2006) p.xi"

 

And the eminent scientist, William Robin Thompson (1887 - 1972) Entomologist and Director of the Commonwealth Institute of Biological Control, Ottawa, Canada, who was asked to write the introduction of the centenary edition of Darwin's 'Origin', wrote:

 

"The concept of organic Evolution is very highly prized by biologists, for many of whom it is an object of genuinely religious devotion, because they regard it as a supreme integrative principle. This is probably the reason why the severe methodological criticism employed in other departments of biology has not yet been brought to bear against evolutionary speculation." 'Science and Common Sense' (1937) p.229

 

“As we know, there is a great divergence of opinion among biologists … because the evidence is unsatisfactory and does not permit any certain conclusion. It is therefore right and proper to draw the attention of the non-scientific public to the disagreements about evolution. But some recent remarks of evolutionists show that they think this unreasonable ......

This situation, where scientific men rally to the defence of a doctrine they are unable to define scientifically, much less demonstrate with scientific rigor, attempting to maintain its credit with the public by the suppression of criticism and the elimination of difficulties, is abnormal and unwise in science.”

 

Prof. W. R. Thompson, F.R.S., introduction to the 1956 edition of Darwin's 'Origin of the Species'

 

"When I was asked to write an introduction replacing the one prepared a quarter of a century ago by the distinguished Darwinian, Sir Anthony Keith [one of the "discoverers" of Piltdown Man], I felt extremely hesitant to accept the invitation . . I am not satisfied that Darwin proved his point or that his influence in scientific and public thinking has been beneficial. If arguments fail to resist analysis, consent should be withheld and a wholesale conversion due to unsound argument must be regarded as deplorable. He fell back on speculative arguments."

 

"He merely showed, on the basis of certain facts and assumptions, how this might have happened, and as he had convinced himself he was able to convince others."

 

"But the facts and interpretations on which Darwin relied have now ceased to convince."

 

"This general tendency to eliminate, by means of unverifiable speculations, the limits of the categories Nature presents to us is the inheritance of biology from The Origin of Species. To establish the continuity required by the theory, historical arguments are invoked, even though historical evidence is lacking. Thus are engendered those fragile towers of hypothesis based on hypothesis, where fact and fiction intermingle in an inextricable confusion."—*W.R. Thompson, "Introduction," to Everyman’s Library issue of Charles Darwin, Origin of Species (1958 edition).

 

"The evolution theory can by no means be regarded as an innocuous natural philosophy, but rather is a serious obstruction to biological research. It obstructs—as has been repeatedly shown—the attainment of consistent results, even from uniform experimental material. For everything must ultimately be forced to fit this theory. An exact biology cannot, therefore, be built up."—*H. Neilsson, Synthetische Artbildng, 1954, p. 11

 

www.trueorigin.org/

 

Berkeley University law professor, Philip Johnson, makes the following points: “(1) Evolution is grounded not on scientific fact, but on a philosophical belief called naturalism; (2) the belief that a large body of empirical evidence supports evolution is an illusion; (3) evolution is itself a religion; and, (4) if evolution were a scientific hypothesis based on rigorous study of the evidence, it would have been abandoned long ago.”

 

Dr James Tour - 'The Origin of Life' - Abiogenesis decisively refuted.

youtu.be/B1E4QMn2mxk

  

To end with a more jocular quote, it has been said that:

"If Classical Darwinism is evolution by creeps and punctuated equilibrium is evolution by jerks, then neo Darwinism is evolution by freaks".

 

The real theory of everything

www.flickr.com/photos/truth-in-science/34295660211

Received in 2013 from Eva Maria Mann.

She thinks the pacemaker could be an (in-law) relative.

Eva Maria Mann www.flickr.com/photos/evamaria2010/

 

High probability that this is the Amsterdam Zeeburgerbaan (333,3 meter), which stood on a site along Zeeburgerdijk between 1901 and 1915. Notice the gaps between the slats! The wooden track was totally worn out. By the way, the track also had to disappear at this location due to housing construction.

 

Before that (from 1895, open: 1896 - 1900), this wooden track stood in Willemspark (later unfortunately built up), which then overflowed into Vondelpark.

 

My grandfather as a youngster also raced on this track; mainly as a ‘hare’ for expensive international riders. For him, a poorly paid job.

 

Private Photo

 

1356

Read the process blog @ softlight.us/clouds_over_maas.htm

 

De Maasduinen in the winter is a barren land with pockets of water keeping the birds alive. The entrance does give an indication of many species you could possibly observe here but, just as any other national park, you will find that there is a high probability you won't. Given those premises, I decided to wait for the sunset, and the water was a good way to reflect any color I would see. The colors are nice, I must say, and the clouds are even better, but I could have hoped for a better reflection.

This is the Clark County Courthouse in Kahoka, Missouri and it was built in 1871. One of the only types left in the state of its time period. Yesterday a special election was held to pass an increase in sales tax to build a new courthouse and it won. Which means the probability of the demolition of this historic courthouse, which IS on the National Historic Register ! Also this courthouse has had 2 public hangings. One I know was at the door on the left wall. I have photographed extensively of buildings in our county. Just the last few years Many have been lost one way or the other. You would expect that the most grand house in the county would be preserved. This is the town who preferred to have their new high school made like a pole barn.

The prophet Isaiah foretold that a conqueror named Cyrus would destroy seemingly impregnable Babylon and subdue Egypt along with most of the rest of the known world. This same man, said Isaiah, would decide to let the Jewish exiles in his territory go free without any payment of ransom (Isaiah 44:28; 45:1; and 45:13). Isaiah made this prophecy 150 years before Cyrus was born, 180 years before Cyrus performed any of these feats (and he did, eventually, perform them all), and 80 years before the Jews were taken into exile.

  

(Probability of chance fulfillment = 1 in 1000000000000000.)

 

www.needgod.com

Freight traffic has never been common at Waverley with most directed via the Edinburgh sub but this short refrigerated train is in all probability bound for nearby Leith Docks.

The Edinburgh Signalling Centre on the left was only five years old at this time.

USAF 01-1935 - Lockheed EC-130J Commando Solo III - US Air Force

at London International Airport (YXU)

during the 2018 London Air Show

 

c/n 5532 - built in 1999

 

The EC-130J Commando Solo, a specially-modified C-130J Hercules conducts Military Information Support Operations (MISO) and civil affairs broadcasts in FM radio, television and military communications bands. These missions are typically flown at night to reduce probability of detection in politically sensitive or hostile territories.

 

operated by193rd Special Operations Wing, Pennsylvania Air National Guard

 

See my main account for my photography, videos, fractal images and more here: www.flickr.com/photos/josh-rokman/

 

Made with Image Creator from Microsoft Designer, formerly known as the Bing Image Creator. Powered by DALL·E 3.

 

I think that AI image generation is similar in many ways to photography. The camera itself handles all the fine details, but the photographer is in charge of curating the types of images that will be created.

 

Ultimately, it is all about maximizing the probability that something good will be created.

 

This is very similar to AI image generation, in terms of the skills involved and what the human does vs. what the machine does.

 

You can't compare AI image generation to the process of actually making these images from scratch with 3D software or paint/pencils, where the human controls every detail.

 

However, I think the process really is very similar to that of photography, as I made the case for above. I think that DALL-E 3 is by far the most powerful AI image generation tool currently available.

 

- Josh

The accident occurred on or around 11 January 1930. Emile, an eyewitness, indicates that he was a passenger on the train and that he was left unharmed. Apparently it was a derailment and not a collision

 

The ‘Tucuman’ board (to the right) would indicate that the train was a north-south service from La Paz down through Uyuni to Villazon, with through coaches down the hill past La Quiaca and onward into Argentina

 

The locomotive is one of the FC Villazon-Atocha’s three ALCO 2-8-2s (FCVA 1-3). It is probably Nr. 1 or 2 (ALCO 64214-5 and 65937 / 1923-4). The running board steps match those locomotives, although Nr. 3 had an even higher upper level to its running plate on the left hand side. The derailed locomotive is in all probability either Nr. 1 or Nr. 2

  

Additional information from Raul Rodriguez:

 

There are some technical and historical aspects that I have not mentioned. As far as the technical aspects are concerned, the car with the Tucumán sign is one of the many built in the railway workshops of Tafi Viejo (province of Tucumán) and is a sleeping car. This is the only thing that I could rescue by looking at the photograph since the rest is reduced to scrap. The track is narrow gauge for many reasons but one of them is that it allows for tighter curves and is better adapted to difficult terrain. Between Tucumán and Jujuy (always in Argentina), the route goes up smoothly from 400 meters ASL to 1200 ASL but from Jujuy (precisely from the Yala station) to Humahuaca, in a few kilometres the track went up to more than 3000 meters ASL which required a rack and pinion system.In the trains that went up the Humahuaca canyon, the locomotive was placed behind the cars to be pushed by it and another one with a rack system was added behind the other locomotive. Up to Humahuaca the train was pushed by the two locomotives. The steep slope, the rack system, and the tortuous nature of the route meant that the speed of the entire section was between 10 and 15 km/h (6 to 10 mph), which explains the time taken to cover the approximately 3000 kilometres between Buenos Aires and La Paz.

 

At this point we should analyze the historical aspect, with a current point of view it would seem ridiculous such a complication to make this journey. But we must bear in mind that the Argentine population was “railway minded”, as the network was very dense and the services good, so there were only a few bad roads with unpaved surfaces. One could think of air transport. But even today it is difficult because of the high altitude of El Alto airport in La Paz (over 13,000 feet ASL ). You have to think that Aerolíneas Argentinas abandoned the La Paz destination when it deprogrammed the Boeing 727s in 1993 because the planes that replaced them, although they could operate at airports at that altitude and sometimes with high temperatures, could not do so with enough cargo or passengers to justify the operation economically. In the 1960s and 1970s, the only American airline that served La Paz was Braniff International, and in order to do so, it had to order a special model of Boeing 707 (the 707-227) from the Boeing Factory, a model used only by Braniff with “hot and high” properties.

 

If this happened in such recent times, one has to think how complicated it was in 1930. The accident in the photo (as I believe) must have been caused by a failure to brake on the slopes of the tracks in Bolivia.

 

The first blow to the Argentine railways was in 1932 when the National Roads Act was passed and quality roads began to be built throughout the country. However, the same did not happen in Bolivia and the international train continued to operate until the 1990s.

 

The Northwest region of Argentina was served by several railway companies but the most -important were the Ferrocarril Argentino del Norte (state-owned ) and the Ferrocarril Central Norte which was an extension of the Ferrocarril Central Córdoba (British owned).

 

In view of the growing competition from the automobile industry and the complexity of the railway operation, the whole sector became economically unviable and was sold to the Argentine State in 1938.- From 1930, passengers began to demand better and faster services, so many of them opted to transfer in Tucumán using the Argentine Central Railroad (British owned, broad gauge) very fast and comfortable for the time, covering practically in the day the almost 1,500 kilometers between Tucumán and Buenos Aires. From 1936 on, air-conditioned cars were included in the Central Argentine Railway and the average speed was around 80 kilometers per hour, which was very fast for the time, taking into account that the Rosario crossing was very complicated since it had to cross the tracks of eight different companies coordinating the schedules and also in the Rosario Central station the change of direction of the train had to be made. The highest speeds, which in certain sections exceeded 120 km / h, were carried out on the double track between Rosario and the suburbs of Buenos Aires (José León Suárez precisely), where the express trains had to adapt to the speeds of local suburban trains for approximately 25 kilometers.

 

Finally, it is clear that the word "ESTADO" (which means “state”) is read above the windows, which coincides with the date of the photo since the Northern Argentine Railroad was part of the State Railways. It should also be noted that although the photo was taken in Bolivia, the service was provided by Argentine companies.

 

I have searched the internet for railway accidents in Bolivia in 1930 and the only one I have found occurred on December 10, 1930 and involved a train from the Railways of the Argentine State.

 

Everything I have written has my memory as its sole source and now I have realized that I made a mistake: in my brain Villazón was confused with Yacuiba. What the photo says is correct, the passage to Bolivia through Villazón was used since colonial times and the Spanish entry route from Upper Peru was always the Humahuaca canyon. What was inaugurated in 1957 was the railway crossing through Yacuiba that runs through flat terrain without the complications of passing through the Humahuaca canyon.

Elaiussa Sebaste was an ancient Roman town located 55 km (34 mi) from Mersin in the direction of Silifke in Cilicia on the southern coast of Anatolia (in modern-day Turkey). Elaiussa, meaning olive, was founded in the 2nd century B.C. on a tiny island attached to the mainland by a narrow isthmus in Mediterranean Sea.

 

Besides the cultivation of olives, the settlement here of the Cappadocian king Archelaus during the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus played a role in the development of the city. Founding a new city on the isthmus, Archelaus called it Sebaste, which is the Greek equivalent word of the Latin "Augusta". The city entered a golden age when the Roman Emperor Vespasian purged Cilicia of pirates in 74 AD. Towards the end of the 3rd century AD however its importance began to wane, owing in large part to incursions by the Sassanian King Shapur I in 260 and later by the Isaurians. The ancient sources tell the history of city’s existence and how the churches and basilicas survived into the late Roman and early Byzantine periods. When its neighbour Corycus began to flourish in the 6th century AD, Elaiussa Sebaste was slowly obliterated from the stage of history.

 

The island that was the site of the first settlement here, where excavations have been underway since 1995 headed by Italian archeologist Eugenia Equini Schneider, is almost completely buried under sand. The original settlement, at a location that provided security for the harbors on either side, is a peninsula today. The ruins of a bath, a cistern, a defense wall and a breakwater can be seen on the side overlooking the western bay of the peninsula. But the most important remains unearthed in the city are a bath whose floor is paved with mosaics and a small basilica on a circular base.

  

A building on the main street of city (east of the theater)

On the opposite side of the highway that divides Elaiussa and Sebaste today stands a theater dating to the 2nd century AD, an extremely small structure with only 23 rows of seats, whose steps and decorations unfortunately succumbed to centuries of plunder. Next to the theater is the agora, built in all great probability during the imperial period. At the entrance of the agora, which is surrounded by a semi-destroyed defense wall once rose two monumental fountains in the shape of lions. Inside the agora stands a large church, its floor is covered by sand to protect the mosaic pavement. Elaiussa’s only temple stands outside the city on a hill overlooking the sea. Only two of the Corinthian columns of this temple, which had 12 on the long and 6 on the short side originally, are standing today. A large bath complex among the lemon groves between the temple and the agora was built by a technique characteristic of the ancient Roman period and little used in Anatolia.

 

The ruins of Elaiussa Sebaste also harbor the richest and most impressive necropolis among the cities of ancient Cilicia. The "Avenue of Graves", located on a hill to the north of the city, preserves close to a hundred graves of various shapes and sizes scattered among the lemon trees. The aesthetic forms of these monumental graves of Cilicia Tracheia are remarkable.

 

The ancient aqueducts that carried water to the ruins from the Lamos ("Lemon") river also adorn the city’s two entrances. The aqueduct to the west of the city in particular is in relatively good condition. Centuries ago these aqueduct, as delicate as necklaces, actually formed a canal system that ran all the way to Corycus.

 

A lidded sarcophagus lies on a small rise exactly opposite the aqueduct. Known as "the Grave of the Princess", this sarcophagus is a prime example of the Anatolian tomb tradition.

Messier 52 M52 NGC 7654 Cassiopeia, with a TSAPO65Q

 

M52 (NGC 7654) is a bright open cluster in Cassiopeia, discovered by Charles Messier on September 7, 1774. It contains 100 confirmed and 193 probable members. While the brightest star in its field is HIP 115542, a giant with an apparent magnitude 8.25 and spectral class F8Ib/II, all of the other members are fainter than magnitude 10.5. With a combined apparent magnitude of 6.9 and angular size of 13 arcmin, the cluster is easily identified with binoculars. Its age is estimated between 35 and 150 million years. Due to the extinction of starlight by interstellar gas and dust, which reduces apparent magnitude to an uncertain degree, the distance to the cluster is imprecisely estimated between 3,000 and 7,000 LY. Assuming a median distance of 5,000 LY, and given the apparent diameter of 13 arcmin, the cluster is approximately 19 LY across, or 3,591 cubic LY in volume, with average distance between stars of 2.65 LY. Due to the cluster's extreme youth, there is virtually no probability of extraterrestrial life among its member stars.

 

Image details:

-TSapo65q astrograph, 65 x 420mm

-Celestron AVX GEM, Orion 60mm f4 SSAGpro autoguider

-Canon T3i modified camera, Astronomik CLS-CCD filter

-6 x 300sec subs, iso 1600, 30 darks + 30 bias, 2x drizzle, ~40% crop

-Software: PHD2, DSS, XnView, StarNet++, StarTools v 1.3 and 1.7

-Limiting magnitude 17.8

  

Illustration that accompanied an article on the risk of preparedness for all types of natural disasters, even those with very low probability.

 

www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-06-22/earth-in-the-balance-hu...

Moved this beautiful young lady from the boiler yard to some bushed, where there's likely to be more food, and a lower probability of being stepped on.

SL Shops Collective Giveaway ends in 1 hour! dyno.gg/giveaway/c5fda613?ref=btn-gw

 

Random prizes will be picked up from designers participating (see poster).

 

3 winners

 

Join the Discord server, enter the giveaway channel and react to the message

Invite your friend (thru invite button of this channel) and add your probability to win

Max 5 entries

First giveaway will last until 25th (after will be from Mon-Sun)

 

Good luck <3

The Butterfly Effect is simply:

 

If a butterfly flaps its wings in China, would it have an effect on the weather patterns in London? The obvious answer is no. But since every action has an effect on other probabilities... The result is infinite.

 

Seen @ Utrecht Botanic Gardens, Holland.

 

View On Black

Bruno: Dave, I'm worried about the fairness of this situation.

Dave: Why's that?

Bruno: Well, There may have been an incident where a dirty socks intended to be worn again were moved from inside of a running shoe to an undisclosed location elsewhere in the house.

Dave: I think that "may have been" is underestimating the probability of that statement,

Bruno: Likely. But, the problem is that I was accused of being the mover.

Dave: Really? And you find that hard to believe?

Bruno: No, not that hard to believe as I have been known to move socks. But these ones I didn't move. Those shoes are too small for me to reach inside and grab the socks.

Dave: And what does this have to do with the line-up of small playmobil dogs?

Bruno: Well, when I explained my innocence and the reason why, the kids decided that a police line-up of dogs would be the best way to identify the culprit,

Dave: Dude, I'm worried for you. I think that this may be a rigged system.

Bruno: Me too. These guys are hardened criminals.

Dave: I'm not sure they're as hardened as they are plastic.

Bruno: If being plastic is the only reason that they're hardened then why are they so used to be interrogated that they won't even talk. I think I need to lawyer up.

 

--------------------

 

Bruno and the rest of the usual suspects. The alternate title suggested by my son is "find the giant". And by the way, Aggie is the guilty party as she can jam her nose really far into shoes to get the re-wear socks out.

 

Playmobil shots have shown up in four of my five 52 weeks projects to date. The other four are in the comments.

Made with the Bing Image Creator, powered by DALL-E 3.

 

I think that AI image generation is similar in many ways to photography. The camera itself handles all the fine details, but the photographer is in charge of curating the types of images that will be created.

 

Ultimately, it is all about maximizing the probability that something good will be created.

 

This is very similar to AI image generation, in terms of the skills involved and what the human does vs. what the machine does.

 

You can't compare AI image generation to the process of actually making these images from scratch with 3D software or paint/pencils, where the human controls every detail.

 

However, I think the process really is very similar to that of photography, as I made the case for above.

 

- Josh

en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Quantum_theory_of_observation/Quant...

 

Quantum theory of observation - Thierry Dugnolle

 

Quantum physics for dummies

Fundamental principles and concepts

Examples of measurements

Entanglement

General theory of measurement

The forest of destinies

The appearance of relative classical worlds in the quantum Universe

Quantum entanglement is the fundamental concept to explain the reality of observation.

---

Wave-particle duality

 

Is light a flow of particles or a wave phenomenon ? Light rays could be particle paths and they were regarded thus by Newton in his Optics. Light reflection in a mirror is then naturally interpreted with the hypothesis that particles of light, or photons, are like bouncing balls. Nevertheless Huygens argued that this phenomenon and others were better interpreted with the hypothesis that light rays are perpendicular lines to wave fronts.

 

Photography gives an evidence of the existence of particles of light, for traces left by light are always like impacts of particles.

 

But if light is made of particles how can we explain interference patterns such as those found by Young and Fresnel ? Interference is always interference between waves. It seems there can not be any interference with particles. An interference pattern is an experimental evidence that light is a wave phenomenon. It is confirmed by Maxwell's theory of electomagnetism, which defines light as an electromagnetic wave.

 

That light be made of particles is not contradicted by the existence of interference patterns. Here is what we can see if we look at how an interference pattern appears on a photographic plate (see photo - animated in original publication)

 

The wave phenomenon, interference, results from impacts of particles.

 

The superposition principle gives a very direct explanation of wave-particle duality. Any physical system is a particle or a system of particles, but these behave sometimes like waves because they can be in many places at the same time. The wave of a particle or of a system of particles determines its diffuse presence.

---

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

 

seop.illc.uva.nl/entries/qt-entangle/

 

1. Quantum Entanglement

 

In 1935 and 1936, Schrödinger published a two-part article in the Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society in which he discussed and extended an argument by Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen. The Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) argument was, in many ways, the culmination of Einstein’s critique of the orthodox Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics and was designed to show that the theory is incomplete. (See the entries on the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen argument in quantum theory and the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics.)

 

In classical mechanics the state of a system is essentially a list of the system’s properties — more precisely, it is the specification of a set of parameters from which the list of properties can be reconstructed: the positions and momenta of all the particles comprising the system (or similar parameters in the case of fields).

 

The dynamics of the theory specifies how properties change in terms of a law of evolution for the state. In a letter to Max Born, Wolfgang Pauli characterized this mode of description of physical systems as a ‘detached observer’ idealization (see The Born-Einstein Letters, Born, 1992; p. 218).

 

On the Copenhagen interpretation, such a description is not possible for quantum systems. Instead, the quantum state of a system should be understood as a catalogue of what an observer has done to the system and what has been observed, and the import of the state then lies in the probabilities that can be inferred (in terms of the theory) for the outcomes of possible future observations on the system.

 

Einstein rejected this view and proposed a series of arguments to show that the quantum state is simply an incomplete characterization of a quantum system. The missing parameters are sometimes referred to as ‘hidden parameters’ or ‘hidden variables.’

 

It should not be supposed that Einstein’s notion of a complete theory included the requirement that the theory should be deterministic. Rather, he required certain conditions of separability and locality for composite systems consisting of separated component systems: each component system separately should be characterized by its own properties (its own ‘being-thus,’ as Einstein put it — ‘So-sein’ in German), and it should be impossible to alter the properties of a distant system instantaneously (or the probabilities of these properties) by acting on a local system.

 

In later analyses, notably in Bell’s argument for the nonlocality of quantum correlations, it became apparent that these conditions, suitably formulated as probability constraints, are equivalent to the requirement that statistical correlations between separated systems should be reducible to probability distributions over common causes (deterministic or stochastic) in the sense of Reichenbach. (See the entries on Bell’s theorem and Reichenbach’s common cause principle.)

In recent years there has been a relentless and vociferous campaign by militant atheists intent on attacking and ridiculing religion. Numerous books have been written on the subject and, it seems, at every opportunity the secular establishment and media seeks out atheists or secular humanists to give what amounts to a jaundiced attack on religion.

For the most part, the opinions they express are the same old, worn out slogans we have heard over and over again, and can only be described as ideological propaganda.

 

We are all familiar with the atheist slogans such as: 'religion is irrational nonsense'.

Or that: 'believing in God is no different from believing in Santa or fairies.'

Or that: 'there is no evidence for God'.

Or that: 'religion is just a crutch for weak-minded people'

Or that: 'religion is outdated, superstitious nonsense',

Or that: 'religion is just for ignorant, unintelligent, backward people who know nothing about science'

Or that: belief in God is 'just a lazy way of filling gaps in knowledge'.

Or that: believing in God is 'like believing the Earth is flat'.

Or that: Christians 'believe in an old man in the sky with a beard'

Or that: Christians 'believe in a sky fairy'.

Or that: Christianity/the Bible was 'invented by ignorant, bronze age, goat herders'.

Or that: Belief in a God 'is just a delusion'.

Or that: Christians have 'an imaginary, invisable friend'.

Etc. etc.

As we will show later, such slogans are either ignorant nonsense, or devised as deliberate, ideological propaganda.

 

If you remember, several years ago, atheists, such as Richard Dawkins, decided to ramp up their anti-religious propaganda effort with slogans on buses. It originated in Britain, but spread to several other countries.

It was known as the Atheist Bus Campaign.

 

The Atheist Bus Campaign, set out to convince you that a loving creator God does not exist, that you have no prospect of eternal life and that all you can look forward to is eternal oblivion.

 

Atheists have no evidence to back up that assertion. In fact logic, natural law and the basic principles of the scientific method rule out their naturalistic alternative to a creator as impossible.

 

They invent all sort of bizarre scenarios to replace a supernatural first cause (God), they even try to present their fantastical, naturalistic replacements for God as 'scientific'. Please don't be taken in by it.

Their naturalistic replacements for God are illogical, they all violate natural laws and the basic principles of science.

 

Atheism is rightly referred to as the no-hope philosophy.

Their ultimate goal and pinnacle of their short life is - eternal oblivion.

And, quite perversely, they want to convince you that is all you can look forward to.

Please don't be dragged down with them into that depressing pit of hopelessness.

The Good News is that they are entirely wrong, and furthermore, it is not just an opinion. It can be satisfactorily demonstrated by logic, natural law, and the basic principle of the scientific method ......

 

Read on .... and you will understand, why atheists can never replace God, however much they try.

 

Their Atheist Bus Campaign is deceitful because atheists have no logical or scientific grounds for claiming "There's Probably No God", in fact, the evidence of applied logic and natural law, is completely the contrary. The atheist claim that there's probably no God is just an unsubstantiated opinion based only on their own ideological beliefs.

You may wonder why they inserted the word 'probably'? Obviously, they knew that if they were challenged to present evidence for the truth of their advertisement and had to defend it in court, they would be unable to do so. Science and logic can be used to prove they have no alternative to a supernatural first cause, and they know it.

 

For atheists to propose that believing there is no God, is somehow a reason to stop worrying and the recipe for an enjoyable life, is perverse in the extreme.

For most sane people it would be the opposite - a road to depression, hopelessness, and a feeling that this short existence is worthless. It will all end in oblivion, and you might as well never have lived.

 

Thankfully, atheists are demonstrably wrong, there is every reason for hope - as we will show - a loving Creator definitely does exist. Your life is not a few short, stressful and worthless years leading to eternal oblivion. You are a unique, valuable, person, specially created out of supreme love, every human life is of infinite value right from the moment of conception. Humans really are special and not just intelligent apes, or a mere collection of atoms, as atheists would have you believe You can live forever in eternal bliss - that is the gift of life the loving Creator of the universe offers you, and it is all offered for free.

 

Please don't be fooled ... people who think for themselves (the REAL freethinkers), are able to see right through the atheist hype and propaganda. Ignore the relentless bombardment of atheist propaganda, such as the atheist bus campaign. Seek out and learn the real truth and the truth will set you free.

 

Please read on and you will understand ......

Because there is a law of cause and effect, the universe can't and won't create itself from nothing.

 

Consider this ....

A creator God (or supernatural first cause) has been made redundant and the final gap (pertaining to the so-called God of the gaps) has now been filled ... who says so?

Atheists, along with the secularist pundits in the popular media.

Why do they say that?

Because they believe that the greatest brain in atheism - Stephen Hawking, has finally discovered the secret of the origin of the universe and a naturalistic replacement for God.

 

The atheist replacement for God is summed up in a single sentence written by Hawking:

"Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing"

That is it .... problem solved - apparently!

 

The secularists in the popular media loved it, as far as they were concerned the problem certainly was solved. Hawking had finally dealt the fatal blow to all religion, especially Christianity. No need to question it, if a revered scientist of his calibre, is so sure of how the universe came into being, it must be correct.

The new atheists loved it, they wasted no time in proclaiming the ultimate triumph of 'science' over religious mythology and superstition.

 

So just how credible is the atheist claim that God has been made redundant?

And just how 'scientific' is Hawking's replacement for God?

 

Shall we analyse it?

"Because there is a law of gravity ....

So,

1) If the law of gravity existed, how is that nothing?

AND -

2) Where did the law of gravity come from?

AND -

3) How can a law of gravity exist before that which gravity relates to ... i.e. matter?

 

"the universe can and will create itself from nothing"

 

4) How can something create itself, without pre-existing its own creation?

(A) could possibly create (B), but how could (A) create (A)? Of course it can't.

 

5) What about the 'nothing' that is not really nothing, as most people understand 'nothing', but a bizarre 'nothing' in which a law of gravity exists. A nothing which is actually a 'something' where a law of gravity is presumably some sort of eternally, existent entity?

AND -

6) Is Hawking implying that the self-creation of the universe is made possible by the pre-existence of the law of gravity?

Of course, natural laws are not creative agents, they simply describe basic properties and operation of material things. They can't create anything, or cause the creation of anything. Something which is a property of something, cannot create that which it is a property of.

 

So, even if we ignore the law of cause and effect which definitively rules out a natural, first cause of the universe, the atheist notion of the universe arising of its own volition from nothing is still impossible, and can be regarded as illogical and unscientific nonsense. Hawking's naturalistic replacement for God, presented in his single sentence, and so loved by the new, atheist cabal, is obviously just contradictory and confused nonsense.

 

The truth, which atheists don't want to hear, is that atheism is intellectually and scientifically indefensible. That is why they always duck out of explaining how the concept of an uncaused, inadequate, natural first cause is possible.

The best they ever come up with, is something like "we don't really know what laws existed at the start of the universe".

However, the atheist claim that - we don't really know... is completely spurious.

We certainly do know that the Law of Cause and Effect is universal, there is no way round it.

The only reason atheists don't want to accept it, is ideological.

 

And ... isn't it strange, that the only laws atheists dispute are precisely those that interfere with their beliefs. For example, atheists seem pretty sure that one law existed .... the law of gravity (even prior to that which gravity is a property of … matter).

Why are they so sure that the law of gravity existed?

Because their naturalistic substitute for God, summed up in the sentence by Stephen Hawking, apparently requires that the law of gravity existed before anything else …..

 

Here it is again ...

‘Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing’ Stephen Hawking.

 

So, atheists DO KNOW for sure that the law of gravity existed, but they don’t really know what other laws existed at the start of the universe. They especially doubt that the Law of Cause and Effect existed.

AMAZING!

 

Well, how about this for a refutation of Hawking’s replacement for God, also summed up in a single sentence?

 

Because there is a Law of Cause and Effect, the universe can’t and won’t create itself from nothing!

 

That is something Stephen Hawking conveniently forgot.

Apparently, he accepts that the law of gravity existed, because he thinks it suits his argument, but he ignores the existence of other laws that positively destroy his argument.

 

So, now you know the truth about the best substitute for God that atheists have ever come up with.

IMPRESSED? I think not!

 

Why is it ATHEISTS that try to dispute the universality of natural laws?

 

According to their claims, atheists are supposed to be the champions of science. Yet we find in practice that it is actually theists who end up defending natural laws and the scientific method against those atheists who try to refute any laws and scientific principles that interfere with their naturalistic beliefs.

Whatever happened to the alleged conflict between science and religion?

That is revealed as purely, atheist propaganda. There is obviously much more conflict between atheism and science.

 

Why is the law of cause and effect so important?

Because it tells us that all natural entities, events and processes are contingent.

They are all subject to preceding causes. It tells us that natural entities and events are not autonomous, they cannot operate independently of causes.

That is such an important principle, it is actually the basis of the scientific method. Science is about looking for adequate causes of ALL natural events. According to science, a natural event without a cause, is a scientific impossibility.

Once you suggest such a notion, you are abandoning science and you violate the basic principle of the scientific method.

 

What about the first cause of the universe and everything?

How does that fit in?

 

Well, the first cause was obviously a unique thing, not only unique, but radically different to all NATURAL entities and occurrences. The first cause HAD to be an autonomous entity, it HAD to be eternally self-existent, self-reliant, NON-CONTINGENT ... i.e. it was completely independent of causes and the limitations that causes impose.

The first cause, by virtue of being the very first, could not have had any preceding cause, and obviously didn't require any cause for its existence. When we talk about the first cause, we mean the very first cause, i.e. FIRST means FIRST, not second or third.

The first cause also had to be capable of creating everything that followed it. It is responsible for every subsequent cause and effect that is, or has ever been. That means that nothing, nor the sum total of everything that followed the first cause, can ever be greater, in any respect, than the first cause.

So the idea that the first cause could be a natural entity or event is just ludicrous.

 

We know that the first cause is radically different to any natural entity, it is NOT contingent and that is why it is called a SUPERNATURAL entity, the Supernatural, First Cause (or Creator God). All natural events and entities ARE contingent without exception, so the first cause simply CANNOT be a natural thing.

That is the verdict of science, logic and reason. Atheists dispute the verdict of science and insist that the first cause was a 'natural' event which was somehow able to defy natural laws that govern all natural events.

Consequently, atheism can be regarded as anti-science. Which means .... the real enemy of atheism is science, not religion. And the real enemy of science is atheism, not religion.

An idea which seems to be popular with atheists at present, is a continuously, reciprocating universe, one which ends by running out of energy potential and then rewinds itself in an never ending cycle ..... this is an attempt to evade the fact that an uncaused, natural, first cause is impossible. They claim that, in this way a first cause, is not necessary. And that matter/energy is some sort of eternally existent entity.

So is it a valid solution?

 

Firstly .....

Matter/energy cannot be eternally existent in a cycle with no beginning).

Why?

Because all natural things are contingent, they have to comply with the law of cause and effect, so they cannot exist independently of causes. The nearest you could get to eternally existent matter/energy would be a very, long chain of causes and effects, but a long chain is not eternally existent, it has to have a beginning at some point. At the beginning there would still have to be a non-contingent first cause. So a long chain of causes and effects simply pushes the first cause further back in time, it can't eliminate it.

Secondly ....

It is pretty obvious that the idea of the universe simply rewinding itself in a never ending cycle, which had no beginning, is complete, unscientific nonsense. How such a proposal can be presented as serious science, beggars belief.

It seems atheists will try anything to justify their naturalist ideology. They apparently have no compunction about completely disregarding natural laws.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics rules out such atheist, pie-in-the-sky, origins mythology.

There is no such thing as a free lunch, the idea of a rewinding universe is tantamount to applying the discredited notion of perpetual motion - on a grand scale, to the universe.

Contingent things don't just rewind of their own accord.

The Second Law (not to mention common sense) rules it out.

Where does the renewed power or renewed energy potential come from?

If you wind up a clock, it doesn't rewind itself after it has stopped.

The universe had a beginning and it will have an end. That is what science tells us, it cannot rewind itself.

Such ridiculous, atheist musings are just a desperate attempt to wriggle out of the inevitable conclusion of logic, and the Law of Cause and Effect which are the real enemies of atheist ideology.

Once again atheism is hoisted on its own petard by natural law and science, not by religion.

 

A variation of the cyclical universe is the argument proposed by some that the universe just is?

Presumably they mean that the universe is some sort of eternally-existent entity with no beginning - and therefore not in need of a cause? Once again an eternally self-existent universe is not possible for the same reason outlined above.

In addition ....

The Second Law of Thermodynamics tells us the universe certainly had a beginning and will have an end. The energy potential of the universe is decreasing from an original peak at the beginning of the universe. Even the most rabid atheists seem to accept that. Which is why most of them believe in a beginning event, such as a big bang explosion.

So the question is how did it (the universe) begin to exist, not whether it began to exist?

Which takes us back to the question of the nature of the very first cause.

It can only be one of two options,

an uncaused, natural first cause

OR

an uncaused, supernatural first cause.

An uncaused, NATURAL first cause is impossible.

Thus the only possible option is a supernatural first cause, i.e. God.

 

Atheists can’t refute the Law of Cause and Effect which is so devastating to their naturalist agenda, so they regularly invent bizarre scenarios which ignore natural laws, and hope people won’t notice. If anyone does they just brush it off with remarks like “we just don’t know ” what laws existed prior to the beginning of the universe.

Sorry, the atheist apologists may not know …. but all sensible people do know, we certainly know what is impossible ….

And we certainly know that you cannot blithely step outside the constraints of natural laws and scientific principles, as atheists do, and remain credible.

We know that natural laws describe the inherent properties of matter/energy. Which means wherever matter/energy exist, the inherent properties of matter/energy also exist - and so do the natural laws that describe those properties. if the universe began, as some propose, with a cosmic egg. or a previous universe, those things are still natural entities with natural properties, and as such would be subject to natural laws. So the idea that there were natural events leading up to the origin of the universe that were not subject to natural laws is ridiculous.

The atheist claim; that we just don't know, is not valid, and should be treated as the silliness it really is.

 

The existence of the law of cause and effect is essential to the scientific method, but fatal to the atheist ideology.

SO ....

Is the law of cause and effect really universal?

 

Causation is necessary for the existence of the universe, but ALSO for the existence of any natural entities or events that may have preceded the creation of the universe.

 

In other words, causation is necessary for all matter/energy and all natural entities and occurrences, whether within the universe or elsewhere.

ALL natural entities are contingent wherever they may be, whether in some sort of cosmic egg, a big bang, a previous universe or whatever.

Contingency is an inherent character of all natural entities, so it is impossible for any natural entity to be non-contingent.

 

Which means you simply CANNOT have a natural entity which is UNCAUSED, anywhere.

If, for example, matter/energy was not contingent at the start of the universe, or before the universe began, how and why would it be contingent now?

Why would nature have changed its basic character to an inferior one?

 

If matter/energy once had such awesome, autonomous power - if it was, at some time, self-sufficient, not reliant on causes for its operation and existence, and not restricted by the limitations causes impose, it would effectively mean it was once an infinite, necessary, self-existent entity, similar to God.

 

Now if matter once had the autonomous, non-contingent powers of a god, why would it change itself to a subordinate character and role, when it became part of the universe?

Why would it change to a role where it is limited by the strictures of natural laws. And where it cannot operate without a preceding, adequate cause?

 

To claim matter/energy was, at one time, not contingent, not subject to causes (which is what atheists have to claim) – is to actually imbue it with the autonomous power of a god.

That is why atheism is really just a revamped version of pagan naturalism.

By denying the basic, contingent character of matter/nature, atheism effectively deifies nature, and credits it with godlike powers, which science clearly tells us it doesn’t possess.

 

Thus, if anyone dismisses causality, they effectively deify matter/nature.

Which means they have chosen the first of the 2 following choices …

 

1. Atheism ... the unscientific, illogical belief in a natural, uncaused god (of matter or nature) which violates natural laws - which science recognises restrict its autonomy?

 

2. Theism ... the logical belief in an uncaused, supernatural God, which created matter and the laws that govern matter. And therefore does not violate any laws, is not contingent, and thus has completely unrestricted autonomy and infinite powers?

 

Which one would you choose?

 

Which one do scientists who respect natural laws and the scientific method choose?

The great, scientific luminaries and founders of modern science, such as Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, Louis Pasteur etc., in fact, nearly all of the really great scientists and founders of modern science, had no doubts or problem understanding that choice, and they readily chose the second (theism), as the only logical option.

So, by choosing the second - a supernatural first cause – rather than meaning you are anti-science or anti-reason or some sort of uneducated, superstitious, religious nut (as atheists frequently claim) actually puts you in the greatest of scientific company.

 

To put it another way, who would you rather trust in science, such scientific giants as: Newton, Pasteur, Faraday, Von Braun, Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Mendel, Marconi, Kelvin, Babbage, Pascal, Herschel, Peacock etc. who believed in a supernatural, first cause?

OR,

the likes of: Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, Lawrence Krauss, Stephen Hawking, Daniel Dennett etc. who believe in an uncaused, natural, first cause?

No contest!

 

We can see that atheists are anti-science, because they treat natural law and the whole principle of the scientific method with utter contempt, and all the while, they masquerade as the champions of science to the public.

 

The question of purpose ....

A further nail in the coffin of bogus, atheist science is the existence of order.

 

Atheists assume that the universe is purposeless, but they cannot explain the existence of order.

The development of order requires an organizational element.

To do useful work, or to counter the effects of entropy, energy needs to be directed or guided.

Raw energy alone actually tends to increase the effects of entropy, it doesn't increase order.

The organizational principle in living systems is provided by the informational element encoded in DNA.

Atheists have yet to explain how that first, genetic information arose of its own volition in the so-called Primordial Soup?

 

Natural laws pertinent to all natural entities, they guide the behaviour of energy and matter, but also serve to limit it, because natural laws are based only on the inherent properties of matter and energy.

So ... natural laws describe inherent properties of matter/energy, and natural processes operate only within the confines of natural laws which are based on their own properties. They can never exceed the parameters of those laws.

 

The much acclaimed, Dawkinsian principle that randomness can develop into order by means of a sieving process, such as shaken pebbles being sorted by falling through a hole of a particular size is erroneous, because it completely ignores the regulatory influence of natural laws on the outcome, which are not at all random.

If we can predict the outcome in advance, as we can with Dawkins' example, it cannot be called random. We CAN predict the outcome because we know that the pebbles will behave according to the regulatory influence of natural laws, such as the law of gravity. If there was no law of gravity, then Dawkins' pebbles, when shaken, would not fall through the hole, they would not be sorted, they would act completely unpredictably, possibly floating about in the air in all directions. In that case, the randomness would not result in any order. That is true randomness.

Dawkins' randomness, allegedly developing into order, is not random at all, the outcome is predictable and controlled by natural laws and the inherent properties of matter. He is starting with 2 organizational principles, natural laws and the inherent, ordered structure and properties of matter, and he calls that randomness!

Bogus science indeed!

This tells us that order is already there at the beginning of the universe, in the form of natural laws and the ordered composition and structure of matter .... it doesn't just develop from random events.

 

A major problem for atheists is to explain where natural laws came from?

In a purposeless universe there should be no regulatory principles at all.

Firstly, we would not expect anything to exist, we would expect eternal nothingness.

Secondly, even if we overlook that impossible hurdle, and assume by some amazing fluke and contrary to logic, something was able to create itself from nothing ….. we would expect the ‘something’ would have no ordered structure, and no laws based on that ordered structure. We would expect it to behave randomly and chaotically.

This is an absolutely fundamental question to which atheists have no answer. The basic properties of matter/energy, and the universe, scream …. ‘purpose’.

Atheists say the exact opposite.

Furthermore, if we consider the accepted, atheist belief; that matter is inherently predisposed to produce life and the genetic information for life, whenever environmental conditions are conducive (so-called abiogenesis), where does that predisposition for life come from? Once again, atheists are hoisted on their own petard, and the atheist idea of a random, purposeless, universe is left completely in tatters.

 

It is the atheist ideology that is anti-science, not necessarily individual scientists.

There may be sincere, atheist scientists who respect the scientific method and natural laws, but they are wedded to an ideology that - when push comes to shove, does not respect natural laws.

It is evident that whenever natural laws interfere with atheist naturalist beliefs, the beliefs take precedence over the rigorous, scientific method. It is then that natural laws are disregarded by atheists in favour of unscientific fantasies which are conducive to their ideology.

Of course, in much day-to-day practical science and technology, the question of violating laws doesn't even arise, and we cannot deny that in the course of such work, atheists will respect the scientific method of experiment and observation within the framework of the Law of Cause and Effect and other established laws of science.

Bizarrely, It is a different matter entirely, when it comes to hypotheses about origins. It then becomes an 'anything goes' situation. The main criteria then seems to be that it doesn’t matter whether your hypothesis violates natural laws (all sorts of excuses can be made as to why natural laws need not apply), all that matters is that it is entirely naturalistic, and can be made to sound plausible to the public.

However, the same atheist scientists would not entertain anything in general, day-to-day science, that is not completely in accordance with the scientific method, they make an exception ONLY with anything to do with origins, whether it be the origin of the universe, or the origin of life, or the origin of species.

 

Atheism is not simply passive non-belief, you can only be a ‘genuine’ atheist if you proactively believe in the following illogical and unscientific propositions:

 

1. A natural, first cause of the universe that was ‘uncaused’.

 

2. A natural, first cause of the universe that was patently not adequate for the effect, (a cause which was able to produce an effect far greater than itself and superior to its own abilities).

 

3. That the universe created ITSELF from nothing.

 

4. That natural laws simply arose of their own accord, without any reason, purpose or cause.

 

5. That energy potential at the start of everything material was able to wind itself up from absolute zero, of its own accord, without any reason, purpose or cause.

 

6. That the effect of entropy (Second Law of Thermodynamics) was somehow suspended or didn’t operate to permit the development of order in the universe.

 

7. That life spontaneously generated itself, of its own volition, from sterile matter, contrary to: the Law of Biogenesis, the laws of probability, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, Information Theory and common sense.

 

8. That the complete human genome was created by means of a long chain of copying mistakes of the original, genetic information in the first living cell, (mutations of mutations of mutations, etc. etc.).

 

9. That the complex DNA code was produced by chemical processes.

 

10. That the very first, genetic information, encoded in the DNA of the first living cell, created itself by some unknown means.

 

11. That matter is somehow inherently predisposed to develop into living cells, whenever conditions are conducive to life. But such a predisposition for life just arose of its own accord, with no purpose and with no apparent cause.

 

12. That an ordered structure of atoms, guiding laws of physics, order in the cosmos, order in the living cell and complex information, are what we would expect to occur naturally in a purposeless universe.

 

The claim of atheists to be the champions of science and reason is clearly bogus.

They think they can get away with it by pretending to have no beliefs.

However, when seriously challenged to justify their dogmatic rejection of a Supernatural First Cause, they indirectly espouse the unscientific beliefs outlined above, in their futile attempts to refute the evidence for a supernatural first cause.

Of course, whenever possible, they avoid declaring those beliefs explicitly, but you don’t need to be very astute to realize that relying on those beliefs is the unavoidable conclusion of their arguments.

 

That is why atheism is intellectually bankrupt and is doomed to the dustbin of history. And that is why we are seeing such a rise in militant, evangelizing, atheist zealots, such as Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens.

Their crusading, bravado masks their desperation that the public is so hard to convince. What Dawkins et al need to face is that they are in no position to attack what they consider are the bizarre beliefs of others, when their own beliefs (which they fail to publicly acknowledge) are much more bizarre.

 

What about Christianity and pagan gods?

 

Atheists frequently try to dismiss and ridicule the idea of a Creator by comparing it to the numerous, pagan gods that people have worshipped throughout history.

 

Do they have a good point?

 

Certainly not, this is just a red herring ….

Other gods, cannot be the first cause or Creator.

Idols of wood or stone, or the Sun, Moon, planets, Mother Nature, Mother Earth etc. are all material, contingent things, they cannot be the first cause.

They are rejected as false gods by the Bible and by logic and natural laws.

They are considered gods by people who worship things which are 'created' rather than the Creator, which the Bible condemns.

In fact, they are much more similar to the atheist belief in the powers of a naturalistic entity to create the universe, than they are to the one, Creator God of Christianity.

For example, the pagan belief in the creative powers of Ra (the Sun god) is similar to the atheist belief that raw energy from the Sun acting on sterile chemicals was able to create life.

 

So atheist mythology credits the Sun (Ra) with the godlike power of creating life on Earth. And thus, atheism is just a revamped version of paganism.

Just like paganism, atheism rejects worship of a Supernatural, First Cause, and rather chooses to worship created, natural entities, imbuing them with the same godlike powers, that theists attribute to the Creator.

There is nothing new under the Sun ... We can see that atheism is just the age old deception of ancient paganism, revisited.

 

The Creator is a Supernatural, First Cause, which is not a contingent entity, nothing like the pagan gods, but rather a self-existent, necessary entity. As the very first cause of everything in the universe, it cannot be contingent (it cannot rely on anything outside itself for its existence, i.e. it is self-existent) and therefore it cannot be a material entity.

The first cause is necessary because, not being contingent, it necessarily exists.

If anything exists that is not contingent, it has to have within itself everything necessary for its own existence. If it is also responsible for the existence of anything outside itself (which as the first cause of the universe, we know it is) it is also necessary for the existence of those things, and has to be entirely adequate for the purpose of bringing them into being and maintaining their continued existence. It is not subject to natural laws, which only apply to natural events and effects, because, as the first cause, it is the initiator and creator of everything material, including the laws which govern material events, and of time itself.

 

The atheist view of a natural first cause is not even rational, to propose that all the qualities I have mentioned above could apply to a material entity is clearly ridiculous. But apparently, atheism has no regard for natural laws or logic. Atheists get round it by simply dressing up their irrational beliefs to make them appear ‘scientific’.

This combined with rants and erroneous and derisory slogans about religious myths and superstition makes it all seem perfectly reasonable. Unfortunately, those with little knowledge, or who can’t be bothered to think for themselves are taken in by it.

 

Atheists repeatedly claim that they have refuted the law of cause and effect by asking : So what caused God then?

How true is that?

 

The ... what caused God? argument is a rather silly argument which atheists regularly trot out. All it demonstrates is that they don't understand basic logic.

 

The question to always ask them is; what part of FIRST don't you understand?

If something is the very FIRST, it means there is nothing that precedes it. First means first, not second or third.

That means that the first cause cannot be a contingent entity, because a contingent entity depends on something preceding it for its existence. In which case, if something precedes it, it couldn't be FIRST.

All natural entities, events and effects are contingent ... that is why the Law of Cause and Effect states that ... every NATURAL effect requires an adequate cause.

That means that the first cause cannot be a natural entity. An UNCAUSED, NATURAL event or entity is ruled out as not possible by the Law of Cause and Effect.

Therefore the very FIRST CAUSE of the universe, which we know cannot be caused, by virtue of it being FIRST (not second or third) CANNOT be a natural entity or event.

Thus we deduce that the first cause ... cannot be contingent, cannot be a natural entity, and cannot be subject to the Law of Cause and Effect.

So the first cause has to be non-material, i.e. supernatural.

The first cause also has to have the creative potential to create every other cause and effect that follows it.

In other words, the first cause cannot be inferior in any respect to the properties, powers or qualities of anything that exists...

The effect cannot be greater than the cause....

So we can thus deduce that the first cause is: UNCAUSED, SUPERNATURAL, self-existent, and capable of creating everything we see in the existing universe.

If there is life in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create life,

If there is intelligence in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create intelligence.

If there is information in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create information.

If there is consciousness in the universe, the first cause must have the ability to create consciousness. And so on and on. If it exists, the first cause is responsible for it, and must have the ability to create it.

That is the Creator God … and His existence is supported by impeccable logic and adherence to the demands of natural law.

Atheists often say: you can’t fill gaps in knowledge with a supernatural first cause.

 

But we are not talking about filling gaps, we are talking about a fundamental issue ... the origin of everything in the material realm.

The first cause is not a gap, it is the beginning - and many of the greatest scientists in the history of science had no problem whatsoever with the logic that - a natural, first cause was impossible, and the only possible option was a supernatural creator.

Why do atheists have such a problem with it?

 

Atheists also seem to think that to explain the origin of the universe without a God, simply involves explaining what triggered it, as though its formation from that point on, just happens automatically.

This has been compared by some as similar to lighting the blue touch paper of a firework. They think that if they can propose such a naturalistic trigger, then God is made redundant.

That may sound plausible to some members of the public, who take such pronouncements at face value, and are somewhat in awe of anything that is claimed to be 'scientific'.

But it is obvious to anyone who thinks seriously about it, that a mere trigger is not necessarily an adequate cause.

A trigger presupposes that there is some sort of a mechanism/blueprint/plan already existing which is ready to spring into action if it is provided with an appropriate trigger. So a trigger is not a sole cause, or a first cause, it is merely one contributing cause.

Natural things do only what they are programmed to do, i.e. they obey natural laws and the demands of their own pre-ordered composition and structure. Lighting blue touch paper would do absolutely nothing, unless there is a carefully designed and manufactured firework already attached to it.

What about the idea proposed by some atheists that space must have always existed, and therefore the first cause was not the only eternally, uncaused self-existent power?

This implies that the first cause was limited by a self-existent rival (space,) which was also uncaused, and therefore the first cause could not be infinite and could not even be a proper first cause, because there was something it didn’t cause i.e. ‘space’.

There seems to be some confusion here about what ‘space’ actually is.

Space is part of the created universe, it is what lies between and around material objects in the cosmos, if there were no material objects in the cosmos, there would be no space. The confusion lies in the failure to distinguish between empty space and nothing. Nothing is the absence of everything, whereas space is a medium in which cosmic bodies exist. ‘Empty’ space is just the space between objects. So space is not an uncaused, eternally self-existent entity, it is dependent on material objects existing within it, for its own existence.

What about nothing? Is that an uncaused eternally self-existent thing? Firstly, it is not a thing, it is the absence of all things. So has nothing always existed? Well, yes it essentially would have always existed, but only if the first cause didn’t exist. If there is a first cause is that is eternally self-existent, then there is no such thing as absolute nothing, because nothing is the absence of everything. If a first cause exists (which it had to), then any proposed eternal ‘nothing’ has always contained something, and therefore can never have been ‘nothing’.

 

What about the idea that the first cause created everything material from nothing? Obviously, the ‘nothing’ that is meant here is … nothing material, i.e. the absence of any material entities.

The uncaused, first cause cannot be material, because all material things are contingent, so the first cause brought material things into being, when nothing material had previously existed. That is what is meant by creation from nothing.

Continued in next comment.

Female Hummingbird IDs can be quite iffy. The other probabilities of similar species here are the Black-chinned and Costa's. Anna's has a straight, short bill and white supercilium. Its tail is reported to project beyond the wing tips but you need the ideal perspective of a perched bird to determine this. I also base my ID selection on the straight bill shape, but other local Hummers have similar bills. The blooms on which the Hummer is accessing are those of Parry's Penstemon, and early blooming native flower that seems to be the current choice of several birds and insects that thrive on nectar.

 

IMG_9771; Anna's Hummingbird

Much water has flowed since I feel like sharing with you my feelings about groups, that I created on Flickr. Hopefully to seek some advice. Maybe it waited to the times – not of peace (where is peace and where’re we), but of slightest hope for peace. Pressure is lower now, PTSD is easier to endure, and it’s spring all over the world. After not typical very, very warm winter in Russia. Because of this fucking war, I guess. Everything is exploding, burning, going to pieces, releasing much thermal energy from this shame, disaster and destruction. Just today I wrote one more two-line poem (I’m making hell of a lot pretty short art, in these times of helluva short lives, and pretty cheap, too; now we here, in poor Russia, know precisely the ultimate price in our regions, or else we could check it on the nearest billboard or advertising of the military contract at utility bills, it’s up to 4 million rubles in some regions, and for this cost one should die at the very short term with a highest probability; they’re buying deaths, not lives). The verse is this:

 

Не повезло с эпохой.

И похуй.

 

(Pretty much of my poetry is extremely obscene at these highly obscene times, with tremendously obscene leaders and politicians, especially those two goons and scary clowns from the deepest nations nightmares).

 

But back to the groups topic. See, they’re sort of my inner art labs and schools. Important part of my life. But. My hand does not rise to deny any photos without strong, completely subjective justification. I don’t want to discourage my brothers and sisters in arts. That’s why I created my favorite group, Just a few of infinity, which allowed just 1 submission per month. And its few members use even this possibility quite rare, thus make me incredibly happy. With this group I became even more allowing admin of all the other groups.

 

So, just a couple of days ago I created this one, Alice’s Lost Adventures: admin's choice, to let my own vision be as well, as yours. Maybe eventually I’ll start “director’s cuts” of all the groups. Though sometimes I’m tempted just to abandon some of them completely. I did that already, simply left them alone, allowing unlimited direct posting without any moderation whatsoever. But that’s the direct way to turn any good group into shithole, in my experience. And they have at least some sentimental values to me. So, I returned to them and cleaned all the shit several times. Which is tough job. Maybe the greatest and noblest Herculean task was the cleaning of an Augean stables.

 

So, what’s your advices about admining groups?

 

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With no Sunday plans, clear skies and a high probability for decent trains, Sam managed to get me out of the house and head to Lincoln for the day.

 

The main goal was for a chase of BNSF 9650, a wagon wheel executive SD70MAC, leading a coal load for Alabama down the St. Joe. However, shortly after getting to the yard and not finding it anywhere, we found out that he was still well into the sandhills, only making it from Alliance to just east of Hyannis in 14 or so hours.

 

After finding that out, we fell back onto a couple backups. For one, the south beltway opened up outside Lincoln this week and with it came a new overpass to shoot the St. Joe from. There was also a Q train detour in the yard getting ready to head down the sub. On the west end, though, was BNSF 662, a warbonnet that was heading out with the 605 local for Hastings. Oliver showed up and we ended up deciding to go after him on the Hastings Sub. Wrong choice.

 

We quickly headed to Denton and was only there for a couple minutes before he came flying through town. I've never seen anyone making that good of time on that line, especially a local. He beat us to Saltillo, something that's never happened before, before stopping outside Crete for MOW. Getting nothing from that chase, we decided to head up to Milford.

 

That's where this shot came from. Lighting wasn't great on the curve but it was really the only place open enough to get a shot and it was better than nothing. Friendly crew as well.

 

BNSF SD70ACe 8418 leads a coal empty westbound on the Ravenna Subdivision through Milford, Nebraska, December 18, 2022.

An aerial view to show some of the angles more clearly. All of the angles parts have more than one stud connected, and relies on the

probability of stud connections.

See my albums list for some of my best work: www.flickr.com/photos/200044612@N04/albums/

 

See my main account for my photography, videos, fractal images and more here: www.flickr.com/photos/josh-rokman/

 

Made with Image Creator from Microsoft Designer, formerly known as the Bing Image Creator. Powered by DALL·E 3.

 

I think that AI image generation is similar in many ways to photography. The camera itself handles all the fine details, but the photographer is in charge of curating the types of images that will be created.

 

Ultimately, it is all about maximizing the probability that something good will be created.

 

This is very similar to AI image generation, in terms of the skills involved and what the human does vs. what the machine does.

 

You can't compare AI image generation to the process of actually making these images from scratch with 3D software or paint/pencils, where the human controls every detail.

 

However, I think the process really is very similar to that of photography, as I made the case for above. I think that DALL-E 3 is by far the most powerful AI image generation tool currently available.

 

- Josh

Rocky Horror Picture Show performance @ Helsinki Pride 2016

 

Helsinki, Finland 2016 (ReUp)

 

Nikon F5 + AF Nikkor (With probability of 99% it was AF Nikkor 85/1.8)

AgfaPhoto APX 100 @100 (expired)

D-76 stock

Epson F-3200

See my albums list for some of my best work: www.flickr.com/photos/200044612@N04/albums/

 

See my main account for my photography, videos, fractal images and more here: www.flickr.com/photos/josh-rokman/

 

Made with Image Creator from Microsoft Designer, formerly known as the Bing Image Creator. Powered by DALL·E 3.

 

I think that AI image generation is similar in many ways to photography. The camera itself handles all the fine details, but the photographer is in charge of curating the types of images that will be created.

 

Ultimately, it is all about maximizing the probability that something good will be created.

 

This is very similar to AI image generation, in terms of the skills involved and what the human does vs. what the machine does.

 

You can't compare AI image generation to the process of actually making these images from scratch with 3D software or paint/pencils, where the human controls every detail.

 

However, I think the process really is very similar to that of photography, as I made the case for above. I think that DALL-E 3 is by far the most powerful AI image generation tool currently available.

 

- Josh

This colorful southwestern species is found mainly in NM, but also in abutting portions of TX and AZ. When trying to ID an unknown lizard, I usually look to the mapped areas to minimize the probabilities. This guy poses special problems because the color and patterns are highly variable. (I hope I got this one right... if not, please comment. I welcome corrections and/or confirmations from pros.)

 

IMG_6644; Southwestern Fence Lizard

Nikon Lite Touch Zoom 70Ws Ilford Delta 400 LegacyPro EcoPro 1+1 02/05/2024

thanks to Young Hee we know now that it is a resonator guitar, in all probability the Style O 14 Fret Replicon

(www.nationalguitars.com/home.html);

and yeah, that singer-guitarist was an American ---

 

please click here: www.flickr.com/photos/qmusaget/?details=1&quot; to see HOW our streams should be preferably [or at least optionally] viewed ---

 

no GROUP ICONS or AWARDS please (they will be [sadly] deleted) - just comments and critiques ---

.