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Some cars are born to glory, and some cars are born to infamy.
Some cars are born out of the logical desire to provide transport to the common man and meet their basic needs.
The Ford Fiesta is such a car.
There are special Fiestas - I have personally had the daily use of the latest Fiesta ST hot hatch, and that car is awesome. But for most people, the entry level car pretty much does everything they actually *need* a car to do.
At work, we discuss this concept that nearly all people basically only need four seats and 100 horsepower (75 kW). If you have less people to move around, you could get away with even less. Somehow though, particularly in markets focused on 'status', everyone throws this needs-based view out the window, and buys themselves a lot more car than they actually need.
Interestingly, in Australia, the standard family car of the 1950s and 60s, defined as a 'large car' basically met this 4-5 seats and 100 hp definition, as did the rise in popularity of 'mid-size' cars in the 1970s and 80s (think Toyota Camrys, Nissan 200B / Stanza / Bluebirds and Honda Accords). Once again in the 1990s and 2000s with 'small cars', this time, Toyota Corollas, Ford Focus, GM Astra, Mazda3, Hyundai i30.
This set up the B-Segment 'sub-compact', again, meeting the basic specification, as the segment likely to become the focus of buyers. A strange thing happened though, As fuel prices receded (like the late 1990s in the US), the consumer decided that they didn't really want four seats and 100 hp. Instead, they wanted a taller vehicle, with big wheels, and lots of toys. Thusly, the CUV, or 'Crossover', has captivated the heart of the market, as buyers choose 'more' rather than what they need.
I was pretty sure Ford was ready for the Fiesta to take over the world, but now find themselves unable to build enough Kuga/Escape, Edge and Explorers.
The Fiesta still has four seats and 100 hp, just like a majority of car buyers actually need. It is a safe, economical, fantastic drivers car. And will be pretty much all the car you will ever need 95% of the time.
What a funny old world we live in.
Artist's impression of ESA's Earth Return Orbiter.
Bringing samples from Mars is the logical next step for robotic exploration and it will require multiple missions that will be more challenging and more advanced than any robotic missions before. Accomplishments in robotic exploration in recent years have increased confidence in success – multiple launches will be necessary to deliver samples from Mars.
ESA is working with NASA to explore mission concepts for an international Mars Sample Return campaign between 2020 and 2030.
Three launches will be necessary to accomplish landing, collecting, storing and finding samples and delivering them to Earth.
NASA’s Mars 2020 mission will explore the surface and rigorously document and store a set of samples in canisters in strategic areas to be retrieved later for flight to Earth.
Two subsequent missions are foreseen to achieve this next step.
A NASA launch will send the Sample Retrieval Lander mission to land a platform near the Mars 2020 site. From here, a small ESA rover – the Sample Fetch Rover – will head out to retrieve the cached samples.
Once it has collected them in what can be likened to an interplanetary treasure hunt, it will return to the lander platform and load them into a single large canister on the Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV). This vehicle will perform the first liftoff from Mars and carry the container into Mars orbit.
ESA’s Earth Return Orbiter will be the next mission, timed to capture the basketball-size sample container orbiting Mars. The samples will be sealed in a biocontainment system to prevent contaminating Earth with unsterilised material before being moved into an Earth entry capsule.
The spacecraft will then return to Earth, where it will release the entry capsule for the samples to end up in a specialised handling facility.
ESA and NASA are exploring the concepts for these missions, with ESA assessing the Sample Fetch Rover and Earth Return Orbiter. These will provide input to ESA’s 2019 council at ministerial level, where approval will be sought for the missions.
Credits: ESA/ATG Medialab
Apron Media photography
Its Logical..
Aero Logic | D-AALD | Boeing 777 | EMA EGNX
Pilots waiting cargo loading nothing more to do than watch her prep for take off..
© Copyright Andy Crossley / Apronmedia Photography 2015
Hi-Res version can be obtained at;
East Yorkshire's fleet purchasing policy has reached its logical conclusion: after strong investments in 2019 and 2020, everything since then has been dealer stock: and none moreso than the six latest buses to join the East Yorkshire fleet. I won't lie, seeing these spotted on transfer along the A63 still with Metrobus fleetnames, I groaned... but all's not as it seems, apparently! According to the East Yorkshire Enthusiasts Facebook page, 300 and it's sister are only here on loan from Dawson Rentals to help out on East Yorkshire's runnings of the Priory Park Park and Ride, freeing up regular fleet vehicles to work on local services. But, I have to ask... what are we waiting on to need these on loan? Four more Enviro200 MMCs have come into the fleet as new dealer stock, however they've quickly been dispersed across the county on EastRider operations... so what, dare I ask, will be the 20's future?
Seen as it departs The Deep for another run along the Park and Ride 20 to Priory Park is East Yorkshire's 20300 (despite being stickered up as 300), a 2023 ADL Enviro200 MMC new to that old chestnut Hulleys of Baslow prior to passing onto Go-Ahead-owned Metrobus, apparently only here on loan from Dawsons Rentals for an unstated amount of time.
The colonization of the Moon is the proposed establishment of permanent human communities on the Moon. Advocates of space exploration have seen settlement of the Moon as a logical step in the expansion of humanity beyond the Earth. Recent indication that water might be present in noteworthy quantities at the Lunar poles has increased interest in the Moon. Polar colonies could also avoid the problem of long Lunar nights (about 354 hours, a little more than two weeks) and take advantage of the sun continuously.
Permanent human habitation on a planetary body other than the Earth is one of science fiction's most prevalent themes. As technology has advanced, and concerns about the future of humanity on Earth have increased, the argument that space colonization is an achievable and worthwhile goal has gained momentum. Because of its proximity to Earth, the Moon has been seen as a prime candidate for the location of humanity's first permanently occupied extraterrestrial base.
A lunar outpost was an element of the George W. Bush era Vision for Space Exploration, which has been replaced with President Barack Obama's space policy. The outpost would have been an inhabited facility on the surface of the Moon. At the time it was proposed, NASA was to construct the outpost over the five years between 2019 and 2024. The United States Congress directed that the U.S. portion, "shall be designated the Neil A. Armstrong Lunar Outpost".
On December 4, 2006, NASA announced the conclusion of its Global Exploration Strategy and Lunar Architecture Study. The Lunar Architecture Study's purpose was to "define a series of lunar missions constituting NASA's Lunar campaign to fulfill the Lunar Exploration elements" of the Vision for Space Exploration. What resulted was a basic plan for a lunar outpost near one of the poles of the Moon, which would permanently house astronauts in six-month shifts. These studies were made before the discovery of water ice (5.6 ± 2.9% by mass) in a polar crater, which may substantially affect plans.
If you enjoy please comment. Thank you very much.
Societa Italiana Auto Trasformazioni Accessori
Coachwork by Stabilimenti Farina
Chassis no. SL0216
Founded in 1926 in Turin, Italy by Giorgio Ambrosini, SIATA (Societa Italiana Auto Trasformazioni Accessori) began life as a tuning firm specialising in the modification of FIATs. When the company, now renamed SIATA Auto SpA, eventually introduced its first production car in 1949, FIAT components, in this case sourced from the Topolino, were the logical choice for the new Amica cabriolet. During the 1950s and on into the '60s, a variety of US engines including Crosley, Ford and Chrysler V8s was adopted in addition to FIAT's home-grown motors.
The Torinese firm's next effort, based on the FIAT 1400, was the Rallye, a traditionally styled roadster bearing more than a passing resemblance to the MG TD. Not all SIATA's designs were so obviously plagiarised, the series of FIAT 8V 2.0-litre V8-powered coupés of the 1950s, equipped with a variety of stylish Italian coachwork from the likes of Stabilimenti Farina, Vignale and Bertone and arguably the firm's finest creations, being particularly striking. We should also mention the similarly powered 208C Spyder - sister car of the Gran Sport – made famous by such owners as Steve McQueen, who dubbed his 'my little Ferrari'.
SIATA's Daina model of the early 1950s was based on the FIAT 1400 and built in both Convertible and Coupé forms, most of the former being bodied by Stabilimenti Farina and the latter by Bertone. Later cars were designated 'SL' Scatolato Lamiera – literally: sheet metal box). The Daina used the FIAT 1400 overhead-valve engine, modified by SIATA with a special cylinder head, pistons, and twin-carburettor inlet manifold. A 1,500cc unit was available as an option.
SIATA was active in racing from its earliest days, and a Daina Gran Sport driven by Dick Irish and Bob Fergus won its class in the inaugural Sebring 12 Hours race of 1952, finishing 3rd overall ahead of many larger-engined cars. The nimble handling of these cars was highly regarded in the USA, where many were modified to accept larger engines. SIATA was also a regular competitor in the famed Mille Miglia race in Italy.
The car offered here is an example of the rare SIATA Daina Gran Sport Type A. The Type A, distinguishable by its front-hinged bonnet and engine sitting over the front wheels, is much less numerous than the Type B, and it is estimated that only eight at most still exist. It is believed that chassis number 'SL0216' was originally sold by SIATA importer Ernie McAfee of Hollywood, California and shipped to Dayton, Ohio by a colonel in the United States Air Force. This is a well-known car with ownership history documented from the early 1980s onwards. It has spent most of its life in the USA, was registered in Germany from late 2006 and is currently registered as '278 YUB' in the UK.
The car was probably fitted with a 1,400cc SIATA engine originally (although it is possible that it was supplied without an engine) but this was replaced in the 1950s with a 265ci Chevrolet V8. When sold in 1969, the car had no drive train; by 1972 a 240bhp Ford 302ci V8 had been installed.
In 2014, an extensive restoration was carried out by Premium Classic Cars of Sudbourne, Suffolk in preparation for the 2015 Mille Miglia, for which the car was accepted. Works undertaken included returning the drive train and other areas, including the engine bay, to period specification. To this end, engine number 'SL0209' (recorded as an original SIATA unit) was installed, and Borrani wire wheels fitted, painted in gloss black like those of SIATA's original Mille Miglia car.
In terms of originality, great efforts were made to restore 'SL0216' as close as possible to original specification. However, the interior, though period, is not entirely original; rather, it has been configured to be comfortable for the Mille Miglia while at the same time incorporating a number of safety features (all as allowed by the Mille Miglia scrutineers). Noteworthy accessories include a rally trip meter, full tonneau, and auxiliary sockets for iPhone, etc.
Unfortunately, a water pump failure forced the car to retire from the 2015 Mille Miglia. It was accepted again for the Mille Miglia in 2016, prepared by Century Classics of Hungerford, and this time successfully completed the race. The car is presented today exactly as it finished the last Mille Miglia, still wearing the livery of 2015 and 2016. Nothing has been done to the car since the 2016 Mille Miglia, other than repairing the brake master cylinder to overcome the only problem affecting it during that event. The car will come with a spare water pump (the weak point that eliminated it from the 2015 Mille Miglia). Accompanying documentation consists of a current MoT certificate, UK V5C Registration Certificate, FIVA papers, and a full photographic record of the restoration.
From arguably the most evocative period of post-war sports car racing, this ultra-rare SIATA has been much admired at the Mille Miglia and has the potential for further development. Opportunities to acquire strong, Mille Miglia-eligible cars are increasingly rare, particularly when they are in recently restored condition like this one.
Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais
Bonhams
Estimated : € 280.000 - 380.000
Parijs - Paris
Frankrijk - France
February 2017
Artist's impression of ESA's Earth Return Orbiter flying over Mars.
Bringing samples from Mars is the logical next step for robotic exploration and it will require multiple missions that will be more challenging and more advanced than any robotic missions before. Accomplishments in robotic exploration in recent years have increased confidence in success – multiple launches will be necessary to deliver samples from Mars.
ESA is working with NASA to explore mission concepts for an international Mars Sample Return campaign between 2020 and 2030.
Three launches will be necessary to accomplish landing, collecting, storing and finding samples and delivering them to Earth.
NASA’s Mars 2020 mission will explore the surface and rigorously document and store a set of samples in canisters in strategic areas to be retrieved later for flight to Earth.
Two subsequent missions are foreseen to achieve this next step.
A NASA launch will send the Sample Retrieval Lander mission to land a platform near the Mars 2020 site. From here, a small ESA rover – the Sample Fetch Rover – will head out to retrieve the cached samples.
Once it has collected them in what can be likened to an interplanetary treasure hunt, it will return to the lander platform and load them into a single large canister on the Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV). This vehicle will perform the first liftoff from Mars and carry the container into Mars orbit.
ESA’s Earth Return Orbiter will be the next mission, timed to capture the basketball-size sample container orbiting Mars. The samples will be sealed in a biocontainment system to prevent contaminating Earth with unsterilised material before being moved into an Earth entry capsule.
The spacecraft will then return to Earth, where it will release the entry capsule for the samples to end up in a specialised handling facility.
ESA and NASA are exploring the concepts for these missions, with ESA assessing the Sample Fetch Rover and Earth Return Orbiter. These will provide input to ESA’s 2019 council at ministerial level, where approval will be sought for the missions.
Credits: ESA/ATG Medialab
Contemporary influences on design made in 2003....
Relationships between key elements
Design Process is the term used to encompass the critically important areas of Information and Interaction design that occurs in designing websites and other digital media. Our customer, the user, interacts with the page and should be informed in the most logical and accessible way. Information design is about how the information we present is ordered and how we structure that online. Interaction design deals with how users engage with what they see and how they work with a site to fulfil a specific task.
Attached to this major influence are the two disciplines of website Usability and Accessibility. These two factors shape much of what we produce as web designers. If a site cannot be used easily it instantly fails; users will be lost and profitability is affected. Therefore, the elements related to usability are Search Engine Optimisation to enable users to find the site easily, browser usage so we can design to popular types of browser and usability testing with user groups to ensure that the site is usable in a real world context. Site traffic statistics enable us to see what works with our users – what is a success and what can generate profit. The W3C gives us an idea of best practice so we can follow guidelines that are accepted globally as good web design practice. These thoughts are also backed up by the writings of experts such as Jakob Nielsen.
Semantics, the study of linguistic meaning, is an important element for the user to be able to identify areas of personal importance. Personalisation is a term used for websites specifically built for each individual user by utilising specific technology such as RSS. This allows users to tailor the content of a site to their specification. A Wiki is a site that is constantly evolving due to user’s inputs.
Accessibility is not only about users being able to access the page through their browser but also enabling those with visual impairments to see the site through screen readers or large font faces on the page. This is a now a part of Government Legislation as sites offering a public service must not exclude users with disabilities. Users with colour blindness must also be catered for in terms of high contrast page or logo designs.
Design delivery is the method in which we deliver content to our end user. Faster connections and improved hardware performance has enabled us to deliver broadcast quality content, through Web TV and Podcasting. We are able to offer a richer array of media for our user base. This is coupled with more traditional e marketing such as banners and emails. Email has also allowed the spread of the viral campaign. This enables us to give marketing and sales new ways of capturing leads.
This improved state of technology, typified by Wireless Connectivity, provides improved conditions for Profitability. This is the final core influence on the design practice. All our design has to be executed in the most cost-effective way possible. The company is publicly owned, and we operate in an atmosphere of profit and loss; therefore all designs must have a genuine ROI. Experimental work cannot be done unless profit is guaranteed. With the strong link to design delivery, cost invariably has the biggest influence on the type of design we offer our client. Aside from the five core influences there are also four other important areas on the sociological/cultural part of the map. The first is Market Research, which is the use of demographics and proprietary documents to formulate an exact plan for executing a campaign or designing a particular type of site. Without research we would not be sure of what we produced would even be needed by a user group. The connection to Usability is obvious but there is also a connection to Brand Identity. Through research the user’s opinion of the brand is brought to light and this is taken through to experience design, the art of lending a tone to the interaction users experience online.
Design Trends are extremely important in online design especially games design because of the GUI (graphical user interfaces) seen in this area. Film, art, movies and most contemporary visual stimuli feature as an influence but from my personal perspective their influence is transient, forever shifting and never permanent in terms of longevity. However, animation does have a greater influence on the web, its use in advertising is seen daily with more users having faster connections. Technology itself is an influence and the hardware stated above does have an impact on our lives.
Market forces and Established Online Companies have a tremendous influence over our websites due to successful business models and applied learning that major companies have demonstrated. Google’s user interface is held up as an example of how a good search model should work. Whilst Amazon is known as the best online buying model, knowing its customers down to their taste in music and film. The cost–shift to users is also an important notion, reducing companies operating costs by centralising logistics operations and having virtual stores. By enabling users to order online, stores such as Waitrose have helped reduce pollution by saving customer’s car journeys. The increase in those working from home also has had the same results. The thought that the internet is eco-friendly has to be balanced with the fact that it does use electricity.
Corporate Responsibility influences design. By having a strong ethical stance concerning Accessibility, for example, the company will enforce a proactive measure to enforce this within our designs. In turn the shareholders feel drawn to companies that care about the environment, who operate in a sustainable way and are aware of social issues. They are more likely to invest in a company with a CSR program. (Alistair Darling London Radio 27/11/05) This is linked to profitability, which links to the five core areas within my design practice.
Bibliography
Pod castingApple Digital Exchange, URL:http://edmarketing.apple.com/adcinstitute/wp-content/Missouri_Podcasting_White_Paper.pdf [14th November]
Web TVICIS Chemical News, URL:http://www.icis.com/tv/tv.aspx [30th September]
Interaction DesignThe Design Council, URL:http://www.designcouncil.info/webdav/harmonise?Page/@id=6043&Session/@id=D_ny3Ag7Lm5V68IIcchL39&Section/@id=1305 [21st November]
Interaction DesignThe Design Council, URL:http://www.designcouncil.info/webdav/harmonise?Page/@id=6043&Session/@id=D_ny3Ag7Lm5V68IIcchL39&Section/@id=1345[21st November]
Useit.comJakob Nielsen Usability expert, URL:http://www.useit.com/ [30th November]
World Wide Web ConsortiumW3C website – international web standards, URL:http://www.w3.org/ [10th September]
Web Semantics JournalWhite paper discussion forum, URL:http://www.websemanticsjournal.org/ps/pub/showDoc.Fulltext/document.pdf?lang=en&doc=2004-5&format=pdf&compression=[16th November]
Web Design Blog/Forum A List Apart, URL:http://www.alistapart.com/ [18th September]
Experience DesignThe Design Council, URL:http://www.designcouncil.info/webdav/harmonise?Page/@id=6043&Session/@id=D_ny3Ag7Lm5V68IIcchL39&Section/@id=1551[24th September]
Proprietary Research DocumentsZDNet, URL: whitepapers.zdnet.com/ [11th November]
Apple G5Article on the dawn of a new age for computer users, URL:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3613790.stm [24th November]
iPodArticle on the explosion of the iPod phenomenon, URL:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4332680.stm [10th October]
Mobile PhonesArticle about the increased sales worldwide of mobile phones, URL:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4459278.stm [24th November]
BlackberryArticle on the Blackberry mobile email device and its rise in popularity, URL:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4529153.stm [10th October]
PersonalisationWhite paper about the possible information structure for a personalised site, URL:http://argus-acia.com/white_papers/personalization.pdf [29th November]
RSSReally Simple Syndication explained, URL:http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/help/rss/ [30th November]
WikiExplanation of the meaning from Wikipedia.com, URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki [30th November]
Colour BlindnessTool for designers to check for colour deficiency in their users, URL:http://colorlab.wickline.org/colorblind/colorlab/ [25th November]
Inclusive DesignThe Design Council white paper, URL:http://www.designcouncil.info/webdav/harmonise?Page/@id=6043&Session/@id=D_ny3Ag7Lm5V68IIcchL39&Section/@id=1286 [25th November]
Browser UsageStatistics showing latest figures of usage online, URL:http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp [19th September]
Search Engine OptimisationWhite paper on marketing of website through search engines, URL:http://www.weboptimiser.com/resources/Searchisbrand280605.pdf [28th October]
Design for Disability Act Government legislation covering the acthttp://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2005/20050013.htm [16th November]
Corporate Responsibility Business ethics from Reed Elsevierhttp://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2005/20050013.htm [28th November]
SustainabilityDTI’s website outlines this part of CSR, URL: www.dti.gov.uk/sustainability/[28th November]
Corporate ResponsibilityReed Elsevier outlines it Green promise, URL:http://www.reedelsevier.com/media/word/a/j/Environmental%20Management%20System%20online%20version.pdf [ 28th November]
Corporate ResponsibilityReed Elsevier shows the effects of CSR on its market place, URL: www.reed-elsevier.com/media/pdf/m/q/MarketPlace.pdf [28th November]
Also a radio programme on CSR with Alistair Darling, London FM, [21st November]
Below is a copy of an actual debate between myself (as Truth in science) and some militant atheists.
Is atheism exposed as bankrupt? Read the debate below, and judge for yourself .....
This debate took place in response to an image ridiculing Christians posted by militant atheist (Silly Deity) on his photostream. Anyone looking at his photostream can see it wholly consists of images insulting and ridiculing religion and religious people.
It commenced with a comment by another militant atheist (Badpenny) supporting the image posted by Silly Deity ...
The image posted by Silly Deity with the original debate can be seen here:
www.flickr.com/photos/131599163@N05/18212093014
I have copied it all in this post to give it more public exposure, and also in case the original is deleted.
THE DEBATE FOLLOWS:
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Bad penny begins the debate by commenting on an image ridiculing Christians. It insinuates that Christians have no sensible argument, and that the only argument they have is to threaten people with Hell.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
I reckon that neatly sums it up :)
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Truth in science 2y
Wrong! Theists do have a VERY reasonable argument based on logic, natural law and fundamental scientific principles. Unlike atheists, who have no such logical argument,
Atheism revealed as false - why God MUST exist.
www.flickr.com/photos/truth-in-science/18927764022
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Sorru #TruthinScience but you've pedalling that same old bollocks for ages now in the hope that the gullible or those with no understanding will buy your sciencey sounding shite as truth
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Truth in science 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
You obviously have no understanding.
Apparently, you have swallowed the ludicrous fable that the universe created itself from nothing, without any cause and for no reason - and you think that is 'science'.
If you disagree with my logical argument (based on natural law and scientific principles) let's see your point by point logical and scientific argument for your non-contingent, autonomous, self-creating, adequate, natural, first cause?
Or is it just the usual bluff, bluster and hot air that I get all the time from atheists? Who are very good at dishing out ridicule and abuse to anyone who refuses to swallow their naturalist ideology, but very poor at logically or scientifically justifying it.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
So basically there has to be a beginning,a prime mover,an initial cause for,well,everything so therefore it follows from the point of view of logic that this first cause is god.
Is that a fair summation of your proof and scientific evidene ???
How do you know this initial cause was god.
Perhaps there was a some event outside of our universe that set our universe into existence.Something non intelligent or sentient that pushed the plunger that ignited the big bang.
I am unable to determine in any realistic way what it was that started the ball rolling in exactly the same way you are unable to.
All you have done here is taken a logical argument and applied it to something that you know fine no one can verify or refute.
Your logical and scientific evidence is mere speculation in the same way all theories of what occured before the big bang are specualtion.Without being able to look back before the beginning to see if there is a cause or anything at all it's all just interesting notions.
If you are touting logic as the proof of your viewpoint then the same logic dictates that something came before god so what was that then ????
Presently cause and effect are deemed to be a universal rule,you're own explanation as I've understood it so far demands this particular order and progression of events but back beyond the big bang,the singularity the laws of physics appear to breakdown so can you definitively show that the time and the law of cause and effect alone remains in tact.
Of course,unless you're privvy to some special knowledge that no one else has ever know or knows today then in all truth you are stumbling around in the dark like everyone else .No ????
Also,you are doing the usual if not this then that juggle that people use all the time.
If there has to be an initial cause then that cause has to be god.
As I've said,yes cause and effect are the fundamental to our universe but until we can say that there is nothing outside or before our universe OR that there is then all bets are off.The laws that dictate here may hold no sway outside our universe and maybe they do but at this point in time we have no way of saying either way.
Obviously you are convinced you can so I'd love to hear how you think you are able beyond applying logic puzzles to that which we can neither see,measure or even state with confidence exists,existed or even possible
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Of course,you do realise logic is just a tool help you think objectively.It's not truth itself just like mathematics is just a language to describe reality not reality itself.
Putting something into a logical argument is just away to apply logic to something,it doesn't make that thing true or suddenly real....you do understand that don't you ???
I could make a logical argument to say that I could become the president of the US but that doesn't mean I will be.
Applying logic to anything at all you can imagine has no effect whatsoever on the real,physical world.
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Truth in science 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
You wrote:
"So basically there has to be a beginning,a prime mover,an initial cause for,well,everything so therefore it follows from the point of view of logic that this first cause is god.
Is that a fair summation of your proof and scientific evidene ???
How do you know this initial cause was god.
Perhaps there was a some event outside of our universe that set our universe into existence.Something non intelligent or sentient that pushed the plunger that ignited the big bang."
The first cause cannot be a natural first cause, that is obvious because all natural events are contingent. There is no such thing as a non-contingent natural entity or event. Science is about looking for causes for every natural thing or occurrence. Every natural effect has to have a cause, and the effect cannot be greater than its cause/s. That is the fundamental principle behind ALL scientific enquiry. If you don't accept that principle you cannot practice science. A first cause has to be uncaused, or it wouldn't be first. If it is the very first cause in a chain of causes and effects it not only has to be uncaused it also has to be adequate to produce everything that follows it. Nothing that follows the first cause can be superior to that which ultimately caused it. So, the first cause has to be capable of creating every property and quality that exists in the universe. Which, of course, includes life, intelligence, information, consciousness etc.
If you think there can be such a thing as an uncaused, natural, first cause which is capable of creating all those attributes, please tell us what it is?
You wrote:
"The laws that dictate here may hold no sway outside our universe and maybe they do but at this point in time we have no way of saying either way"
Laws of nature are based on the properties of natural things, they describe those properties. contingency is a basic property of all natural things. That law is fundamental, it cannot be different elsewhere. If matter/energy was once some sort of non-contingent, autonomous being, why would it change its nature to an inferior one where it is subject to the limitations of causality? To claim that matter/energy is, or once was, an autonomous, non-contingent entity is to imbue it with the attributes of God. It is simply replacing the supernatural, first cause - God, with a natural deity.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Again you are making sweeping assumptions about the conditions previous to our universe and stating as fact that what's a natural law within the universe is both fundamental and natural outwith it or before it.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Until you can categorically state what was before the big bang,that the universe is all there is where nothing exist beyond it.Until you can state what conditions prevailed before our universe began you cannot with certaintity make definitive claims what the first cause consist of because you cannot difinitively state what was natural and fundamental before the start of our universe.You cannot even do more than claim that the big bang was a result of a first cause.How do you know the there aren't entirely different laws that prevail in the time and/or space before/beyond our present universe.
There could be an infinite number of universe that all have different laws prevailing within them.
Until you fully know the nature of our universe,whether it's all there is,the first and only one to exist you cannot say with certainty that laws the govern how ours work our the same laws outwith and therefore all statements pertaining to the conditons before our universe are equally uncertain.
How exactly does the quantum world relate to your ever regressing complexity of causes as much of what is observed there does necessarily conform strictly to your natural laws of cause and effect.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Fundamentally what you are doing is the ultimate example of the god of the gaps.Everything that has happened since the big bang is natural therefore what came before cannot be natural or contingent because that is the natural law ever since.You cannot and don't know what came before so it has to be god because the big bang was the first event.The first event that created the conditions we exist in so.........
Yes it was the beginning of our universe but perhaps there's a continous cycle where the universe begins,has it's life cycle before collapsing in on itself down to an infinite point where it begins all over again so on and so on.
Until it is possible to observe back beyond/before the big bang which it seems likely is impossible you cannot apply the laws that govern here.
You would have to know for sure these fundamental laws were created in the event that created the universe or that they existed before,beyond and outwith the universe all together .Again you cannot make such categorical statements while knowing nothing of what was before it.How can you even be sure time existed before the big bang.
Without time,without entropy and the conservation of energy there may be no order the governs cause and effect.There may even be a god or there may not be,with no knowledge what came before the beginning of our universe you cannot be certain what laws are a product of the universe and what are laws outwith it.
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Truth in science 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
So you want to indulge in fantasy and still claim it is science.
If you want to evade the Law of Causality, and other natural laws that destroy your naturalist argument, you step outside of science.
Nevertheless, you still pretend to be working within a scientific framework by proposing causes which are actually non-causes.
You seem to think you can glibly dismiss natural laws as irrelevant to the argument, when they are absolutely crucial to any ‘scientific’ argument.
There is NO god of the gaps.
The so-called gaps are created by your own, unscientific fantasies.
The universe was CAUSED - there are no gaps, there is only the question – was the CAUSE natural or supernatural?
If you claim it was ‘natural’ but at the same time you want to claim that natural laws did not apply, you are simply contradicting yourself. You are effectively claiming supernatural abilities for a natural cause, which cannot possibly have supernatural abilities. In other words, you are endowing nature with godlike abilities and attributes, which science tells us nature certainly does not possess.
The god of the gaps argument is stupid. We can only deal in known facts, not a never ending, stream of what if’s or maybes, conjured up by fertile imaginations working overtime.
And all your - ‘what if’s?’ can be easily debunked.
For example - a cyclical universe, is similar to applying the scientifically, discredited idea of perpetual motion on a grand scale to the universe. Firstly, matter/energy is contingent, it always is, and always has been, contingent. It is not, and cannot be, autonomously, self-existent.
Secondly, the universe is running down from a peak of initial, energy potential at its creation. It cannot rewind itself any more than a clock can – there is no such thing as a free lunch, to suggest otherwise is fantastical nonsense, not credible science or logic.
‘What if’s’ or maybes are not logical arguments, they are just a way of evading definitive conclusions which are uncomfortable.
That is the whole basis of the god of the gaps argument, they are just fantasy gaps which can never be filled by anything, because as one gap is filled another can be immediately invented.
Anyone can attempt to destroy any logical conclusions by creating their own ‘gaps’ with endless, bizarre - what if’s and maybes?
Well how about this - What if I don’t actually exist? ‘What if’ you think you are having this discussion with a person, but really, I am just a clever, robotic, word generator in cyberspace? It would mean you are wasting your time, because I can just generate answers and ‘what if’s’ until the cows come home – and ‘what if’ the cows don’t ever come home? – It means all your arguments are just gaps in my – endless stream of - what if’s? And if you manage to fill one gap and answer one of my - what if’s?, I can just keep creating more and more, so your argument is, and always will be, useless. It is just an argument of never-ending gaps.
As for time – time is a physical thing, which theists knew long before Einstein confirmed it.
Theists have always known that where physical things exist, time MUST exist. Put simply, time is the chronology of physical events.
Matter/energy cannot exist in a timeless state. Only non-physical entities can be timeless.
2 + 2 = 4 is both statistical information and a true fact. Information and truth are both non-physical entities which (unlike physical entities) can exist independently of time. They are, in effect, eternal. Time does not in any way affect them. Only the tangible expression of information and truth in physical media can be eroded by time, but not the essence of their existence.
Truth and information exist whether they are made tangible in physical form or not.
If any physical thing or cause existed before the alleged Big Bang, it had to be subject to time.
Which, means - that which existed in a timeless state before the creation event of a physical universe (the first cause) had to be a non-physical entity. There is no other option.
Your claim that we can have no knowledge of anything before the material universe or the alleged Big Bang is completely spurious. Logic and science are tools that help us to make predictions and sensible and reasonable assessments and conclusions. They help us to know what is possible and likely - and especially, in this instance, to know what is IMPOSSIBLE. We do KNOW that a self-created, autonomous, NATURAL, first cause is IMPOSSIBLE. There are no ifs and buts about it, that is what science, logic, reason and common sense tells us.
And that is enough to debunk the atheist belief in an all-powerful, self-creative, non-contingent, Mother Nature.
To dispute that is not only irrational, it is the hallmark of a dogmatic, illogical and unscientific ideology.
As for quantum effects, they may appear random and uncaused, but they are most definitely not. Even if their direct cause is difficult to determine, they are part of a CAUSED physical universe.
So, the idea that anything within a CAUSED universe can be causeless is ridiculous.
As for a direct cause of quantum effects, it can be compared to the randomness of a particular number coming up from throwing a dice. It may appear random and without a direct cause, but it isn’t. Because if we knew all the complicated and variable factors involved – such as the exact orientation of the dice as it leaves the hand, the velocity of the throw and the amount of spin etc. we could predict the number in advance. So just because, in some instances, causes are too incredibly complex to accurately predict the end result, doesn’t mean there are ever no causes.
You wrote:
"There could be an infinite number of universe that all have different laws prevailing within them."
No there couldn't.
The 'Multiverse' idea is as nonsensical as it sounds, and has been soundly debunked.
www.flickr.com/photos/truth-in-science/15897203833
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Silly Deity 2y
Since the bizarrely named "Truth in science" is so fond of repeating the fallacy that his drivel is based on "the principles of science" let's look at the principles of science shall we?
There are five basic components to the scientific method:
1) From observations of the natural world, determine the nature of the phenomenon that is interesting to you (i.e. ask a question or identify a problem).
2) Develop one or more hypotheses, or educated guesses, to explain this phenomenon. The hypotheses should be predictive - given a set of circumstances, the hypothesis should predict an outcome.
3) Devise experiments to test the hypotheses. ( All valid scientific hypotheses must be testable.)
4) Analyze the experimental results and determine to what degree do the results fit the predictions of the hypothesis.
5) Further modify and repeat the experiments.
"Truth in science" fails to get beyond step 2.
He is also repeatedly pedalling the notions so succinctly described earlier as "bollocks" otherwise termed logical fallacies.
This is the use of poor, or invalid, reasoning for the construction of an argument. Some fallacies are committed intentionally to manipulate or persuade by deception, while others are committed unintentionally due to carelessness or ignorance.
So.........."Truth in science" fails the Principles of Science test and also uses logical fallacies as a means to deceive.
Yep!! Bollocks just about sums it up!
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Ah no way my latest reply written last night has gone astray.
It was very much along the lines of your response Silly Diety although I'd hasten to admit not as eloquently put.
Basically,if you live by the sword then you will die by the sword.Or more aptly if TruthinScience is going to continously invoke science to frame his argument in a manner that appears both authoritative and beyond argument then he has to remain within the bounds of science.
As I think I said in an earlier reply science,much like critical thinking,logic and reason,is not a particular set of complex or technological subjects but a tool and a framework for the study and advancement of knowledge that is based on observation,analysis,hypothesis,prediction,experimentation to tthe predictions,divising similarly or more liable explanations...i.e falsification and then ongoing refining ofyour hypothesis even if it is fully accepted and becomes a scientific theory.....as Newton's work on gravity gave way to Einstein centuries later.There are NO sacred cows in science as Newton would attest if he were alive today and the day may come when Einstein is proven to have got relativity completely upside down if the evidence is stong enough to prove it.
Now why doesn't TruthinScience's claims bear any resemblence to science ???
Quite simply he is making definitive statements that he knows and can prove what happened before our universe began.
His arguments about causality and contingent and natural causes sound very compelling at first glance,science certainly does seem to confirm cause and effect and certainly seems at first to support time as a river that only flows one way but the point is that these natural laws as he puts it,these fundamental laws that govern our universe have as he suggests been observed to apply across the entire universe from the moment of the big bang forwards until this second.
But we CANNOT look further back in time than the big bang,our science and laws of physics can alliw us to model and imply what happened millionths of a second after the big band but note AFTER not before.
We have no way of observing back before the big bang and can only see as far as light has travelled since then giving us a horizon beyond which we can not see and therefore cannot make observations of,about,from either.
Therefore the science cannot say anything at all about either what occured,what was there,the potential cause,whethee time and space existwd in any sense we could understand or even if such fundamental laws like causality applied.If everything started with the big bang i.e time and space,then seeing as causality (cause and effect) are contingent on time then is there any reason at all to imagine causality meant anything pre big bang ???
The real answer is,the scientific answer absolutely,is there is simply no way of knowing,there may never be a way of see back before the big bang so the probability is we may never know though every time such statements have been made,that some knowledge is beyond science it's eventually been discovered and understood by science but.......
TruthinScience is clearly taking laws of physics that are well established and seemingly understood amd applying them to an area that isn't.That is a sound logical and reasoned approach but to apply them to something that is so far beyond our knowledge we don't even know if it can ever be observed or how that could happen is completely unscientific......it's what's known as psuedoscience.If it had any true grounding in logic or reason it may be a form of philosophy but it's too ad hock and cobbled together to be that.
At the very best and most generous his claims could be said to amount to an hypothosis but when they are based on a fog of reason like they are that's being too kind.
I know what it is he objects too so strongly and that's other hypothoses by real scientist about possible causes or ways that the universe could have come about without the necessity for a FIRST SUPERNATURAL INTENTION CONTINGENT CAUSE i.e god.Personally,the only one I've really read and have an understanding of is Laurence Kraus and his 'A Universe from Nothing' which I highly recommend anyone to read.
The one thing to note though is as he takes great pains to stress throughout the book it's a hypothosis that COULD explain how a universe can be created from seemingly nothing (although it would appear nothing is the operative word as empty space devoid of matter of any kind still has mass and energy).What TrurhinScience and many,many other theists fail to grasp os he's offering an expanation that remains within the bounds of science yet he freely admits that doesn't mean it's what happened,that there is no way of knowing what happened for all the reasons I've stated.
Shit,who knows there may be something extremely bizarre behind it all like some big,old bearded man who waved his hand and 7 days later
.......lol
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Silly Deity 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
As Bertrand Russell so eloquently stated:
“If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.”
The reliance on logic alone to "prove" something fails because logic is not empiricism (which is fundamental to science). It fails to provide EVIDENCE..........something sorely lacking in "Truth in science's" rants. His presumption that a real or perceived relationship between things means that one is the cause of the other is simply an example of false cause. To make such presumptions with no evidence means that his argument falls flat on its face.
So he fails on the scientific principles (miserably) and he fails on logic too.
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Truth in science 2y
Silly Deity
Nice try, but I am afraid it is another gigantic fail. You have simply hoisted yourself on your own petard.
None of the proposed, fantasy, natural, origin scenarios invented by atheists in order to get around natural laws and scientific principles are testable - none are observable - none are subject to experiment and - none are repeatable.
So NONE of them have got anything whatsoever to do with genuine science.
For example, tell us how a ‘singularity’ or a ‘multiverse’ can be tested, observed, or demonstrated by repeated experiment?
The Law of Cause and Effect and other natural laws which atheists glibly dismiss, and which definitively rule out a natural, first cause - ARE testable - ARE observable and - ARE subject to repeatable experiment.
We can only deal in FACTS, not atheist myths and fantasy.
The existence and veracity of the law of cause and effect and other natural laws IS A FACT.
The idea that natural laws and the basic principle of the scientific method didn’t apply to the origin of the universe or of matter/energy is NOT a fact, it is no better and no more credible than a fairy story or Bertrand Russell’s, flying teapot.
I don’t claim that a supernatural first cause can be proven by science, it can’t, because it is outside the remit of science, which can only deal with natural events and entities.
But the atheist idea of a natural, first cause can also never be proven by science.
However, science CAN DISPROVE a natural, first cause of the universe - and that is exactly what it does.
Science tells us that a natural first cause is impossible. Science can only look for adequate causes, that is the fundamental principle and raison d’etre of the scientific method.
Science cannot look for non-causes – or for inadequate causes – or for non-contingency – or for natural things self-creating themselves from nothing.
Therefore, the claim that atheist naturalism has anything to do with science is completely bogus.
In fact, atheism is anti-science - because it seeks to contradict the verdict of the scientific method and natural law.
If we apply the scientific method to the origin of the universe/matter - science tells us that it had to have an adequate cause, but atheists say no! We can't accept that, science must be wrong, we propose that the universe was causeless.
If that is what atheists want to believe, then fair enough, but they should stop calling it 'science', it is anti-science.
As for Mr Krauss and - his universe from the ‘nothing’ that isn’t really nothing, but ‘something’ - space/time, you would need to be extremely gullible to fall for that load of nonsense.
It is just another desperate, atheist attempt to get around the Law of Cause and Effect.
Presumably he thinks that if he can fool people into believing that something, which is an integral part of the material realm is – no different from nothing (i.e. no thing). Then he can avoid having to explain what caused it?
Nothing (that which doesn’t exist) obviously doesn’t need a cause. However, Mr Krauss’ nothing is a bogus ‘nothing’ … so, unfortunately for him, it certainly does require an adequate cause, just like everything else in the material realm. So the whole exercise is spurious and devious nonsense. One thing is certain, it is not science, it is just fantasy.
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Silly Deity 2y
Truth in science
Getting a bit desparate eh?
Can't refute the issue that you don't understand the science or scientific principles?
Can't deny that you use logical fallacies?
So you pepper your response with a few more of the latter, ignoring the self-same scientific principles you claim to espouse, while introducing the odd red-herring and conflating theories of the origin of the universe with atheism.
A bit of a messy really.
Desparate too.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Truth in PsuedoScience I honestly cannot be bothered trying to refute your nonsense anymore I'm losing interest and the will to continue by going over and over it ad infinitum .....of course you,like all theists will claim it as your victory but you don't get it,you refuse to contemplate anyrhing that doesn't fit you particular beliefs and you won't be remotely swayed from your abslotue certainty despite the fact you're making a fool.of your self by firmly clinging to the label scientific....even a high school kid just starting out in basic science could see the gaping fallacy at the heart of your bullshit but you blythely ignore it making you dishonest or you just don't see it making you not exactly the sharpest tool.
Either way m8 I have to respect the law of free speech (the most important and fundamental of laws lol) which afterall allows you to talk whatever pigs swill you like and be judged by it.
Can I just add with science observations,results,evidence are what determines the theory the outcome if you like.You DON'T start with a confirmed conviction and shape the evidence to fit it.
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Truth in science 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
Is that the best either of you can do?
In other words, like every other atheist I have encountered, you don't have a credible answer or response.
Of course, you bluff it out and pretend that you have refuted my argument.
But I have shown that it is science and logic that you are trying to refute, not me. And that is why you are doomed to failure.
Atheists masquerade as the champions of science but, all the while, they hate the verdict that science has for their cherished ideology.
The only arguments they ever present to justify belief in their religion of naturalism are based on fantasies which seek to undermine natural laws and basic scientific principles. Such as; a universe self-creating from some sort of bogus 'nothing' or a magical, so-called singularity where no laws apply. They are clearly nothing to do with genuine science, they are just devices to fool people into thinking atheist naturalism is credible.
Atheist naturalism is a completely blind faith, one that has no support from natural law, logic or science.
You obviously can't answer the question I posed: tell us how a ‘singularity’ or a ‘multiverse’ can be tested, observed, or demonstrated by repeated experiment?
I will leave people reading through my arguments and your responses to judge who has won the argument - but they can be sure of one thing that I have demonstrated, that the point presented in the image is completely erroneous. It is not theists, who don't have a reasonable rebuttal of any arguments, but atheists.
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Silly Deity 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
Bob
He's the one making the claims here...........no one else. He can't provide evidence to support those claims so resorts to flim-flam.
As I said earlier................just a bit desparate.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Come on PsuedoScience now you are throwing out scientific method as if you were applying it all along.
A multiverse ???
Have you not read my main arguement over umpteen replys now I have stated that we are unable to observe back before thw big bang and the 'birth' of our universe.That means no observations of god with a match,a multiverse,a continueing cycle of big bangs or any other hypothesis rational or batshit crazy you can possibly suggest.
Do you not get this fundamental basic fact,i cannot prove,observe or test or take a fucking stroll in a multiverse.I thought that point was self evident any more than you can prove,observe or state what came before either.The point is neither of us can say anymore than the other but science which you claim is your master can at best just hypothosise it cannot state fact,prove,observe,test anything pre big bang either so your claims being proven by science are as disingenuos as any claim I decided to state as fact.
Do you not understand that yet.No obsevations,no way to test or experiment,predict etc,etc means science has nothing definitive to say about it as yet nor can it prove what happened.......do you not get this genuinely straight forward premise.
As for singularitys.......observe the centre of almost any galaxy you wish to study.You'll find a super massive black hole or all the predicted effects of one.Isn't a black hole a singularity then ????
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
I know Silly Deity that he's the one making spurious claims but seriously beginning to piss me off.....not because of his pure unshackelled belief that he's cracked it and won't listen but because people may actually believe he's based his claims in sound science
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) (deleted) 2y
Oh yes and Psuedo you do realise that simply 'defeating' the multiverse or singularity idea in your own mind doesn't mean your claims are true.
I cannot prove of make statements of fact about the origin of the universe but that doesn't mean that you in that case must be right.It's not either or.
Your whole premise of calling something bogus or demanding that everyone else's suggestions must withstand scientific rigour you don't apply to your claim is basically a straw man.As if the best argument against your beliefs is the multiverse hypothesis so if you can show it cannot be proven therefore you win.No it doesn't work that way.
How have you made observations of your first cause god then,how did you measure,quantify his existence and that he was responsible for putting it all into action.Experiments and test ???
Come on,just banging on about natural laws and causality does nothing whatsoever to observe,analyse,test,experiment on god.
Come on,you're the real,true scientist here......explain how first before you can expect anyone to take you seriously
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Truth in science 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
You wrote:
"Do you not get this fundamental basic fact,i cannot prove,observe or test or take a fucking stroll in a multiverse.I thought that point was self evident any more than you can prove,observe or state what came before either.The point is neither of us can say anymore than the other but science which you claim is your master can at best just hypothosise it cannot state fact,prove,observe,test anything pre big bang either so your claims being proven by science are as disingenuos as any claim I decided to state as fact."
So why do atheists continuously present such unscientific nonsense as a 'multiverse', or the universe from nothing without a cause, as 'science'? It doesn't even make logical or common sense, let alone scientific sense.
It is all sheer, magical fantasy.
If you are going to frame a scientific hypothesis, then you should do so according to the facts we know - and within the framework of natural laws and the principle of causality which lies behind the scientific method.
You should not just dream up any old, imaginative nonsense, which tramples on natural laws and the basic principle of science, and then present it as the latest, greatest, scientific explanation of how the universe originated and/or a so-called 'Theory of Everything' which effectively makes a supernatural, first cause redundant. When, in fact, it is a Theory of absolutely Nothing,
it doesn't even deserve to be called a theory.
And then why have the barefaced cheek to accuse anyone who challenges atheist, naturalist fantasies or questions the scientific credibility of abandoning natural laws and scientific principles with such airy fairy, mythological fables, as indulging in pseudoscience and advocating a "god of the gaps?"
The ONLY motivation atheists have for dismissing and opposing natural laws and scientific principles, concerning origins, is an ideological one. It is nothing whatsoever to do with science or logic. It is ONLY to do with trying to preserve their religious devotion to naturalism. So, stop pretending it is science.
Atheism has nothing to do with science. The fact that atheists deliberately abandon natural laws and scientific principles in ALL of their proposed origin scenarios, just because they are inconvenient to their naturalist ideology, actually makes atheism - anti-science.
Put simply - I respect natural laws and the fundamental principle of the scientific method. And I present a logical argument for the origin of everything, simply on that basis.
Whereas - you reject and hate natural laws and the fundamental principle of the scientific method as far as they relate to origins.
And you live in the vain and contradictory hope that somehow, someday, someone will present a 'scientific' argument for the origin of everything which can ignore or refute natural laws and basic scientific principles. In the meantime, you are quite willing to consider any hair-brained unscientific idea or fantasy that supports your naturalistic beliefs, regardless of whether they violate natural laws, in preference to any logical argument that respects them.
And you refer to my logical argument based on natural laws and scientific principles as the 'god of the gaps'. The 'gaps' are only created by your fantastical belief and wishful thinking that natural laws will someday be shown not to apply.
So who is indulging in pseudoscience? I think the answer to that is obvious.
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Silly Deity 2y
Truth in science
So......................................back to familiar territory yet again with strawman arguments and ad hominem atttacks.
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~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!) did NOT present the multiverse as a cause. If you actually bothered to read his response you would have realised that he was saying nothing of the sort.
You plainly DON'T respect the scientific method otherwise you would present evidence to support your claims. You consistently fail to do that.
Your rant simply confirms the caricature in my image. Talk about life imitating art!
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Aimless Alliterations PRO 2y
"Life imitating art!" He, he. Love it!!!!
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Truth in science 2y
Silly Deity
If you had actually bothered to read my comment properly you would know that I didn't accuse him of presenting the multiverse as a ‘cause'.
I asked: "So why do atheists continuously present such unscientific nonsense as a 'multiverse', or the universe from nothing without a cause, as 'science'?"
In fact, the only reason that atheists invent such bizarre, origin scenarios as; a multiverse - or a universe from nothing, is to avoid having to explain a cause.
They think they can hoodwink the public into believing they are credible explanations of how everything could come into existence from nothing, without needing an adequate cause.
The scientific fact that every natural occurrence and entity requires an adequate cause is absolutely fatal to atheist, naturalist beliefs. So, atheists are compelled to waste their lives trying to devise origin scenarios which they think can fool people into believing that everything CAN come from nothing without a cause. Unfortunately for them, every sensible person, who is not indoctrinated with atheist pseudoscience, knows it CAN'T.
The amazing thing is, that you and the other 2 stooges, on here actually fall for such nonsense and think it is credible science.
Atheists even have the cheek to rip off theist arguments to try to silence any opposition. Such as the theist argument that ("to ask what caused God? is an invalid question, because the first cause - by virtue of being first - could have no preceding cause"). Atheists cynically apply a similar concept (in disguise) to their naturalistic fantasies - i.e. "to ask what caused the universe to arise from nothing? is an invalid question. It is like asking what is north of the North Pole?" Which of course anyone with any sense knows it isn't. To ask - what caused any and every natural occurrence or entity? Is not only a valid question, it is also an essential question. A question which true science demands we ask.
The only way atheist, naturalist beliefs can be true, is if natural laws and the basic principle behind the scientific method are not true and valid.
So, there is a straight choice between supporting atheism - OR supporting science and natural law. You can't do both...
Which do you choose?
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Silly Deity 2y
Truth in science
Let me translate what you've just stated:
I've repeatedly dodged providing evidence to support the initial claim that I made.
Instead I've quoted one of the individuals who questioned the validity of my claim and then turned that into a straw man argument by distorting his question to give the impression I was refuting his argument, while actually refuting an argument which was not advanced by him in the first place.
I know that this was pointed out to me but I flatly deny that I've done this and will now repeat that self-same straw man (incorporating sweeping generalisations).
Now having tried to wriggle out of that I'll make some bizarre and inaccurate statements about science and throw in some ad hominem attacks for good measure as that's something I like to do.
I'll round it off with a false dichotomy which results in me once more dodging the fact that I've no evidence to support my original claim and tries to hide that I'm talking absolute bullshit.
Yes. Life imitating art it most certainly is. I posted that image little realising how accurate it was but true to form "Truth in pseudoscience" you have repeatedly confirmed its accuracy.
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Truth in science 2y
~~badBADpenny~~ (read profile !!)
You have produced no logical or scientific justification for atheism. Whereas I have presented a logical argument based on natural law and scientific principles for theism which should satisfy any reasonable person. Furthermore, I have presented a logical argument as to why atheist naturalism is unscientific nonsense. I don’t expect you, or any other died-in-the-wool atheist to accept it, because atheism is an insidious and deceptive cult, which attempts to indoctrinate the public through relentless hype and propaganda.
Here is some good news for any theists reading this. All atheist arguments are easily demolished. Not because I, or any other theist, is exceptionally clever, but because atheism is based on lies and deceit. Once people realise that, it becomes obvious that there will be major flaws in EVERY atheist argument. It is then a simple matter, for anyone interested in truth, to expose them.
Atheism is claimed to be the scientific viewpoint and supporter of science. That is the great deception of the modern age.
What is the truth?
Science is based on looking for adequate causes of EVERY natural happening or entity AND on making predictions and assessments about the natural world, based on the validity of natural laws.
Atheism is based on ignoring the fact that EVERY natural happening or entity requires an adequate cause, not just ignoring it, but even actively opposing it. Atheism is about looking for, and hoping to find, non-causes and inadequate causes.
Atheism is also against the scientific method, of making assessments and predictions based on the validity of natural laws, and in favour of rejecting and challenging the validity of natural laws.
Your argument that we just don’t know whether causality or any other natural laws existed before the start of the universe, is not a valid argument for atheism. Even if it was a sensible argument, the very best that could be said of it, is that it is an argument for agnosticism. Not knowing (agnosticism) is a neutral position, it is not an argument for or against theism or for or against atheism. If you claim to be in the ‘don’t know’ camp and are a genuine agnostic, you have to sit firmly on the fence - you have no right to ridicule and lambast theists who believe that causality and natural laws are universally valid and by the same token you cannot ridicule atheism. You are clearly not a genuine agnostic, because you come down firmly on the side of atheism made evident by the fact that you support ‘silly deities’ posts and photostream which attacks theism. That is not a ‘don’t know’ (agnostic) position.
The argument for atheism cannot be simply based on ‘not knowing’ whether the law of cause and effect and other natural laws existed prior to the universe. Atheism depends on a definite rejection of causality and natural laws at the beginning of the material realm.
And that argument also reveals atheists as gross hypocrites.
When Stephen Hawking declared to the world: “Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing” atheists applauded and crowed about ‘science’ making God redundant. How come they didn’t criticise him for claiming he knew the law of gravity pre-existed the universe? Apparently, Hawking KNEW the law of gravity existed, but decided that the law of cause and effect and other natural laws didn’t exist. What happened to the: “we just don’t know what laws existed before the universe or Big Bang” argument on that occasion? Unbelievable hypocrisy! Which effectively demolishes the bogus atheist argument that “we don’t know what laws existed”. What atheists actually mean to say is that: “we know that laws which support our argument did exist, but we don’t know that laws which destroy our argument existed”.
As I said before:
The only way atheist, naturalist beliefs can be true, is if natural laws and the basic principle behind the scientific method are not true and valid.
So there is a straight choice between supporting atheism - OR supporting the universal validity of science and natural law. You can't do both...
__________________________________________
Silly Deity 2y
Truth in science
I'll make this very simple "Truth in pseudoscience"
You made a claim.
The scientific method requires that you provide evidence for your claim. That is a fundamental scientific principle.
Logical argument is not evidence. Particularly when such arguments are logical fallacies. For example I could state the following:
1. Some men are doctors.
2. Some doctors are women.
3. Therefore, some men are women.
Logically that is correct, however it is patently wrong. In order to prove it true I would have to provide evidence. That is the problem with your arguments. Arguments are not evidence. You may think they are logical but they fail because they are logical fallacies and because you provide no EVIDENCE to support your claim.
Everything else you've stated (the straw man arguments, the reversal of burden of proof, the ad hominem attacks, the quoting the phrase "natural laws" ad nauseum) is merely you dodging for the umpteenth time the fact that you have no evidence to support your claim.
I'll repeat, the scientific method requires that you provide evidence for your claim. That is a fundamental scientific principle.
EVIDENCE
EVIDENCE
SHOW US THE EVIDENCE
Your failure to grasp this and the nature of your responses simply reinforces the satire contained in the original image.
________________________________________
Truth in science 2y
Silly Deity
Your comments are as pathetic as your original image.
Your ridiculous image, which you seem to be so proud of, is a straw man portrayal of a Christian, which bears no relationship whatsoever to any Christian I know, or know of. It is nothing more than a crude and offensive stereotype which exists only in the imagination of atheist ideologues and zealots. I have shown it to be entirely false. I have shown that theism is based on eminently reasonable arguments and that it is atheism that is unreasonable nonsense with NO credible, logical or scientific argument Furthermore I have not mentioned, nor have I needed to mention, anyone being condemned to hell.
As for your stupid example of a logical argument, it bears no comparison to my logical argument.
Science uses natural laws to predict and assess the answers to questions, that is all science can do. It cannot make predictions or assessments based on the idea that natural laws are not valid. My logical argument is the ONLY possible assessment based on the validity of natural laws and the basic principle of the scientific method. if you think that is wrong, once again, I challenge you to give a logical or scientific argument against it?
My evidence is that natural laws can be observed, and tested by repeated experiment and have been shown to be valid in all known circumstances - AND that scientific research cannot even be carried out without an acknowledgement that we can expect every natural occurrence to have an adequate cause. I cite the known and tested universality of natural laws and scientific principles as my evidence.
My evidence is the fact that science and natural law supports my logical argument for a supernatural, first cause and definitively rejects the notion of a natural, first cause. It couldn't be clearer than that.
My argument is based on things we know, ALL atheist arguments are based on fantasy - what ifs, maybes, what we don't know and are never likely to know.
_________________________________________
Aimless Alliterations PRO 2y
So your evidence is...........just a repeat of you saying you're right and everyone else is wrong? You don't seem to get what the scientific method requires of those who make claims.
A central theme of science and scientific method is that all evidence must be empirical, or at least empirically based, that is, it should depend on evidence or results that can be observed by our senses. Scientific statements are subject to and derived from our experience or observations and empirical data is based on both observations and experiment results.
Not one of your statements refers to empirical evidence of a supernatural being.
____________________________________________
Silly Deity 2y
Aimless Alliterations
Thanks for that. It saves me the trouble of having to explain the concept of evidence yet again to our scientifically-challenged "friend".
"Truth in pseudoscience" The example of flawed logic I provided you with was just that - an example. You appear to have some difficulty understanding that trying to prove an argument through the use of logic is always going to fail if you use flawed logic. Your repeated use logical fallacies simply illustrates this.
Your constant ad hominem attacks when you are accused of such behavour are further examples of logical fallacies. So my comments are far from pathetic......they are an uncannily accurate reflection of the satire contained in the original image.
If you can't see that, then that's your problem and I think we can safely say this debate is at an end.
___________________________________________
Aimless Alliterations PRO 2y
Yes. For someone who claims to use science to supposedly support his claims there appears to be some pretty fundamental gaps in "Truth in pseudoscience's" knowledge of science and scientific principles.
Something that's reflected in all of his bizarre claims.
__________________________________________
Mark 2y
@"Truth in science" and pretty much everyone too..
1. Your wish thinking does not work as advertised. (unlikely headline: prayer meeting ends world hunger)
2. Your convoluted blathering is only a neon sign to the above.
3. As a person raised on the secular ideals of the U.S. I can not support any leader who is not answerable to the rest of us, so "worship" is totally out of the question.
(even the "inalienable rights" line proves the plastic nature of a simple deist assumption of a god's nature, let alone one who takes more license)
4. I'm disappointed that anyone gives you the time of day, as your kind need not be eliminated but simply left to wither away.
____________________________________________
The debate ended with the comment by atheist 'Mark' above.
I didn't think there was any point in continuing, as the arguments were already becoming repetitive.
I think I am justified in concluding that this debate (as many others) demonstrated that the atheist belief in naturalism - and the belief that there was no adequate, infinite, first cause of everything temporal - is bankrupt. It is bankrupt because it relies completely on natural laws not being universally valid. Atheist HAVE TO dismiss natural laws, because they are fatal to their ideology of naturalism. To dismiss natural laws is not scientific, we depend on the reliability of natural laws to make scientific predictions. We cannot practice science without trusting in natural laws. So, atheism, in seeking to debunk natural laws, is exposed as ANTI-SCIENCE.
The image posted by Silly Deity with the original debate can be seen here:
Babylon: Its Coming Destruction!
by N. W. Hutchings
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Scriptures speak of two Babylons: Babylon and Mystery Babylon. It could be concluded that Babylon was the original Babylon over which Nebuchadnezzar reigned, and Mystery Babylon the Iraq of today.
Another more plausible explanation is that Babylon is, of course, the Babylon of 600 B.C. that was a world empire, and it is also the one that destroyed the Temple and took the Jews into captivity. However, Mystery Babylon appears at the end of the age as we see the revival of the Roman Empire in the European Union within a world system, a New World Order, touted through international entities like the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Club of Rome, Council on Foreign Relations, NAFTA, GATT, WTO, etc., and even includes the Roman Catholic Church and the ecclesiastical leadership of most of the non-Catholic denominations. Other than 3 million Israelis in Israel, the Jew is still captive in the world. Therefore, it would seem logical that Mystery Babylon is the one-world system in its tripart identification: political, economic, and ecclesiastical. It would appear that the titular head of the system will be the person who will sit in the Temple of God on Mt. Moriah and claim to be the Messiah.
We read in Revelation 13:7 that this person, called the Son of Perdition and the Antichrist, will have power over all races, nations, and languages-this will be total political power over the earth. In Revelation 13:8 we read that everyone who is not a saved person during the Tribulation will worship this world dictator as a god. This will be total religious and ecclesiastical power. According to Revelation 13:12, there will be a high priest of the false religious system, but this ecclesiastic will be part of the beast system and preach that everyone should submit to the religious authority of the Antichrist. We also read in Revelation 13:15-17 that it be mandated by the Son of Perdition that any person who does not worship him as the "messiah," in order to get a mark and number, will be killed. This is total economic power.
The old Babylon, at least today, could not possibly fulfill the prophetic destruction described in Revelation 18. However, what about the destruction prophesied for the literal city of Babylon on the Euphrates River?
According to all archaeological reports found in numerous biblical dictionaries and encyclopedias, the Babylon (or Babel) founded by Nimrod and later ruled over by Hammurabi, encompassed 200 square miles. The city was protected by a double wall, with the great wall being 344 feet high and 86 feet wide. Chariot races were held on the wall, and in times of danger, troops could be swiftly moved to points of attack. The city was so big 25 bronze gates were in the wall on each side. In numerous prophetic scriptures in the Old Testament, the ultimate destruction of Babylon, just as Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed, is to come swiftly. Most biblical references claim that this was fulfilled when the armies of the Medes and Persians in about 540 B.C. diverted the Euphrates River and marched into the city under the walls. While the account of the fall of Babylon to Medo-Persia did, according to Daniel 5, happen in one day, it certainly was not destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrah. The city was only slightly damaged by the Medes and Persians because its fall happened so suddenly.
Babylon remained an important city during the 200 years of the Persian Empire. It was also an important political and commercial metropolis during the Grecian Empire. Alexander the Great died in Babylon in 320 B.C. When the Jews were allowed to return during the time of the Persian Empire, many remained in Babylon. At the time of Jesus Christ there were still 25,000 Jews in Babylon. Jesus commissioned Paul to take the Gospel to the Gentiles, and Peter was to go to the circumcision (Israelites). In carrying out this responsibility, we know that Peter did preach the Messianic Gospel to the Jews in Babylon in A.D. 63 (1 Pet. 5:13). The opinion of some that the Babylon referred to in this scripture was Rome is ridiculous.
With the decline of the Roman Empire the city of Babylon was not that important to world trade and commerce. Political, religious, and economic centers moved eastward and westward. Many of the beautiful bricks were carried off to be used in construction projects in Baghdad, Damascus, and cities of the decathlon. However, this was such a huge metropolis that the majority of the buildings and walls remained to be covered up with the sands of the Euphrates River and the blowing sands of the Middle East. The decline of Babylon was a slow process that occurred over a thousand years. There was no sudden destruction of Babylon, nor was it destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrah.
There was considerable activity by German archaeologists during and after World War I. However, this activity was more of a nature of archaeological pillage, and certainly not reconstruction. The top 100 feet of the Ishtar Gate at Babylon was removed brick-by-brick and reassembled at the Pergamum Museum in Berlin. After the Germans, the French and English pillaged the ruins of Babylon under the sand. Many of the Babylonian artifacts are piled in the basement of the British Museum in London where there is so much junk from around the world that it probably will never be cataloged.
In 1971, UNESCO announced that it would help Iraq completely restore the ancient city of Babylon. The reconstruction would be under the general supervision of Saddam Hussein, who made his appearance in 1969 as the Iraqi strongman by hanging eight Jews on the streets of Baghdad as a warning for others to hit-the-road elsewhere. In 1978, 1 led a Southwest Radio Church tour of 103 to Iraq. One of the sites we visited was Babylon. There was a four-lane highway between Baghdad and Babylon with brick factories along the way turning out bricks for this tremendous reconstruction project. On one end of the brick was the name Nebuchadnezzar, and on the other end was the name Saddam Hussein who, then and now, envisions himself as a modern Nebuchadnezzar to restore the glory that was once Babylon's.
In spite of the 10-year suicidal war with Iran which began in 1980, Hussein continued the restoration project. In 1987 the rebuilding of the temples, the palaces, and the gardens had proceeded to a point where a month's Babylonian festival was set to declare to the world that Babylon had been restored to its former glory, and a new Nebuchadnezzar has been resurrected, or at least his spirit now lived in Saddam Hussein. To reference a story that appeared in the January 16, 1987, edition of the Los Angeles Times, Hussein appointed as marshal of the festival a musician by the name of Bashir, who invited famous musicians and personalities from around the world-the very best talent possible-to participate in the Grand Festival. In the invitations sent out to musicians, dancers, opera singers, movie stars, kings, queens, etc., a specific invitation was extended to Madonna, the sleazy rock singer, because as was noted, she lives in the heart of all Iraqi people.
It is not known exactly how the Babylonian Festival turned out, but we would presume it fared some better than Belshazzar's affair. In any event, the long war with Iran left Hussein short of funds to complete the rebuilding process, so in 1990 he invaded oil rich Kuwait. President Bush, along with the New World Order proponents, concluded that if Hussein got away with this take-away, he would also move to include Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the other oil-producing fields in the Middle East. Then, as we read in Daniel 3, the world's leaders would have to come to him and fall down and worship his golden image.
All these plans were foreshadowed in the Babylonian Festival where he placed his huge portrait beside a replica of the Ishtar Gate; he commanded a world festival to convene in Babylon; he intended to prove God a liar, and he announced that Madonna lived in the heart of the Iraqi people. Mea Domina, Madonna, in Latin corresponds in meaning to Semiramis in the Chaldean-Goddess of Heaven. So, Mea Domina, Madonna, or Semiramis indeed is worshiped by Iraqis. Semiramis constructed the first huge obelisk (phallic symbol) in honor of her late husband, Nimrod. According to tradition, she conceived a son by Nimrod after he was dead. Semiramis named him Tammuz, Son of Heaven, and he was worshiped by some of the women of Israel who were captives in Babylon (Ezek. 8:14). This past year Madonna, the movie star, said she just had to have a child, so she did have one even though she was not married. Perhaps she was destined to fulfill the type. However, any connection between Mea Domina (Semiramis) and Mary, the mother of Jesus, is of pure Catholic invention.
President Bush based his hopes on a combined alliance of nations to stop Saddam Hussein. He announced on an international television network on September 11, 1990:
A new partnership of nations has emerged...Out of these troubled times, a New World Order can emerge...A hundred generations have searched for this elusive path to peace, while a thousand wars raged across the span of human endeavor Today that new world is struggling to be born...a world where the rule of law supplants the rule of the jungle; a world in which nations recognize the shared responsibility for freedom and justice; a world where the strong respect the rights of the weak...This is the vision I shared with President Gorbachev in Helsinki.
The subsequent effort to divest Saddam Hussein of his Kuwaiti dream was 90 percent the United States; 9 percent England; and 1 percent the other 37 nations. However, all members of the alliance were represented in some way, even though they may have only sent a symbolic firecracker. And President Bush, who was the idol of the free world in just six months, became one of the most unpopular presidents in the history of the United States, and was replaced by an unknown womanizing Arkansawyer, showing just how fickle is the uncertainty of the human mind.
The scenario for the Desert Storm/New World Order war was prophesied by Isaiah. We read in Isaiah 13:1, 4-5: "The burden of Babylon... The noise of a multitude in the mountains, like as of a great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of nations gathered together: the LORD of hosts musters the host of the battle. They come from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the LORD, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land."
In January 1991, representative armies from five continents, 39 nations, came with loud weapons to destroy the ability of Iraq to make war. Did it happen? No! Did the Bible say it would happen? No! Why? It was not God's time. However, what did it signify? We read in verse 6: "Howl ye; for the day of the LORD is at hand; it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty."
Even though the military capability of Saddam Hussein was not destroyed, it signaled that the Great and Terrible Day of the Lord, the Great Tribulation, was near. Following verse 6 is an interlude until we get to verse 19 in the Day of the Lord: 'And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldea's' excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah."
Babylon will be destroyed in an overwhelming judgment of fire, but it will be in the Tribulation, which may be near, but not now. This is why we see Saddam Hussein continuing to be such a problem today, and also why it defies reason, human or inhuman, as to why the job was not completed in 1991.
Now why would, from a New World Order viewpoint, this reconstructed city be destroyed, perhaps by an H-bomb? We keep hearing about the germ factories that Hussein has, but so do other nations. Why is the U.N. so concerned ,about the germs that Hussein owns? According to the February 4, 1998, edition of the Near East Report, both the Washington Post and New York Times have confirmed that U.N. inspectors uncovered a 1995 agreement between Russia and Iraq whereby Russia would give Hussein factories to produce huge quantities of biological weapons. Inspectors also uncovered evidence that the machinery had already been delivered, then the Russian government, evidently with the knowledge of Boris Yeltsin, lied about it. This caused grave concern in the Pentagon. Biological warfare is just not the same anymore. I refer to pages 41-45 of the book The New Creators:
At least twenty years ago Congress was warned to place government restrictions on microbiological experimentation. The April 1, 1977, edition of Time reported in part:
"Appearing before a Senate subcommittee ...HEW Secretary Joseph Caliban asked Congress to impose federal restrictions on recombinant DNA research, a new form of genetic inquiry involving E. coli ....DNA with the DNA of plants, animals, and other bacteria. By this process, they may well be creating forms of life different from any that exist on earth....What would happen, they ask, if by accident or design, one variety of re-engineered E. coli proved dangerous? By escaping from the lab and multiplying...it could find its way into human intestines and cause baffling diseases...Calder's biology chairman, Robert Sunshine, concludes: 'Biologists have become, without wanting it, the custodians of great and terrible power It is idle to pretend otherwise.'"
That the AIDS virus could have been the result of mutations resulting from genetic engineering experiments seems to be the insinuation of Karl Johnson of the National Institute of Health, quoted on page 603 of The Coming Plague:
"I worry about all this research on virulence. It's only a matter of months--years, at most--before people nail down the genes for virulence and airborne transmission of influenza, Ebola, Lassa, you name it. And then any crackpot with a few thousand dollars' worth of equipment and a college biology education under his belt could manufacture what would make Ebola look like a walk around the park."
Microbes and viruses can be genetically re-engineered now to cause any number of new and deadly diseases. Jesus said that disease epidemics would be a judgment in the last days, and we read of the boils that would affect men on earth during the Tribulation. There are at least 30 references to pestilences in the books of the prophets, and many of these are in a Tribulation setting. Hussein has played games with the U.N. inspectors, and through trickery keeps moving his deadly pets from one location to the next.
A news report from Jerusalem titled "Saddam Hiding Bio-Weapons Under Babylon?" dated March 9,1998, is interestingly related to our subject:
German newspapers this week published new disclosures on Iraq's military capabilities. The Daily Bold reported that Saddam Hussein has hidden a large supply of nerve gas and biological weapons beneath the ruins of ancient Babylon, on the assumption that the United States would not dare to bomb the archaeological and historical site.
A few weeks ago I watched an imagined scenario on television where the inhabitants of a town had been infected with a deadly new virus for which no vaccine could be found. In order to save the country, the military was ordered to obliterate the town and its inhabitants to save the rest of the nation and, perhaps, the world.
The biblical scenario in Isaiah 13 and Jeremiah 50-52 specifically state that God uses the nations to bring judgment against Babylon. Could Israel, the United States, or some other nation drop nuclear bombs and missiles on Babylon if it meant saving other nations? Yes! Would this fulfill the biblical prophecy that Babylon will be destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrah? Yes!
We read in Ezekiel 29 that Egypt will be so desolated that even a dog will not be able to walk over the land for 40 years. This indicates nuclear destruction. However, we continue to read that Egypt will be in the midst of the nations that will be desolated.
No better close to this article can be found than 2 Peter 3:9-14: "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, Looking for and hastening unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. Wherefore beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot, and blameless.
April 1998, vol. 5. No. 4 Keeping Time On God's Prophetic Clock L-838.
Copyright 1998 by Southwest Radio Church.
BRENDA HOLLOWAY INTERVIEW - Brenda was friends with the Late Tammi Terrell who
she mentions in this interview.
conducted on October 13th 1997 at Brenda's Los Angeles home by Andrew Rix
Brenda Holloway - Andy Rix interview
Well I started out as a dancer with my sister. I was interested in singing but I didn't know...
October 30, 2001 By Andy Rix, in Soul Music Articles,
BRENDA HOLLOWAY INTERVIEW
conducted on October 13th 1997 at Brenda's Los Angeles home by Andrew Rix
AR: The logical place to start is at the beginning. We know you were born on June 21st 1946 in Atascadera, had a younger brother and sister - Wade and Patrice, and at
some point moved to Watts.
BH: I was born on June 26th and moved to Watts when I was two years old.
AR: What can you tell us about your childhood, particularly your dreams and aspirations, and how you became interested in music.
BH: Well, when I was an infant I used to cry a lot and my mother used to put on the stereo. That was the only throguen_storiesing that would make me quiet, listening
to music, not anyone talking to me, or patting me, or trying to calm me down, only music would calm me down. I would listen to Dinah Washington and B.B. King so maybe
I developed an ear for music when I was an infant.
AR: What opportunities did you receive in the early days that led you to follow a career in music.
BH: Well, support from my teachers. I had a teacher who used to take me out of school to the colleges because I was a violinist at first. I started studying the violin
when I was seven years old and the music teachers would always be interested in me because I played the violin, sort of like a gypsy, with a gypsy flare. So they used
to take me to USC which is not too far from here, but it was kind of far from Watts, about 10 miles, from here it's about 10 minutes. At USC I would go to the lessons
and they respected my talent even though I didn't really know I had a talent. All I knew was that I liked the violin. Going back into my background I have Hispanic and
as you know they are known for playing the violin. That's probably where I picked up wanting to play because nobody in my family liked it infact they used to make me
practice in the backyard. There would be me, the dogs and the violin and they would howl because the sound of the instrument would make them mad. So I used to practice
for about an hour and then people would say "Brenda it's time to go in 'cos we can't take it anymore" so I was always trying to find a place to rehearse and I would
complain to my teachers. They would take me away, out of Watts, to go and study. My mother used to have a boyfriend and he would take me out for auditions. They had an
audition for a violin player, they had 500 people from all of the schools in southern California and they picked only 107. There was only 7 blacks out of the whole 500
and I was one. If the insurance man used to come in the house I would sing for him or if the neighbours came I would sing for them so I was always known for my music
and singing. My mother always made sure I had the money to go for my lessons and she always pushed me, she'd say "nothing can hold you back, you can do anything you
just have to be faithful and just believe". My mother didn't have any colour barriers, she didn't feel you should be held back because of your race, if your gift could
make room for you and you were prepared so she used to say "get out there and do your best".
AR: Would you say that your mother guided your initial interest.
BH: We had a lady across the street from us and she was into gospel. I wasn't in the Church as a little girl, I was close to God but I didn't really want to be in the
Church because I felt you would have to stop everything, I didn't understand God, that he would want you to do your best at everything. I was in Church but I was
scared to get totally into it so she would take me out to sing in Church and then Hal Davis came on the scene and Marc Gordon, when I was in high school, and they are
the ones who got me involved in Rock&Roll, cutting, doing backgrounds. That's how I got into R&B with Hal Davis and he introduced me to Berry Gordy.
AR: When did you decide to make singing and performing a career.
BH: At 5 years old
AR: Was there anyone who influenced this decision.
BH: I would always see people on TV and I would always tell my family that that was gonna be me. They used to say "please Brenda get out of the way of the TV cos we
can't see". I was fascinated with television just to look at the people that were singing like Mahalia Jackson, I can't remember in particular but when I saw people
singing I would always say that's gonna be me. I always loved music.
AR: When you decided to make it a career and you actually got into performing how easy was it for you to get work.
BH: Well I started out as a dancer with my sister. I was interested in singing but I didn't know if I really had it. If you're raised in a place like Watts or maybe in
a ghetto everybody can sing. You could get a bum off the street or out of the liquor store - they could all sing. I didn't know my own potential but when I'd sing
people would say "we like your voice", so I always got a good response. I didn't know how individual I was 'cos I'd sing Mary Wells things and I tried to sound like
her, Diana Ross things and so on. I tried to sing like everybody but there was always a sadness in my voice and my sadness came from a lot of childhood stuff because I
was always a loner. I didn't play with dolls, I didn't do any of those things because music was an outlet for me, it was the way I handled a lot of my personal
sadness. I was basically an introvert, I didn't mingle with my sister and brother, I was just into music and doing my own thing.
AR: Did you intend to be a solo singer or did you have any thoughts at the beginning to be in partnership with Patrice.
BH: I was gonna be a songwriter and help Patrice whenever she needed me because she was the first one that was chosen to sing. She had a hit here with 'Do the Del-
Viking', I was trying to be a part of it so I was the dancer.
AR: That song was written by you and Patrice and issued on Taste Records in July '63.
BH: I don't remember when. I can only recall when I started singing.
AR: The first issued recording of yours that we can trace is a song called 'Hey Fool' that came out on Donna Records in February 1962. What were the circumstances of
you getting this first recording contract.
BH: Well Hal and Marc were trying to place me. I was the oldest, Patrice was 12 and I was 17 or 18, so they were trying to place me cos I had a figure and they said
"you have a shape so you could probably get a deal". I didn't even know about the shape because everybody had everything that I had, so I said "I do ?". I felt like a
square 'cos I was into classical and like a classical musician I was focused on the instrument, that was the kind of mentality I had from a little girl I was focused
in on one thing. I couldn't care about the shape..I didn't know I had a figure or anything like that so Hal was trying to prepare me and that's how I got the deal. I
was always a team player and if Hal had a project and he'd say "can you help me write this song" I'd say "sure" so I got the opportunity because I was easy to work
with .
AR: Was the song 'Hey Fool' taken from your first recording session as a solo artist.
BH: I think that was maybe my one and only song, We didn't have a lot of money. I don't think I had an album it was just like a one time thing and then I started
writing from that point. That was my initial introduction into writing .
AR: How did you feel when you went into the studio the first time.
BH: Everybody was there with me, I think Hal was on background, I just felt like a studio musician. you learn your lyrics and you sing it to the best of your ability.
I didn't really feel special it was just a job, I wasn't too excited about it. I didn't actually know it was going to be put out we were just trying to get a deal.
AR: According to my research you had three records released at Donna.
BH: What were they.
AR: 'Hey Fool' recorded in January '62 with 'Echo' on the flip side.
BH: I liked 'Echo'.
AR: 'Game of Love'.
BH: I don't remember 'Game of Love'
AR: We've never seen it and can't find anybody with a copy.
BH: Now that we're going back I can kind of remember it but I liked 'Echo' because I was starting to go into my own type of writing that I liked to do.
AR: Yes you wrote that Patrice and K. Harris.
BH: Ken Harris.
AR: 'Game of Love' had the flip side 'Echo Echo Echo' and the third single was 'I'll give my life', written by Robert Jackson, and the flip was 'More Echo' so 'Echo'
was obviously very popular. There are unconfirmed reports of two other singles on Del-Fi, one by 'The Sisters' and the other by 'The Wattasians'.
BH: 'The Wattasians', yes I was a part of that group. We were like a group of people where all of our product was coming from, we just used different names but we were
all part of one stable, the same organisation, we were trying to just get a hit. The Wattasians were girls from Watts, that's how we got the name, we had one lady who
became Eleanor Rigby, she worked with Gene Page, and was in Alaska doing a lot of work but I remember her because she was so heavy. We used to buy these clothes out of
little cheap shops, like a 99c store, we used to have to buy two dresses, cut them down the middle, and sow them together and that would make her one dress. Her real
name was Priscilla Kennedy and she was a very very talented musician.
AR: If I remind you what they were can you tell me how much success you achieved with the pre-Motown singles. There's the three we've just mentioned on Donna then you
had a single with Hal Davis as 'Hal & Brenda called 'It's you' flipped with 'Unless I have you' that came out on Minasa and Snap Records.
BH: They were local hits and may have sold some in the East, they were creating interest and making us popular back here in L.A. . We were just coming out with songs
that were making noise and making hits. Patrice's was the biggest but we were getting known in L.A. and we would do the record hops and were getting popular but I
didn't have that real big one until I got with Motown. People knew us here because we were in the publics eye a lot.
AR: The next one was 'I'm gonna make you mine' and 'I never knew you looked so good til I quit you' which you cut with Jess Harris for Brevit Records released in June
1963.
BH: I remember them, I liked singing with Jessie he had a good voice. Can you imagine a title like 'I never knew you looked so good til I quit you', in those days we
could sing what we really believed in because we didn't know the mechanics of writing, what we felt we penned it and put music to it and put it out.
AR: The next track was 'I get a feeling' flipped with 'I want a boyfriend (girlfriend)' that came out on In-Sound Records locally and then Era Records nationally.
BH: I didn't know it went national, I mean I didn't know it was even on a national label.
AR: Well Era was the label that had Jewel Akens and Ketty Lester.
BH: Through that Ketty Lester association is how I met a writer called Ed Cobb.
AR: Robert Jackson, the other singer, I believe was the brother of Gloria Jones.
BH: Yes I think that was Gloria's brother.
AR: That takes us up to August 1963. The next one was Brenda Holloway & the Carrols.
BH: Really.
AR: 'I ain't gonna take you back'.
BH: I remember the title.
AR: It was flipped with 'You're my only love'. Now I'm not convinced that it's actually you singing. I think that this record, which was released in June 1964, three
months after your first Motown release, was put out as a cash-in. They probably only had one side so just used a filler on the flip.
BH: What was the label.
AR: Catch.
BH: I've never heard of that. I don't think that's me.
AR: So they are your pre-Motown's and from what you've said they were local hits. Going over those releases there are a number of names that crop up regularly Hal
Davis, Robert Jackson. We've said that 'Echo' was used on the first three 45's. Whose idea was it to use the other names as 'I want a boyfriend; was issued as 'Bonnie
& Clyde' .
BH: I think that was Hal's idea.
AR: Then the issue on Era was credited to 'The Soul Mates'.
BH: Maybe Robert was tied up to another contract and didn't want to use his name.
AR: Hal seems to be the common thread through all of those releases. Was he always beside you at that time.
BH: Yes.
AR: Patrice's record 'Do the Del-Viking' was released in July '63 and by this time you'd already made six records.
BH: Well evidently they didn't sell.
AR: You co-wrote 'Del-Viking' with Patrice and used to dance for Patrice when she performed the song, we would assume as sisters you enjoyed a close relationship so
what part did each of you play in establishing the other as an artist and at that time when you were working together did you perform or record as a duo.
BH: Well we were very close as a family and were raised in a single parent home, my mother was very strong and believed in the family. We even sang at the dinner table
and could talk in harmony. We were a musical family. We were always taught to help each other and stick closely together and I love Patrice, she's my baby-sister.
Patrice had a very strong business-head, I'm more of an artist, she was very focused on the business side and I was looking at it as being an artist and getting my
product out, getting my feelings out there. So we pushed each other and we would do anything for each other and when I broke with my big hit I'd got the title and
everything came to me. I'd got the title but I'm not a lyricist I'm a melody person, a feeling person, I can tell you my feelings and you can put words to it so she
worked very closely with me to help establish me as an artist and vica-versa, we enjoyed each other. She was more business-like so she got more jobs than me, I'd do
jobs for free but she would always want paying, she had two cars and I had one. At 21 she had lots of property and I just gave all my money to my mom. We helped each
other a lot in those days and we were very close. I knew that everything that I had would go to my family and she knew everything she had would go to buy property and
cars. She was practically a movie star because the 'Josie & the Pussycats' show was led by Patrice, she would go in there and handle her own deals whilst I would
always say "where's Hal, I don't want to talk to these people, I'll do whatever you say". We were totally different but sometimes she was too strong, she could be very
intimidating to people where people always liked me because I was so easy going.
AR: You were obviously very supportive but you never got to record together.
BH: We wanted to record together but it never worked like that. People always pull you in the direction they want you to go, where they want to see you. At first we
would always listen to Hal but when Patrice got a few breaks she went out on her own, she got her deal at Capitol but I stayed with Hal and he got me the deal at
Motown.
AR: How important was Hal to your career.
BH: He was the person who started everything, except for the grooming which my mother looked after, but he was the vehicle that I used to get all of my deals.
AR: When did you meet up with Ed Cobb, was it when you entered your Motown period.
BH: Hal met him, I think it was earlier than when you're talking about. You remember the Ketty Lester association, 'Love letters', he did that with her and Hal knew
Ketty. Ed had a song for her but Ketty didn't like it. The song was 'Every little bit hurts' and they loved it for me but I didn't like it but Hal was the one who got
it to Motown. Hal knew a guy called Jack Eskew who knew Berry personally and when they came here to Los Angeles for the DJ convention in '63, I think, Hal set it up
and I sang and sang and sang for hours. There were a group of men that came in and I was singing Mary Wells songs, I was supposed to meet Berry and I'd been singing
for about four hours when these men came in. There was this little short man and he was cute, I didn't know who he was, I was just singing but I was getting tired and
was getting ready to go home. You know I'd been singing since 10 o'clock and now it was 4 o'clock and I wanted to meet Berry but I said to Hal "I'm gonna go home
because I'm tired". Then they all left the room, Hal included, then this little short man comes out and says "I am Berry Gordy" well I almost choked, he said "I like
you, I like the way you look, I like the way you sound and I want to sign you up". I told Hal " you go home and get my mother and you tell her she better let me sign
this contract". So they got her and she was all dressed up, actually I think I went home to get her. I used to believe in the horoscope and I'd read the paper that day
and it said "today is a good day" I said to my mother "you better let me sign this", you know my mother was like a sister we had a good relationship. We went back and
she signed for me and Berry said "there's one thing that all artists are told, you've got to graduate and when you do I'll put your record out". So I was in college
and I graduated and people were saying to me "you've got a record out" and I said "no I haven't" they said "you have got a record out, isn't your name Brenda Holloway"
I said "I think so". I still didn't believe them because I didn't have any communication with Berry while I was in High School. I recorded the songs here because I was
a West Coast artist and the offices they have now they established because they found me so they started recording their people there, they brought Detroit here. So I
never heard anything else, he never spoke to me again until I'd graduated, he put the record out, it could have been the day I graduated, because I was only at the
college a little while. Well one day I was at home and I was mopping, I'm always mopping.......
AR: You're moving a bit too quick for me because I wanted to ask you about the DJ Convention. Motown had a PR knack of creating fairytales about how it discovered its
artists, it's been written, that you apparently gatecrashed the DJ Convention dressed fit to kill in a gold pantsuit. Catching Berry Gordy's eye whilst miming to a
Mary Wells record and signing a contract before the day was out. Did this really happen as reported.
BH: Well all I can remember about the pantsuit was that it was tight and I had gold shoes to match. I was noticed when I walked in but Berry wasn't in the crowd, they
probably told him "there's a girl out there trying to sing, she's got a figure". My mother dressed me that day, I had all kinds of clothes so that particular day I
just picked something that was kind of glam and sexy, not that I knew what sexy was, I was only 17 years old, and everybody has a figure at 17. So I just put on some
high heel shoes and the gold pantsuit and everybody liked it...all the men. I wasn't miming to that song I was actually singing, it was 'My guy', I kept on singing it
over and over again for hours and hours and like I've told you Berry came to me and said "I like you".
AR: So how fast did that contract get signed.
BH: As soon as my mother got there. I wasn't going to leave without that contract being signed, it was probably an hour. I used to tell everybody that I was gonna get
on Motown and they would say "do you realise you're in Watts and Motown is in Detroit" so nobody believed me. When I got on Motown I was so excited I thought I was at
Disneyland I saw Stevie, Mary and Marvin....I was so happy. You know my mother was into clothes and her friends used to own dress shops so when I went to Motown I was
dressed out of the store and the women there said "she didn't come from the projects, what is her problem", I said "I don't have one". Berry would say "that's the girl
who always says the right thing" and the girls would be like "who is she, she's not from Detroit, she's got all these clothes like a movie star". I've never been into
clothes but my mother was and she would say "if your hair is good and your shoes are good whatever is in-between can be as cheap as I don't know what". When I went
there I had good shoes and everything matched and a lot of the girls started to copy me..when I first went I was so excited but they were like "who is she". I always
felt special because it's like having a large family of children and you decide to adopt, your gonna pick that child and mould them to how you want them to be. I felt
that Berry picked me, I was an adopted child and the other kids didn't understand me. It was like "why did our dad want her when he has us" and that was how they
treated me like "you've been adopted so you're not really part of the family". It made me feel funny because they used to talk about my clothes and being from
Hollywood. I could hear them when I went to the parties.
AR: Your arrival at Motown co-incided with the departure of Mary Wells.
BH: I was there for a little while before Mary left, she was still releasing records, she was doing some tours and we were actually on the Dick Clark tour when we
found out that Mary had left and then they started calling me in to cover her songs. She'd put them out but wasn't going to be there to do them so they wanted to make
sure they would be covered by an artist who was with the company so they picked me 'cos I always tried to sound like her anyway just to get in the doors at
Motown....but I always had that Brenda Holloway sound.
AR: Given that you actually recorded some of the songs that Mary had already done was there any suggestion, at that time, that you would be the new "first lady", the
Mary Wells replacement, and if so how did you feel about that.
BH: Everybody wanted that but there was one hinderance....Diana Ross......she decided that she was gonna be the "first lady". When we started on the Dick Clark tour
Berry negotiated that deal really well because he knew that the Supremes had hit potential so when they wanted me to go on the tour Berry kept on saying "I want the
Supremes to go" and Dick Clark said "but I want Brenda Holloway I don't want the Supremes". Berry said "I'll make you a deal, we're not gonna let Brenda go unless the
Supremes go", Dick Clark said "oh just send them". When we were on the road all their songs started selling, going up to a million, so they became the replacement for
Mary Wells and that's when I started having my problems as an artist.
AR: It's difficult not to mention Patrice, at this point, as press releases from the time announced that you had both been signed to Motown.
BH: I don't think Patrice was ever signed to Motown but the job that Suzanne de Passe has was a job that was created for my sister. You know Patrice got ill and she
was never able to take that position....she was business and instead of being an artist would have been better in administration.
AR: One of the first recordings we can actually trace, from March '64, is 'Come into my palace', a duet between you and Patrice. That song had already been recorded by
Lee & The Leopards and was recorded by the Supremes. It was obviously a hectic time for the pair of you but you're saying that Patrice never had a contract and we're
saying that we have evidence that she recorded tracks like 'For the love of Mike' and 'Stevie the boy of my dreams'.
BH: For Motown.
AR: Yes.
BH: I remember those songs. She probably did sign but she was never featured as a major artist for Motown. When I listen to the songs we were similar in sound, the
only thing that I'm really famous for that she wasn't is that I have a cry in my voice, a moan in my voice, and I don't know where I got that. It's a thing that's
similar to what Tony Braxton has in her voice also. If those songs of Patrice were on Motown then she did in fact sign.
AR: Did she actually physically work there.
BH: Yes she worked there but Berry was looking at her as more of an administrator...film making, a gigantic job , because he saw in her the potential and if she hadn't
gotten sick she would have functioned there very well.
AR: Is it theoretically possible that because she was there, on the premises, and they knew she could sing that she just might have done some demos.
BH: No I think he was considering her for an artist because I think those songs were released actually. Weren't they released.
AR: No they were never issued. 'For the love of Mike' was a song written by Smokey, and the Supremes did it, but that has never been issued.
BH: Well basically to my thinking she was doing demos then.
AR: There are three songs we know of, all from around that same period.
BH: Maybe she got sick before they could release the package on her, before they could do a total album on her.
AR: Do you recall the song 'Come into my palace' that you recorded with her. We haven't heard it.
BH: I don't remember it.
AR: Do you ever recall recording with her.
BH: Never.
AR: Your first Motown release was, of course, 'Every little bit hurts, from March 1964, written by Ed Cobb. I played you some rehearsal versions a few years ago....can
you recall the circumstances surrounding those sessions. Were they Motown sessions or were they intended to show your talents to Motown.
BH: They were cut for Motown as part of the project for my first album so 'Quality Control' could pick, Billie Jean and Janie Bradford could screen it and Berry..he
basically screened all of my material and then picked out the best ones. I didn't want to do 'Every little bit hurts', and I never wanted to do any of the songs that
were hits for me. I'd always get into big big fights over things that were gonna be hits for me. I don't have a feel for my own hits.
AR: The debut album must have been recorded very quickly because it came out only a couple of months after that first single. The single was released March '64, the
album June '64.
BH: My debut album..what songs were on that
AR: The album tracks were....(lists tracks).
BH: We did all that work in '63 I think. We started working on that album as soon as I signed but he didn't release it and he didn't talk to me until I graduated, and
then he put it all out. Hal Davis, Marc Gordon and Frank Wilson put that album together.
AR: So you didn't record all of that stuff in three months.
BH: I could have recorded it in three months because I had one of the best teams in showbusiness.
AR: How did you feel when you saw the album for the first time.
BH: I hated the cover. I hated the way I looked but when I first heard it it was okay..everybody loved it back then.
AR: So you weren't too thrilled.
BH: Well I loved the songs, I liked the songs that Hal picked because I was coming into my own style and I liked to work with Hal because he let me interpret the songs
the way I wanted to. I could have all the feeling, all the moans, a lot of times with the producers at Motown they would say "you do to many slurs..you slur too
much..you're the slur queen" and I would say "I don't like these people".
AR: You wrote a couple of tracks on the first album but what do you recall about those sessions. Did you have time to rehearse or was it a case of get in, get them
done and get out.
BH: If somebody wanted me to record a song I would live with it for about a week because I wanted to feel the song and know the song. I wanted to be able to put my
feeling in it. So it would take a week to learn the words and then I would record it in a few takes because I knew how I wanted to do it and if they'd used a bulldozer
they wouldn't be able to change my mind. Once I got a feel for it I interpreted it in the way that I wanted to do the song and through listening to all my favourite
female singers I would fit myself in the middle of them and the ladies who inspired me the most were Morgana King and Sarah Vaughan. I always liked ballads because of
my sad feeling caused by the broken family. I don't really talk about it but it was a sad situation and I would always pull from that. Whenever I was singing I never
used to think about happy things, only sad things that I wanted to be happy, that I wanted to improve...a lot of them didn't so I would sing out of my sadness.
AR: We think that most of the tracks on that album were cut in Los Angeles.
BH: You're right.
AR: Did you have a band in L.A. or did they send band-tracks over from Detroit.
BH: We had a band in L.A. and when we were trying to sound like Motown we were creating our own West Coast Motown too and it was good. We tried to mimic Motown and
came up with a happening L.A. sound. They would then come out here and try and get our sound. We did the fingerpops and the handclaps and even though it was different
it was still Motown.
AR: We knew that a lot of band-tracks were laid down so they could bring 'whoever' in to lay a vocal on top, or fly the tape out to Chicago, or New York, to get a
touring artist to cut a track.
BH: Most of the musicians they had at Motown were musicians they had all the time like the Andantes, the background group, they were just there all of the time.
Everything that came out, if it wasn't Martha like at the beginning, it was the Andantes.
AR: The track 'A favor for a girl with a lovesick heart', according to Clarence Paul, was probably the only song cut in Detroit. If so was this your first Detroit
session.
BH: That's correct, I think it was my first Detroit session.
AR: Did you go to Detroit to record on a regular basis.
BH: No, that was one of my problems..if I went there to record and Gladys came in when they were cutting my track, she did my track and when I got there and said
"where's my track" it would be "Oh Gladys came in and she had to go back out and she cut your track", I said "she did.....thankyou....can I go back home now ". I was
always upset, I always wanted to be like everybody else at Motown but Berry had other plans for me and I just didn't want to wait for them.
AR: Did you record anywhere else.
BH: No, when I recorded with Joe Cocker he came here from London, I think, we did 'Feeling alright' and the one that's on the 'Wonder Years' now. Most of the other
artists flew in and if the Blossoms didn't do it the Union Singers, which I was a part of, would do the backgrounds....me and Edna Wright, Gloria Jones, Shirley
Matthews, Merry Clayton and Patrice.
AR: Shirley was in the Blackberries I think.
BH: Yes that was my sisters group.
AR: If we look through the discography when I mention songs if there are things about them you'd like to share with us please do. One of the things Edna Wright
mentioned when interviewed was that she used to cut some demo's for you particularly 'Just look what you've done'...you've said you used to live with a song for a week
so were the songs presented to you as demo's by other artists.
BH: The songs were presented as demo's by other artists but I didn't know Edna had done 'Just look what you've done' because I didn't listen to her version I listened
to Frank's version because his were the best. I loved Frank Wilson's voice, I loved his delivery, his phrasing and everything.
AR: So you used to take the acetates home.
BH: Yes, take them home, live with them, record them.
AR: Where are they now.
BH: They took them back. They would never let you keep them because they were not published...that's top priority material, you can't have a writers demo until it's
published so they would take it back immediately. They'd take them at the session.."Give me my demo"
AR: So you never got to keep any.
BH: Oh no.
AR: Okay I'll go through these songs...'Every little bit hurts' we've already discussed.
BH: Barbara Wilson, who was Frank's first wife did that, she did such a good rendition of it I didn't want to do it. That was why when I was doing the song I was
crying. After she did the demo and they decided to do it with me I cried in the studio. I didn't want to do it, I wanted her to do it...but she died.
AR: 'Land of a thousand boys'.
BH: Oh that was my song..it was about for every boy there's a girl. You don't have to pinch someone else's guy there's one for everybody.
AR: 'I'll always love you'
BH: I love that song... I liked it better than 'Every little bit hurts'...that song was pulled in because there was a conflict of sales between my record and the
Supremes. They pulled it so the Supremes could go to a million and then people were not interested in my song anymore and that's the problem being with a young
company....it's like a family, everybody has to push one person, they weren't able to push a lot of artists when I was coming through so that was one thing that I
didn't understand. I was upset because I did the best that I could do on that song, it was selling but they wanted my sisters at Motown, the Supremes, to sell a
million so they pulled mine in so I wouldn't sell any records and theirs would sell...that was not a wise business move.
AR: 'Sad song'.
BH: I love that song, Frank Wilson wrote it.
AR: 'When I'm gone'.
BH: I love that song, Smokey wrote it. Mary Wells did that so I used her version as my demo. It sold a lot of copies.
AR: This next one is my favourite, 'I've been good to you', and I'll tell you why...It's because of that little break in the middle where you sing "you know that it's
hurting me so" and you hold the note, the band stops...when I hear that I just tingle.
BH: You better keep that record...I don't know if I could ever do that again in my life.
AR: When people come to my house and they don't know all of you're material I say "If you want to listen to the best thing you're ever gonna hear just sit there, close
your eyes and listen to this".
BH: It does have a thing where I went to my maximum but I didn't understand all that when I was singing it...my voice was at it's peak, I was much younger but had an
old voice and old feelings. I'm just now coming up to where I should be feeling like that or being able to sing like that...I was before my time vocally. That's the
way I feel about my voice because when I listen to that stuff it kinda blows my mind too. I think "is that me at 18"..that's all I did in those days..music..that was
it, that was my life.
AR: So you can understand what I'm saying.
BH: When I hear it I say "is that me"..I love it because it's so soulful.
AR: 'Operator'.
BH: I was honoured to sing that song because Mary had a hit on that before I recorded it.
AR: I think yours is the best..I think all of your versions of songs that Mary did are better. To be honest I don't think Mary compares vocally.
BH: Well that's a toss-up because when I listen to Mary's stuff now that she's passed away...we only value stuff from people when they are not here and we always
associate the person with the work but when they're gone you can really listen to them because you don't have to deal with them as a person. When I listen to her, now
that she's not here, I can listen and be really open..I don't think about anything but her artistry. That girl was fabulous.
AR: She was good but I don't think she was as good as you.
BH: On certain things she was better on other things I was better..to me..but what you're saying is one of the greatest compliments because she is one of my all time
favourites. To me Mary Wells was the voice behind Motown. I was different and I was special because I brought a different feeling to the company but as far as Motown,
the authentic, the original I don't think there's anyone else. They could have taken me to a place where I could have been one of the most famous and fabulous. They
could have taken me anywhere but they didn't really develop me and I didn't have the patience to wait. I would be interested to see if I'd stayed with Motown where I
would have gone and where I would be today but a lot of times we don't go on the path where we started out, we go in many other ways...I would be interested to see
what Brenda Holloway would be if she'd stayed and let Berry work his plan out. But who could say I would be alive today if I had gone with him. He did establish a name
for me and I can work with that.
AR: 'I'll be available'
BH: I think Mary did that before too.
AR: 'You can cry on my shoulder', apparently Berry wrote that.
BH: I think Berry actually did write that. he thought he was gonna have a smash on me but it hardly did anything.
AR: There are two different versions of that. The promo copies and the ones you could buy in the store are different mixes.
BH: And they expected the public to buy it.
AR: 'How many times did you mean it ' written by R. Nievelt, which means nothing to me, and Staunton & Walker.
BH: I thought it was Ivy Hunter. That was probably one I was given a demo on.
AR: 'Together til the end of time'
BH: Another Frank Wilson, I loved recording all of his songs.
AR: 'Til Johnny comes', that was withdrawn , do you know why.
BH: I don't know. I guess when I left they didn't want to put it out. That would have been a hit.
AR: The Supremes did it on one of their albums.
BH: They did. I was probably gone by then. When should it have come out
AR: It was scheduled for July '66. You were still there
BH: I was having a lot of problems then.
AR: 'Just look what you've done'
BH: Frank rehearsed with me so much I fashioned the song after his, the way he sang it.
AR: 'Starting the hurt all over again'
BH: They just gave me a demo I don't know who it was.
AR: Your last Motown release 'You've made me so very happy'
BH: I don't know what Berry actually did on that song but he said that he'd helped, he probably decided to put it in a modulated key.
AR: There was a song that was pressed as a single sided promotional disc called 'Play it cool, stay in school', written by Jimmy Clark, that was done for the Women's
Club of Detroit. How did that come about.
BH: I don't remember who wrote it but I thought it was just gonna be a promotion type thing. they thought it was better if I did it. I'm very interested in children
and school and have adopted Jerome's school because I want to see young people, especially black people, graduate.
AR: Why do you think you were picked to do the song.
BH: I think a lot of it had to do with my diction. I think a songwriter wants to make sure that what he has written can be understood.
AR: There a loads of unreleased tracks in the vaults. I have details of at least 50.
BH: I was always doing a lot of work and that was one thing I didn't understand..why they didn't release any of those songs.
AR: Can you recall any of those unissued songs like 'Think it over' which is very popular in England.
BH: I can remember them now and I don't know why they didn't release them because they were good songs...maybe it was because with my leaving they just decided not to
go forward with them because I wouldn't be able to do anything live. I severed all of my relationship with Motown in '68 and I went with Holland-Dozier to Invictus we
recorded there too and they also didn't put any of that out.
AR: A couple of tracks I taped for you 'I'm on the outside' and 'Here are the pieces of my broken heart', which are you and a piano, do you remember those.
BH: I remember those, I think it was me and Lincoln Mayorga but I seem to recall more instruments backing me.
AR: How much encouragement were you given to write songs.
BH: I had to battle....I'd always be fighting with Eddie because we were both artists..I started writing because they said "women can't write around here", I said "oh
they can't..I can" because I had been writing before. You know we weren't totally liberated, we hadn't been doing too much in the 60's so I talked to Berry and said
"Berry give me some pointers" he told me to "never write a song like it's past, always write a song like it's happening right now so people can associate with it". So
when I decided to write 'You've made me so very happy' I said "he's making me happy now" even though I was very sad because I had a bad love affair, a boyfriend that
walked out on me, so I said "I'm gonna write a song like this is the happiest day of my life". Berry really helped me out with a few little pointers because we always
listened to what Berry said because we knew we weren't going to get much time with him as he was a busy man. Whatever he told us we had to really take in, internalise
it and keep it so we could pull from it. I used to do stuff on a dare, if somebody told me I couldn't do it I used to do it, I'd make a point of proving them wrong. So
I started writing because people told me I couldn't.
AR: You mentioned at the beginning that you play the violin ..do you play anything else.
BH: I play violin, viola, cello, bass and the piano.
AR: Did you ever get involved in the technical side of recording.
BH: No but I eventually wanted to be an executive producer. I had my producers Hal, Marc, Frank..so I never got the chance to have a go.
AR: One of the things that's said about Motown is that everybody helped everybody else out at sessions. Did you ever do backing vocals on other artists sessions.
BH: Not to my knowledge..not anyone at Motown. I do backing for other artists like John Denver, Joe Cocker, Barry White....my sister did background on the Supremes
'Someday we'll be together'. I did a lot of background before I got involved with Motown.
AR: The second album, that should have come out, called 'Hurting and Crying' if it had come out in our opinion would have been regarded as one of Motown's finest
moments. Having listened to the tracks what do you recall about that album. I'll remind you of the unreleased tracks. 'I don't want nobody's gonna make me cry'
BH: I remember that..it was okay.
AR: 'Til Johnny comes'.
BH: I love that.
AR: 'A world without you'.
BH: Who wrote that.
AR: Helen & Kay Lewis.
BH: I loved all their songs. I worked very closely with them in the beginning.
AR: A Frank Wilson track called 'I'll be alright'.
BH: O yes.. I love Frank's stuff.
AR: 'Everybody knows' and 'Make him come to you'
BH: I remember those.
AR 'You've changed me'.
BH: Oh yes Smokey..I loved that song.."You've changed me and made me someone new and the person you've made me doesn't want you"..I remember that because of the twist
in it. That's the way life usually is when you get someone who tries to make you over, when you become that person you're not usually interested in the person that
made you that way.
AR: Obviously all the tracks were cut and Robert has seen the project file with all of the artwork and everything.
BH: Was it good. RT: Don't ask me...I didn't buy it and it's one of the biggest mistakes I've made in my life.
AR: How aware were you of that planned second album.
BH: I didn't know it was coming.
AR: So you didn't have feelings of unhappiness when they pulled it.
BH: There were several years of unhappiness after leaving Motown. I always wondered where I would have been had I gone along with Berry's plan..but there was a lot of
depth being involved with the Motown people..it was fab, hectic, behind the scenes was mind-blowing to me as a young girl...and there was so much sadness behind the
scenes what with Tammi's death and Janis Joplin, who died out here, a lot of that drug-induced death became a little bit too much for me and I had never really messed
with street drugs...I was on prescription drugs and was addicted to Benadril. It took me a year to really clean myself up from that. When you're travelling, on the
road, you're up at all kinds of hours and go past your sleep cycle so you need something to help you sleep, then you need something to wake you up. It was all
prescribed by a Doctor but became something I depended on...I like to be just the natural me. I'm a simple, uncomplicated person and when I have something in me that I
can't function properly it's a handicap to me. I like to be alert..that was one of the reasons I left also because I didn't want to get any deeper into the drugs. I
can feel for artists that get on them but you should be natural....my sister Patrice, she did lose herself in the entertainment world . She lost the 'person' Patrice
and had a nervous breakdown, she has never recovered from that and I didn't want to go there. One thing that really affected me, when Tammi was real real sick, she'd
had her first brain surgery, I saw her in Detroit and she was shaking all over..she had a big shopping bag full of pills, she said "you see all these pills, nothing
helps me, nothing is gonna help my condition". Shortly after that she died and that impacted me in a bad way. I said "if this is all that there is..drugs, death and
sickness..I really don't need it. I'm not really happy, I'm not getting what I want"...I was promised so much and that was part of the letter that I wrote. I was
promised so much and got so little, I have to sacrifice so much for the little bit that I'm getting that it's not really worth it. I was in a state of depression when
I left Motown. I was in a recording session with Smokey and I called my mother at home and said "I'm depressed, I'm not happy" and she said "well come home, you can
always come home". I said "well I'm gonna have to sneak away" and she said "do whatever you need to do, just get back to L.A.". When I was on the plane I decided "I'm
gonna get away from Motown". It's not what I really expected and I will never be handled in the way that I feel would be correct and I will never get the chance at the
original art that the people from Motown got..I won't get those chances and opportunities to record so I said "I'm just gonna have to leave because I'm unhappy". If
I'd had someone other than my mother, someone who knew about the business, who could really help me I probably would have stayed and waited but I didn't and I couldn't
figure it out. I was a young woman and I decided that it just wasn't worth it, the risk, and what I might go to. Smokey called me from Detroit and tried to get me to
come back. Berry never tried to force me but Smokey did. I told him "no Smokey I'm just gonna get involved in the church..it was not what I thought it would be and
thankyou for everything".
AR: I've listened to some of the things that made you unhappy. 'Til Johnny comes' was pulled, they pulled the album..there were other songs you recorded such as 'Bah
bah bah (you don't hold me in your arms the way you did)'
BH: We wrote that for Diana.
AR: There were another, 'I can't make it alone', which you cut but ended up on a Supremes album.
BH: Since they weren't gonna push me, and we came to that conclusion because I found out on the Dick Clark tour, as the Supremes were making it..we decided, my sister
and I, that we were gonna write for them. We wanted to generate some money so the two songs we wrote, they put them on the album, then Patrice branched off into her
own thing with 'Josie & The Pussycats'. She signed to Capitol and was going real good then she had her downfall and she never recovered from that.
AR: Did you ever record the 'Bah bah song' yourself.
BH: We recorded the demo.
AR: So it was always intended for the Supremes.
BH: It was.
AR: I think there was a concern, on our part, that you were being used to do Supremes demo's.
BH: No. We wrote it for them, we wanted to get it on the album because they were selling records and we were interested in making money.
AR: Talking about you doing stuff that ended up with somebody else, whether you wanted it to or not, you cut a track, in December '65, called 'All I do is think about
you'. It eventually found itself on Stevie's 'Hotter than July' album, he co-wrote it and you recorded it..have you listened to his version.
BH: Yes and I loved it..the only problem I had with Motown was that they would let Marvin, Diana and everybody get in there and listen to my diction. Diana had a
problem pronouncing her words and she would study my tapes..I should have been paid for that.
AR: One other thing my research threw up was that you were recorded live at the Twenty Grand in Detroit...did they ever plan a live album.
BH: Yes, they were gonna do a live album. They were gonna cut it in L.A. but it never happened. I seemed to be just as good live as I was in the studio, perhaps even
better live. Hal Davis was the one who thought of it and we were trying to get it together but it never came into being.
AR: You worked with an awesome set of producers and songwriters...It's a big question but how did they compare and who did you like the best.
BH: I liked Frank..I was crazy about Harvey because he was different, really approachable..Smokey was professional with me, he would give me a lot of pointers about my
stage presence.. Harvey was more like a friend..Frank was someone I admired, I loved everything he did...Hal Davis was my fiancee, as a matter of fact I'm working with
his daughter right now, we've recorded some stuff with Hal Davis and my daughter Christie. Hal's daughter Colette Davis and my daughter Christie Davis.. I married a
Davis and have four children..so we're doing a project right now and when I come back from my trip to England we're gonna finish it up..so we'll see where that goes
but it sounds real good.
AR: What was Berry like in the studio.
BH: Berry was one of the most intense producers that I've worked for. He knew what he was looking for and expected you to come up to his standard. It was an honour to
work with him but you were constantly afraid of making a mistake. Smokey was easy to work with because I fitted Smokey's mould. I always wanted to stay close to
Frank's melodic pattern because he sang a lot. Smokey always presented a demo and Berry didn't sing. I liked the feel of Berry's songs, we were very similar in our
interpretation..we were more or less on the same wavelength.
AR: Clarence Paul.
BH: I loved Clarence. His songs were easy and instantly recognisable. They didn't push Clarence's songs but you knew if they did you would have a hit..he was awesome
and was the one who pushed Stevie.
AR: We know you recorded a lot of songs by Ivy Hunter and Holland-Dozier-Holland.
BH: I think that the Ivy songs I felt more for because he really took time to write songs for me..he didn't just pull something from a bag...he tried to tailor the
songs to my voice. He took a lot of time with me, more time than the other producers even Hal.
AR And H-D-H.
BH: I had a crush on Eddie so I liked everything 'cos he was so good looking and he was a genius.
AR: Did you have studio time with them.
BH: I had studio time especially when I signed with Invictus. At Motown it was basically that we would fuss over material so I could get some extra time with Eddie. I
admired him because everything he put out was a hit but they never released any of those songs.
AR: Did you ever work with Norman Whitfield.
BH: I think maybe once, just the one time.
AR: The session musicians at Motown have always been unsung hero's. How did you get on with them, did you have any favourites.
BH: I didn't have a favourite. I liked everything that they did. I admired them because I was a musician too. I got on well with them because of that.
AR: You've described your relationship with the Detroit family as "being like an adopted child". Did you ever become close to any of the other artists and what impact
do you feel your relationship with the Detroiters had on your career.
BH: It had a big impact because I was with a company that was growing. My best friend was Tammi Terrell..we were buddies.
AR: How about Miss Ross.
BH: I didn't get along with Miss Ross because she was constantly stirring up trouble because I was in her way. I didn't really know it 'cos I really liked her but when
I found out she was undermining me and lying on me a lot I began to stay away from her. At first I wanted to be her friend as I really admired her but when I found out
she had deceitful ways and was only really interested in Diane I began to pull away from her, leave her alone, stay out of her way.
AR: We can't find any published references to your live shows apart from the Beatles video at the Shea Stadium.
BH: I haven't even seen that.
AR: We hear your stage presence was dynamite.. were you ever asked to tone it down.
BH: Smokey didn't want me to do any moving, he just wanted me to stand still and sing. He didn't want me to move like Tina.
AR: I've seen a T.V. show with you on and you were filmed from the waist upwards.
BH: That's new. I had a guy who would choreograph the songs and there was a lot of movement but I don't know why they wouldn't film below the waist.
AR: When performing did you sing non-Motown material.
BH: I did a lot of Beatles stuff, some Gershwin and then the Motown stuff.
AR: Did you have a favourite venue.
BH: My favourite was Hollywood A Go-Go. I think I was with the Temptations. I really enjoyed that.
AR: Any amusing stories from those Dick Clark tours like Miss Ross accusing you of stealing her hairspray....