To people who only acknowledge one concept of God, despite the ambiguous nature of the word, an atheist is someone with any other concept of God. Silly, really.

I have high-functioning autism, so I don't naturally look people in the eyes... or at them... or speak with normal inflection. Now I just do it because I've conditioned myself to do so.

I agree that it's wholly a cultural thing. Had I not been brought up with the idea that you have to look people in the eyes to talk to them, I wouldn't be doing so.

Using Richard Dawkins' scale of belief, 1 meaning you "know" there isn't a God and 7 meaning you "know" there is one, it seems most Athiests place themselves at about a 2. Sensible people would never claim to know matter-of-factly that there isn't a God, just like they wouldn't claim to know there is one. Most atheists can be classified as agnostic, not knowing either way. We just tend toward disbelief.

Jeannie, you are called an atheist most likely because you don't believe in someone else's concept of God. Simple as that.

Is it just me, or is he exceptionally boring? I mean, I LOVE the things he lectures and writes about, but it's almost a chore to watch/read.

Whether YOU really believe the world is coming to an end or not is irrelevant. Many people still do. Any time I see reference to 2012 and the Mayans I send people to said website. It's informative, even if you don't believe the doomsday bullsh!t.

Just as I figured. Carry on then.

There is no Mayan prophecy. 2012 is the end of their longcount calendar. Stop buying into the hype.

This website should give you some useful information. It's an actual research website dedicated to Mesoamerican studies.

http://www.famsi.org/research/vanstone/2012/index.html

I might as well play the Devil's Advocate here and ask what empirical evidence you have that any of this is real? I used to believe in the same nonsense, with energy, auras, psychic vampires, meditation, magick, etc. That is, of course, until I understood that it's almost definitely a product of one's own imagination.

If you can demonstrate any of this to be real and viable, then why not contact James Randi? He's got $1M waiting for anyone who can "prove" the existence of the supernatural.

Mine would be something along the lines of:

Enjoy life. It's the only one you'll get.

I don't really put any more thought into it. As long as I'm happy, I don't really need anything else.

<irrelevance>
Bertrand Russell may not have added anything new to the rules of logic, but he used them masterfully, in my opinion.

</irrelevance>

Likewise, this song reflects the way I feel inside:

In the not-too-distant future,
somewhere in time and space,
Mike Nelson and his robot pals
are caught in an endless chase.

Pursued by a woman,
whose name is Pearl;
just an evil gal
who wants to rule the world.

She put a few things
in her purse
and in her rocketship she hunts them all
across the Universe. (I'll get you!!!)

I'll send him cheesy movies.
The worst I can find.
I'll make him sit and watch them all
and I'll monitor his mind.

Now keep in mind Mike can't control
where the movies begin or end.
He'll try to keep his sanity
with the help of his robot friends.

(Robot Roll Call)
Cambot.
Gypsy.
Tom Servo.
Crooooow!

If you're wondering how Mike eats and breathes,
and other science facts,
just repeat to yourself, "It's just a show,
I should really just relax."

Oh, Mystery Science Theater 3000.
*twang*

Holy sh¡t, smiless is Jet Li!!!

Seems either the press rushed scientists to publish findings before they were conclusive, or someone's using "embellished" data. It happens sometimes.

That's similar to my town. Cops would rather catch speeders than bust drug deals. Less paperwork to fill out. I wouldn't say they're corrupt -- just lazy.


So yeah.... Black Holes...

You get caught. Even if one has more resources than the average person, you'd have to stay in the country, around familiar people, and in familiar territory, in which case you'd be found and killed inevitably.

Could be, but I wouldn't go that far with it. After all, shows like CSI exaggerate how easily a criminal can be caught, so why would movies tell them the opposite?

It was somewhere between 150-250 thousand years ago. How they determined how large her population was is puzzling though.

I never meant that we came from modern apes, as I'm aware tha humans and great apes split quite some time ago; most recently being the split from chimpanzees (our common ancestor with them, that is).

We can't have come from modern-day monkeys, and anyone who claims so would be misunderstanding evolution. What I was saying, in a mildly humorous manner, is that our distant, DISTANT ancestors were classified as monkeys.

I'd agree with you that we descended from ratlike creatures. Not quite like the rodents today mind you, but small, ground-dwelling mammals.

Dramatic effect, or the filmmakers just don't know.

Technically, from a taxonomic standpoint, we did come from monkeys.

Youtube's AronRa explains it rather well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6TEDuDD3Zs

I'm not a scientist either, but I'd say you're still not understanding how Black Holes work.

For a Black Hole to form, all of the mass of a star (that is itself sufficiently massive) must be overcome by its resultant gravity, so that it is essentially crushed into oblivion. There is no energy radiating from the core of a Black Hole. There isn't really a core in a black hole as it is.