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Posted
by
CmdrTaco
from the thats-just-bizarre dept.
cbull writes "USA Today has an article about practice for the attempts to capture the Genesis capsule. Helicopter stunt pilots will have 5 chances to capture the 400-lb. capsule. Military pilots were unavailable, due to the 6-year commitment required."
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"GIIIIIIVE MEEEEEE GENESIIIIIIIIIS!"
Oh, for God's sake.
Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted!
Reason: Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING.
Yes, that was the idea, you son of a targ.
The stunt pilots say their biggest challenge will be flying at 40 mph nearly a mile over the Utah desert without any visual reference points to judge distance or speed as they close in with hook and cable on the capsule, which will be descending 400 feet a minute at a forward speed of 20 mph.
So will the capsule get bonus points if it takes out one of the helicopters without the pilots seeing it first?
As pilot Tom Paris experienced: a 10 out of 10 maneuver would be flying in some sort of quantum state where you capture memories by pure chance of instantly visiting all over the place.
I know Voyager wasn't the best ST series but at least you could have watched it once to prove your nerdyness. Tom also taught hopeless nerds how to get a girlfriend, simply put up with a aggressive woman who beats YOU around.
Yes. They do pitch so much in fact, that carriers prefer to reel helicopters in by attaching a cable to them and then pulling the choppers in with the cable, while the chopper keeps the cable tout by hovering upwards.
"The three best things in life are a good landing, a good orgasm, and a good bowel movement. The night carrier landing is one of the few opportunities in life where you get to experience all three at the same time."
I don't know about bonus points but I wouldn't want the pressure of trying to catch this thing while half the world watches:
The civilian pilots have replicated the retrieval without fumbles in dozens of practice runs, but are terrified of flubbing it live on NASA television with a worldwide feed.
Hell, I'll be watching! How often do you get to see a helicopter try to catch space puke?
Is anyone else wondering why the container has to be caught in midair? Why can't the capsule have larger parachutes or a balloon structure attached to it?
"If the Genesis capsule hits the ground hard, scientists say they'd have to spend months sorting through broken jewelry-studded disks holding tiny solar wind particles."
Another article in some other paper (sorry no link) said that they did not want to risk any kind of touch down since it was carrying actual samples. Any significant shock could damage the sample container which would lead to either a loss of particles or contamination-not good either way. They're just playing it safe and doing away with that kind of landing all together. Besides, it's damn cool.
I understand their need to reduce shock, but I would think a properly designed system with parachutes and balloons to absorb the impact, proven technology that's been used in the mars lander missions, would work just as well with less risk.
Catching the capsule mid-air with a hollywood helicopter stunt-pilot definitely does not sound like playing it safe to me. It sounds to me more like NASA is trying to attract the publicity by going with a risky recovery scheme at the expense of the science involved.
Catching it as it falls from orbit is a tried and tested technique too.
It was used to catch film from spy satellites back in the days when they still used wet film.
Theres a description of the first satellites to use it (Corona) here [ucsb.edu],
and the google cache [216.239.59.104] for good measure.
So catching payloads in mid air has a longer history and more successful reoveries than a couple of mars landers. They did use military pilots though;o)
a properly designed system with parachutes and balloons to absorb the impact, proven technology that's been used in the mars lander missions
Mars has less gravity than Earth so the parachutes and balloons would need to be much larger. And much larger coming down is much larger to lift up in the first place. This is a cheap (relatively) $200 million mission. Increasing the size to include touchdown equipment would boost the budget by a large factor. If they pull this off, it will be the new poster chi
Why did the pilots have to commit for 6 years? Does it seriously take that long to learn how to catch a falling space probe with a hook dangling from a chopper?
Sure... but seriously, why not two one year commitments: one for the testing before launch, and one to re-acquaint the pilots with the procedure before re-entry?
I mean, come on... catching a probe that's re-entering the earth's atmosphere with a hook and rope dangling from a chopper is like riding a bike.. once you learn, you never really forget.
I don't suspect the military could commit to something that far in advance. What would happen if a war broke out a few days before it was due to return?
Actually I sent these people some email after hearing a claim of this being a first (which isn't true, project Corona did mid-air recovery of returning space capsules) and they have a few people who did this during project Corona.
Yep, they used to snatch the parachutes with a T-shaped bar trailing from a C-119...if you can do it with a 60,000-pound, 200 mph airplane, you can certainly do it with a helicopter.
I don't know this, but my guess is that since this thing reenters the atmosphere from something really remote, it will crash in much faster than something falling in from low earth orbit. That could make a big difference. But I'm just guessing.
...but then, since it does deploy a parachute, I guess not. But it is OK to hype things to get people excited about something that is pretty cool, namely the return of solar wind particles.
1. So why didn't Bill C. do something about it? After all...he knew, right?
2. Tell us, o sage. Where will military helicopter pilots be active on September 8, 2010? Haiti? Sudan? Yemen? Saudi Arabia? Chechnya? Where will a particular pilot be in 2010?
If the military can commit people to things like the Air Force Band, sending people to the olympics, and things like the Golden Knights [army.mil], then they can commit a crew or two to this project. If one or two helecopter crews are going to make the difference in winning a war then we have an even bigger problem.
Would it be so hard to get one more helecopter and train one more crew over what we already have?
None of those you listed are 6 year committments. And all are subject to "the needs of the military".
Is this a function that only a military pilot can do? No. Besides...many, many high end civilian pilots (rotary and fixed wing) came from the military.
I just thought that Slashdot editors had started letting Shakespeare monkeys post stories. If I hadn't RTFA, I would have had no idea it was a real story.
I'm a little baffled over what to yell out when the catch is made. "He's out!" "Goal!" "Touchdown!" "Tiddlywinks!" and "KHAAAAN!" are all pretty good options IMO
This sounds more like a fishing thing than a ball game to me. So what do fishermen say when they catch something - "Hey, pass me another beer"? Or maybe the other guy should critize: "Pretty small - throw that one back!"
Why do they need to put this? Are people really that stupi... oh, wait a minute. =b
Since this mission is named Genesis and will tell us about the beginning of the solar system, will it try to prove or disprove the Bible?
The Genesis mission will collect samples of the solar wind, material flowing outward from the Sun, and return these samples to Earth. Scientists will be able to compare the compositions of these samples with known compositions of the planets and help in the effort to understand how our solar system and its planets formed. It is not NASA's role to address theological questions or interpretations, and Genesis' investigation will be studied as a scientific question, not a theological one.
I agree completely that science is science. The light is either on or off, it really doesn't matter how you feel about it. Truth is that way.
However, frequently a straw man is drawn between science and matters of faith, where science is portrayed as unbiased - merely truth, and matters of faith are at best irrelevant, and at worst completely counter to reason itself.
People of faith bring a bias to a discussion. People of no faith bring a bias to a discussion, too. Because scientists are people, they bring a bias to their work. Specifically, scientists who deny God's existence have a bias that impacts their work, and not always in a positive way.
It's true that science and theology are separate disciplines, but to suggest that neither is relevant to the other is a bit naieve.
Where does your favorite deity appear (or rather where should it appear) in physical equations? And how? (And if you answer, in the cosmological constants, then where's the bias?)
That many religious people seem to feel as though their faith should be given special weight, as though because it's written in the Bible or some other book claimed to be of divine origin, science should accept it as fact. They want scientists to find evidence that supports their views, and ignore evidence that doesn't. Well, that's not how it works. Science (when properly done) finds evidence and draws theories to explain it, regardless of if they like what it shows.
The other problem is that the claims of faith are generally unfalsifiable, which is REQUIRED to be a valid scientific theory. So anything that looks like it might support their claim, they point to and shout, anything that looks like it might detract from it, they claim doesn't apply. Since their claim isn't an empiricially valid, falsifiable claim, it doesn't really matter either way.
Remember: We do not prove things true in sciemce, with each test we show them to be not false under a certian set of circumstances. So the more something is tested and the more varied the conditions, the more sure we can be that it is the truth.
So when you take an empiricist viewpoint, which is what is needed to do good science, leaving god out of it is appropriate. There is NO valid empirical evidence to support the existance of god. That god exists ins't even a testable theory. Thus it needs to be treated like ESP or anything else that is claimed but not testable. That doesn't mean that god doesn't exist and we just can't test for it, but science is, and must be, only concerned with the testable.
So having faith is fine, but don't pretend the arguments should be given scientific creedence until you can come up with a falsifiable test. If you want scientists to deal with matters of god, design a test that is empirically valid and falsifiable. Then they'll be interested and test it (as well as probably winning you major recognition as a philsopher, whichever way it turns out).
You submit that people of faith want the scientists to cook the books by collecting evidence in harmony with religious belief and discarding that which appears to conflict with it.
While many would describe me as quite religious, I know a great number of intelligent people, some of them scientists, who would totally reject that idea. The evidence is the evidence. Nothing more, nothing less.
Realistically, science provides us with a framework to measure, describe, and manipulate the material that comprises
See Karl Popper's "The Logic of Scientific Discovery" for complete information. The thing is, science is ONLY concerned with the testable, and to be scientifically testable a theory must be falsifiable. This is how science is done. If it's not testable, it's not science. Doesn't mean you aren't free to believe it but don't pretend like science should give it any weight. You hold a belief with no scientific proof, that's faith and that's fine, but don't then turn around and ask scientists to consdier your faith in science.
Of course scientists have bias, everything has bias. Even physics has bias as there are things that you cannot observe without changing the result. That does not, however, make religion any more scientific or any more worthy of scientific consdieration.
Look, whatever facts you think you have that support a cerator, none of them come even close to passing scientific muster. I've heard basically all of them, and they just don't hold up. You may choose to believe they are evidence of a creator, and that's fine, but they are SCIENTIFIC evidence and thus aren't of any intrest to scientists.
I'll cover a couple of the popular ones:
The cause of the universe. The believer says that everything must have a cause, including the universe. This cause is god. Sorry, but now you've got the same problem, now god is the prime cause, what caused god? It is a much simpler explination (and thus the working theory) that the universe IS the prime cause.
Healing by prayer. The believer points to cases where a person with an uncurable disease got better after they, or others, prayed for it. Problem is, the ignores counter evidence, the many cases where people prayed and the person still died. This was restated as a falsifible theory and tested, and falsified. They said that if prayer healing worked, then there would be a statistical difference in those that survived. So they had a group go and pray for some cases in a hospital, not others. There was no stastical difference.
So it goes for all the claims I've ever heard. A believe may see them as evidence and that's fine but they are NOT scientific evidence. Science has a very specific standard, strong inference (laid out in Popper's book) that must be met. Religion doens't get a free pass at that and get to be called science with less evidence.
Also you mistake the difference between not believing in something and saying it can't exist. I don't believe in god because there is insufficient evidence to do so. I do nto claim god can't exist, just that until I see some scientific proof, I'm not going to believe in it. Same for ESP, astral trips, and so on. There is not the evidence to convince me it is true so I don't believe it.
Really, you need to get some of the philsophy of science and Popper's book is the best place to start. You have a very common misconception of what science is. It's a process of knowing things about the world and testing things, the only reliable one we've found. It is not infalliable or complete but it is highly reliable and has advanced knolwedge more than anything else save writing. It isn't just some random process, it's a logical, robust process of testing things to find out the truth.
He was talking more about scientists. And you're talking more about science.
Not all scientists do good science.
As for the supernatural: there was at least one double blind study which showed that prayer affected IVF success rates - the IVF was done in a hospital in Korea, the prayers were done by people in the US who only had the photos of those prayed for- the people in the hospital didn't know who was being prayed for - not even sure if most knew a study was
Gently illustrates your point...
Exposed: conman's role in prayer-power IVF 'miracle'
One of the authors of a university report on infertility has admitted a multi-million-dollar fraud, reports Paul Harris in New York
Sunday May 30, 2004 - The Observer
It was a miracle that created headlines around the world. Doctors at one of the world's top medical schools claimed to have scientifically proved the power of prayer.
Many Americans took the Columbia University research - announced in October 2001 after
Again, problems in understanding science. I am NOT talking about if scientists are properly doing science, I'm talking about how science is properly done. You deal with the testable, the measurable, and that's it. That there may be more to the universe is fine, you don't deal with that, htat's for philsophers (that's actually one of the purposes of philsophy, to postulate an explination that scientists can test). A theory isn't a scientific theory unless it's a testable, falsifiable one.
I noted scientists have bias. Scientists kow they have bias and, on more universal terms, that the simpl act of measuring something can change the result, so something can be different when measured than when not measured.
The reason I go on about science is because of the other side of his argument, that scientists need to take god into account to clear up or at least balance the bias (or at least that's what I got out of it). That's not the case. Scientists deliberatly bias away from untestable, so called
As for the supernatural: there was at least one double blind study which showed that prayer affected IVF success rates - the IVF was done in a hospital in Korea, the prayers were done by people in the US who only had the photos of those prayed for- the people in the hospital didn't know who was being prayed for - not even sure if most knew a study was being done. Whether it proves there is a God is another thing - coz it could just prove that some people can effect supernatural powers if they do certain th
I've read that the paper has been withdrawn , but I can't find a link to it right now. (The links I gave are a few months old.)
There were other problems as well. For example, no informed consent of the people taking part in the study. Speaking as an ex-infertility patient, I would have been highly offended if I had been one of the ones included in the study without the authors asking.
Science is all about the testable. I agree completely. To follow the scientific method, one observes a phenomenon, gathers information about it, develops a theory about the relationships among the events, and then tests that theory.
We're on the same page here, right?
Origins are not testable using this method. This method can be used to gather information and speculate about the origin of the universe, but science cannot conclude what happened in the absence of being able to test the speculation.
To suggest that all of humanity is built from the basic building blocks of elements and chemicals causes us to neglect much of the human experience.
Actually doing that is not a scientific requirement at all. Economics, for example, doesn't require that kind of analysis; it keeps "human actions" as an indivisible object of study, and build a (somewhat) successful theory in top of it.
Reductionism is not the only way to proceed on science. As Sycraft-fu points out, the only required thing is testability -
I would say that truth is truth, regardless of whether or not science, or anything else for that matter agree with it.
Of course it is. But if nobody knows the truth, it's all but irrelevant if it is the truth or not. And believing something is true does not make it so, any more than believing something is not true.
I cant even prove that your mind (not brain) exists (I cant see it, touch it or otherwise), so how do I know that you have a mind?
You don't. For all you know, I may not have a mind. For all
I know I've seen plenty of footage of big prop planes capturing spy satellites before they knew how to beam images back to Earth. Why spring for helicopters? (FYI, helicopters are generally more expensive than fixed-wing aircraft)
The difference in cost between a couple hours flight for a C-130 or a helicopter isn't even a blip on NASA's budget. And I'm not sure operating a C-130 is actually cheaper per hour than a helicopter.
This is literally a once in a lifetime chance. Why risk it trying to shave a couple of dollars?
I would think that the air pressure of the heilocopter going above the parachute would quickly cause the chute to fold up and send the probe crashing to the ground.
The first U.S. spy satellites, the Corona series, sent its exposed film back via capsules that were gathered by crews in, I believe, C-130's. This was almost 40 years ago.
Dunno if the Soviets needed to try that, since they had all that empty space to bring a payload down safely and away from prying eyes.
I wondered the same thing. If you read the article it seems letting it land by parachute takes the chance that the samples inside the unit will get damaged.
Possibly a case of a larger chute, while allowing a slower fall, subjects it to greater variation in landing areas due to whatever winds are happening as it comes down.
Also, there is a limit to just how slow a parachute (at least any current design) can go. At very slow speeds, the parachute can be come less stable with parts of it collapsing.
ah hell, just because SCO is in Utah doesn't mean ou have to blame all the Mormons for it. Not everyone in Utah is Mormon, and not everyone here owns stock in SCO
Not again! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Not again! (Score:2, Funny)
Heard aboard one of the recovery choppers (Score:2)
Re:Not again! (Score:2)
Re:Not again! (Score:2)
http://jumptokahnclusions.ytmnd.com/
Re:Not again! (Score:3, Funny)
Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:5, Funny)
So will the capsule get bonus points if it takes out one of the helicopters without the pilots seeing it first?
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:5, Funny)
So, what the hell rates a 10?
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:1)
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:1, Funny)
As pilot Tom Paris experienced: a 10 out of 10 maneuver would be flying in some sort of quantum state where you capture memories by pure chance of instantly visiting all over the place.
I know Voyager wasn't the best ST series but at least you could have watched it once to prove your nerdyness. Tom also taught hopeless nerds how to get a girlfriend, simply put up with a aggressive woman who beats YOU around.
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:2)
I was under the impression that this is what happened to the pilot if they failed in their attempt to do a 10 out of 10 maneuver.
SPLAT
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:2, Funny)
as obviously its rather easy to do in even a dated starship...
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:4, Informative)
Landing on an aircraft carrier at night.
rj
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:1)
fine with the crosswinds... (Score:2)
Re:fine with the crosswinds... (Score:2)
Re:fine with the crosswinds... (Score:2)
WARNING!!! Very graphic images are contained in this site.
http://poetry.rotten.com/chopper/
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:2)
Landing on an aircraft carrier at night.
Ahh yes, thus the famous saying:
"The three best things in life are a good landing, a good orgasm, and a good bowel movement. The night carrier landing is one of the few opportunities in life where you get to experience all three at the same time."
Damn I'd love to try that!
Re:Hmm... sounds tricky (Score:5, Funny)
The civilian pilots have replicated the retrieval without fumbles in dozens of practice runs, but are terrified of flubbing it live on NASA television with a worldwide feed.
Hell, I'll be watching! How often do you get to see a helicopter try to catch space puke?
Cheers,
Erick
I've got the training! (Score:5, Funny)
When will they learn? (Score:1, Funny)
Re:When will they learn? (Score:2)
Re:When will they learn? (Score:1)
Bigger Parachute (Score:1)
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:4, Informative)
Reading is fundamental
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:3, Insightful)
I understand their need to reduce shock, but I would think a properly designed system with parachutes and balloons to absorb the impact, proven technology that's been used in the mars lander missions, would work just as well with less risk.
Catching the capsule mid-air with a hollywood helicopter stunt-pilot definitely does not sound like playing it safe to me. It sounds to me more like NASA is trying to attract the publicity by going with a risky recovery scheme at the expense of the science involved.
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:4, Informative)
It was used to catch film from spy satellites back in the days when they still used wet film. Theres a description of the first satellites to use it (Corona) here [ucsb.edu], and the google cache [216.239.59.104] for good measure.
So catching payloads in mid air has a longer history and more successful reoveries than a couple of mars landers. They did use military pilots though
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:2)
Mars has less gravity than Earth so the parachutes and balloons would need to be much larger. And much larger coming down is much larger to lift up in the first place. This is a cheap (relatively) $200 million mission. Increasing the size to include touchdown equipment would boost the budget by a large factor. If they pull this off, it will be the new poster chi
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Bigger Parachute (Score:1)
Bad joke thread (Score:3, Funny)
Please don't overdo your bad jokes about the following topics:
However (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Bad joke thread (Score:5, Funny)
But the massive overuse of sad Star Trek lines is perfectly acceptable to you? Odd choice there...
Re:Bad joke thread (Score:1)
What about the Andromeda Strain? (Score:1)
Did they account for weight differential? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Did they account for weight differential? (Score:2)
Starfleet's feelings on the matter here: (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Starfleet's feelings on the matter here: (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Starfleet's feelings on the matter here: (Score:2)
Re:Starfleet's feelings on the matter here: (Score:1)
6 year commitment? (Score:5, Funny)
Amateurs.
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:4, Funny)
I mean, come on... catching a probe that's re-entering the earth's atmosphere with a hook and rope dangling from a chopper is like riding a bike.. once you learn, you never really forget.
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:2)
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:5, Informative)
Closest Thing to a Corona Homepage [nro.gov]
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:3, Informative)
rj
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:2)
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:2)
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:2)
Say, Afghanistan.
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:1, Offtopic)
Even when Bill told him.
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:1, Offtopic)
2. Tell us, o sage. Where will military helicopter pilots be active on September 8, 2010? Haiti? Sudan? Yemen? Saudi Arabia? Chechnya?
Where will a particular pilot be in 2010?
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:1, Flamebait)
And you laughed at him:
Of course he was also a pusillanimous weenie.But so is George:
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:2)
Would it be so hard to get one more helecopter and train one more crew over what we already have?
Re:6 year commitment? (Score:3, Insightful)
Is this a function that only a military pilot can do? No. Besides...many, many high end civilian pilots (rotary and fixed wing) came from the military.
Just curious... (Score:4, Funny)
[goes off to RTFA, grudgingly]
Re:Just curious... (Score:2)
Re:Just curious... (Score:1)
A semi slashdotter would have searched for that previous article and read the comments on that, thus cirmumventing the necessity to RTFA
What to shout? (Score:4, Funny)
"He's out!"
"Goal!"
"Touchdown!"
"Tiddlywinks!" and
"KHAAAAN!"
are all pretty good options IMO
Re:What to shout? (Score:2)
Why do they need to put this? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Why do they need to put this? (Score:5, Insightful)
relevance (Score:4, Insightful)
However, frequently a straw man is drawn between science and matters of faith, where science is portrayed as unbiased - merely truth, and matters of faith are at best irrelevant, and at worst completely counter to reason itself.
People of faith bring a bias to a discussion. People of no faith bring a bias to a discussion, too. Because scientists are people, they bring a bias to their work. Specifically, scientists who deny God's existence have a bias that impacts their work, and not always in a positive way.
It's true that science and theology are separate disciplines, but to suggest that neither is relevant to the other is a bit naieve.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
Re:relevance (Score:1, Redundant)
The problem is (Score:4, Insightful)
The other problem is that the claims of faith are generally unfalsifiable, which is REQUIRED to be a valid scientific theory. So anything that looks like it might support their claim, they point to and shout, anything that looks like it might detract from it, they claim doesn't apply. Since their claim isn't an empiricially valid, falsifiable claim, it doesn't really matter either way.
Remember: We do not prove things true in sciemce, with each test we show them to be not false under a certian set of circumstances. So the more something is tested and the more varied the conditions, the more sure we can be that it is the truth.
So when you take an empiricist viewpoint, which is what is needed to do good science, leaving god out of it is appropriate. There is NO valid empirical evidence to support the existance of god. That god exists ins't even a testable theory. Thus it needs to be treated like ESP or anything else that is claimed but not testable. That doesn't mean that god doesn't exist and we just can't test for it, but science is, and must be, only concerned with the testable.
So having faith is fine, but don't pretend the arguments should be given scientific creedence until you can come up with a falsifiable test. If you want scientists to deal with matters of god, design a test that is empirically valid and falsifiable. Then they'll be interested and test it (as well as probably winning you major recognition as a philsopher, whichever way it turns out).
Some may, but I think you're being a bit unfair (Score:2)
While many would describe me as quite religious, I know a great number of intelligent people, some of them scientists, who would totally reject that idea. The evidence is the evidence. Nothing more, nothing less.
Realistically, science provides us with a framework to measure, describe, and manipulate the material that comprises
Again you fail to understand science (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course scientists have bias, everything has bias. Even physics has bias as there are things that you cannot observe without changing the result. That does not, however, make religion any more scientific or any more worthy of scientific consdieration.
Look, whatever facts you think you have that support a cerator, none of them come even close to passing scientific muster. I've heard basically all of them, and they just don't hold up. You may choose to believe they are evidence of a creator, and that's fine, but they are SCIENTIFIC evidence and thus aren't of any intrest to scientists.
I'll cover a couple of the popular ones:
The cause of the universe. The believer says that everything must have a cause, including the universe. This cause is god. Sorry, but now you've got the same problem, now god is the prime cause, what caused god? It is a much simpler explination (and thus the working theory) that the universe IS the prime cause.
Healing by prayer. The believer points to cases where a person with an uncurable disease got better after they, or others, prayed for it. Problem is, the ignores counter evidence, the many cases where people prayed and the person still died. This was restated as a falsifible theory and tested, and falsified. They said that if prayer healing worked, then there would be a statistical difference in those that survived. So they had a group go and pray for some cases in a hospital, not others. There was no stastical difference.
So it goes for all the claims I've ever heard. A believe may see them as evidence and that's fine but they are NOT scientific evidence. Science has a very specific standard, strong inference (laid out in Popper's book) that must be met. Religion doens't get a free pass at that and get to be called science with less evidence.
Also you mistake the difference between not believing in something and saying it can't exist. I don't believe in god because there is insufficient evidence to do so. I do nto claim god can't exist, just that until I see some scientific proof, I'm not going to believe in it. Same for ESP, astral trips, and so on. There is not the evidence to convince me it is true so I don't believe it.
Really, you need to get some of the philsophy of science and Popper's book is the best place to start. You have a very common misconception of what science is. It's a process of knowing things about the world and testing things, the only reliable one we've found. It is not infalliable or complete but it is highly reliable and has advanced knolwedge more than anything else save writing. It isn't just some random process, it's a logical, robust process of testing things to find out the truth.
Re:Again you fail to understand science (Score:3, Interesting)
He was talking more about scientists. And you're talking more about science.
Not all scientists do good science.
As for the supernatural: there was at least one double blind study which showed that prayer affected IVF success rates - the IVF was done in a hospital in Korea, the prayers were done by people in the US who only had the photos of those prayed for- the people in the hospital didn't know who was being prayed for - not even sure if most knew a study was
Re:Again you fail to understand science (Score:2)
Exposed: conman's role in prayer-power IVF 'miracle'
Re:Again you fail to understand science (Score:2)
Any conclusion by Columbia University after their investigations? Links would be helpful.
Re:Again you fail to understand science (Score:2)
As noted by another
Re:Again you fail to understand science (Score:2)
You ignored that and kept going on about science.
While it's not quite the "wookie defense" you have validated his point about the "straw man".
Re:Again you fail to understand science (Score:2)
The reason I go on about science is because of the other side of his argument, that scientists need to take god into account to clear up or at least balance the bias (or at least that's what I got out of it). That's not the case. Scientists deliberatly bias away from untestable, so called
I don't want science to 'prove' god (Score:2)
Prayer study was garbage (Score:2)
As for the supernatural: there was at least one double blind study which showed that prayer affected IVF success rates - the IVF was done in a hospital in Korea, the prayers were done by people in the US who only had the photos of those prayed for- the people in the hospital didn't know who was being prayed for - not even sure if most knew a study was being done. Whether it proves there is a God is another thing - coz it could just prove that some people can effect supernatural powers if they do certain th
Re:Prayer study was garbage (Score:2)
Has the journal really withdrawn the paper? I haven't been keeping track.
The rest of my post remains valid. Even if the study was correctly done the responses to it would still be the same.
Re:Prayer study was garbage (Score:2)
There were other problems as well. For example, no informed consent of the people taking part in the study. Speaking as an ex-infertility patient, I would have been highly offended if I had been one of the ones included in the study without the authors asking.
I think I understand science (Score:2)
We're on the same page here, right?
Origins are not testable using this method. This method can be used to gather information and speculate about the origin of the universe, but science cannot conclude what happened in the absence of being able to test the speculation.
Scienc
Re:Some may, but I think you're being a bit unfair (Score:2)
Actually doing that is not a scientific requirement at all. Economics, for example, doesn't require that kind of analysis; it keeps "human actions" as an indivisible object of study, and build a (somewhat) successful theory in top of it.
Reductionism is not the only way to proceed on science. As Sycraft-fu points out, the only required thing is testability -
Re:Why do they need to put this? (Score:2)
Of course it is. But if nobody knows the truth, it's all but irrelevant if it is the truth or not. And believing something is true does not make it so, any more than believing something is not true.
I cant even prove that your mind (not brain) exists (I cant see it, touch it or otherwise), so how do I know that you have a mind?
You don't. For all you know, I may not have a mind. For all
Re:Why do they need to put this? (Score:2, Interesting)
Why a helicopter? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Why a helicopter? (Score:5, Interesting)
This is literally a once in a lifetime chance. Why risk it trying to shave a couple of dollars?
MARS in the Early 70s (Score:4, Informative)
This sounds only a little more difficult that the recovery of drones ("UAVs" in today's parlance) during the early 70s [55srwa.org]. In this, drones would be captured in mid-air by a CH-3.
(My dad flew the CH-3 part of this set-up)
Not saying that there aren't new aspects, merely that the capability was present 30 years ago.
karma burn (Score:1)
I have a question... (Score:1)
unfortunately (Score:1)
The fate of the world rests upon that renegade capsule...
Sounds pretty tricky (Score:1)
I'd like to point out that... (Score:4, Insightful)
Silicone (Score:5, Insightful)
Together, the charged atoms captured on the capsule's disks of gold, sapphire, diamond and silicone are no bigger than a few grains of salt
Atomic element or polymer [cafepress.com], it's probably close enough. But Spaceflightnow say's it's the element Silicon [spaceflightnow.com]. And they've got a cool picture of the spacecraft.
Overheard during the "catch"... (Score:2, Funny)
(chop chop chop chop chop)
GOONIES! (Score:2)
You klutz!
I hope it's not a deposit bottle!
We've Been There, Done That (Score:2)
Dunno if the Soviets needed to try that, since they had all that empty space to bring a payload down safely and away from prying eyes.
Re:Seems like a hard way of doing things... (Score:1)
If you read the article it seems letting it land by parachute takes the chance that the samples inside the unit will get damaged.
Re:Seems like a hard way of doing things... (Score:5, Interesting)
A larger chute also mean less payload.
Everything is a tradeoff.
Re:Seems like a hard way of doing things... (Score:2)
Re:In Utah? (Score:1, Offtopic)