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 white_light
being of love
Registered: 12/26/03
Posts: 11
Loc: everywhere..
Last seen: 20 years, 2 months
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 the bumble bee 
#2266483 - 01/23/04 04:48 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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I was talking to this woman the other day about bees. She mentioned how scientists don't know how the bumble bee is able to fly, and then I pointed out that "they" have recently discovered why it's possible because they missed something in their original calculations.
She didn't like this. She has no problem using science to show how bumble bees are supernatural, but then when science turns around and takes away the mystery, she gets defensive and starts making disparaging remarks about how those scientists should leave some mystery in the world as if there isn't an infinite supply.
It is wrong to do this.
She also thinks that magic mushrooms growing inside in a terrarrium in your closet doesn't suit them. This is a silly idea. Nothing suits them better. When I explained that magic mushrooms grow mostly in artificial environments by using examples of species and their habitats, she was dissapointed to know that people knew things about them. "It's so different from just going out into the wilderness and finding mushrooms." Meanwhile, where does she get her mushrooms? Probably through organized crime.
Do not be like the woman.
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 muhurgle
Turtles all theway down
Registered: 10/29/03
Posts: 299
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Just like how Keats accused Newton of 'unweaving the rainbow' when he published Opticks. People don't want the truth.
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"To make this mundane world sublime
Take half a gram of phanerothyme."
Aldous Huxley
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Frog
Warrior
 
Registered: 10/22/03
Posts: 4,284
Loc: The Zero Point Field
Last seen: 11 years, 2 months
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I admit that I hate being disillusioned, but I'd rather know the truth.
When I was a teen-ager, I used to enjoy going down to the beach to watch the sunsets. I loved the colors of orange and pink and purple.
One day, I was sitting there watching the sky change color, and some guy came up and initiated a conversation. We came to the topic of the color of the sky, and he told me that it was because of the smog that the sky changed into the different colors.
Sigh.
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The day will come when, after harnessing the ether, the winds, the tides, gravitation, we shall harness for God the energies of love. And, on that day, for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire. -Teilard
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NiamhNyx
I'm NOT a 'he'
Registered: 09/01/02
Posts: 3,198
Last seen: 14 years, 10 months
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I think I know what the woman is getting at, mystery makes life exciting, beautiful. Does she really think that figuring out the mechanism of bumble-bee flight is a strike against the mysterious? It hardly is! Knowing the mechanism of things doesn't strip mystery from the world, it simply gives us a reason to pretend that the mystery is gone. There is plenty that we still don't know about bumble bees, what do they think about? What sort of emtotions do they have? There is plenty we'll never understand through science.
The universe is infinitly mysterious and there is (probably) nothing humans can ever do to change that. Therefore there is no reason to get upset over that particular item.
One goal of science has been to demystify the world, but that's simply not possible since science can ONLY understand mechanics and not meaning or motivation. In that sense science is no threat.
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Dankman
Headphone Wizard
Registered: 06/24/02
Posts: 2,660
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Re: the bumble bee [Re: NiamhNyx]
#2267087 - 01/23/04 10:48 PM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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If she doesn't want to know the mysteries of the universe all she has to do is ignore science articles and such. I don't see why she cares if anyone else knows. 
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"There was a dirty rainbow coming out of the fucking toilet" - 40 Oz.
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djd586
Underpants Gnome
Registered: 02/03/03
Posts: 1,655
Last seen: 14 years, 1 month
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Where did she get the information that scientists do not know how bees fly? I specifically remember studying social insects as a grad student. I studied the behavior of insects such as bees and wasps on a daily basis. Learning the basic mechanism of insect flight was one of the first things I had to learn.
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Phase 1... collect underpants... phase 2...??? ... Phase 3 - PROFIT!
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Kokserek
newbie
Registered: 01/18/04
Posts: 31
Last seen: 20 years, 2 months
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Re: the bumble bee [Re: djd586]
#2267457 - 01/24/04 02:19 AM (20 years, 2 months ago) |
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the bumble bee wasn't understood for a long time. The ratio of weight to wing size or something like that was off, but not anymore. It used to be a mystery people used to promote whatever ideas they were in the business of promoting.
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger
Registered: 03/12/02
Posts: 24,855
Loc: Pandurn
Last seen: 1 year, 2 months
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The funny thing about life is that you start out with nothing. Then we start to pick up the pieces. We set out on this search as humans to start to fill in the unknown....
The trouble comes when we either make assumptions about things we do not know or we hold onto stuff that we "know" when something else comes and replaces it.
There is always going to be some unforseen variable that comes and makes itself known, and it is going to adjust our knowledge, the way we look at things. The more open we are to taking in these new variables, the more open to reality we are.....
Peace.
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If I should die this very moment
I wouldn't fear
For I've never known completeness
Like being here
Wrapped in the warmth of you
Loving every breath of you
  
 
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