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From: DMcCunney on 22 May 2010 01:32 * Matthew Russotto: > In article <ht20p1$i4p$2(a)speranza.aioe.org>, > DMcCunney <plugh(a)xyzzy.com> wrote: >> * despen(a)verizon.net: >> >>> To terraform Mars we'd need to increase it's mass so it could hold an >>> atmosphere we can breath. >> >> Or modify ourselves to be something that could live there as is. >> >> It's actually a fairly common theme in SF: do you change the planet to >> suit you, or change yourself to suit the planet? > > "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man > persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all > progress is made by the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw > > And yet, it's conservatives who are against changing oneself, and > liberals who are against changing the planet. > > <ducks and runs> Define "reasonable" and "unreasonable", then decide which descriptor applies to which group. Be prepared to defend your assertions. ______ Dennis
From: DMcCunney on 22 May 2010 01:39 * William Hamblen: > Shaft and belt drives persisted after electric motors became popular. > A big electric motor replaced the steam engine. I've been in one old > woodworking factory like that. It is long gone, now. The owner was > an academically trained artist and had decorated his office with > plaster casts of eyes, noses, ears, etc. He had been trained in the > era when they had art students draw from the antique before they let > them loose on lofe drawing. Do they still do this? I wonder. SF illustrator Donato Giancola teaches at the School of Visual Arts, and introduced me to one of his students from Scandinavia. The chap wanted to do realistic painting, but had to come to the US to study. Art schools back home all emphasized free expression and abstract art. Painting something that actually *looked* like the object you were using as a model was Right Out... They seem to have forgotten the need for a foundation in the fundamentals. Look at his early work, for example, and you discover that Picasso could *draw*. > Bud ______ Dennis
From: DMcCunney on 22 May 2010 01:59 * Joe Pfeiffer: > Lewis <g.kreme(a)gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> writes: > >> In message <1b4oin4ow5.fsf(a)snowball.wb.pfeifferfamily.net> Joe >> Pfeiffer <pfeiffer(a)cs.nmsu.edu> wrote: >>> Just about the only real example of a theory that was dismissed >>> out of hand when new but well-accepted later is plate tectonics. >> >> Quarks, Quasars, The Big Bang, curved space-time, almost everything in >> astrophysics, elliptical orbits, atoms consisting of 99.9999% empty >> space, light as a particle AND a wave form, the entire field of quantum >> mechanics, global warming, warm-blooded dinosaurs, dinosaurs as bird >> ancestors, chaos theory… >> >> …the list goes on and on and on. > > You've got a *really* romanticized view of the Struggle of New Ideas. > Almost all of these were accepted off the bat when they were > demonstrated; in many cases as soon as the math was verified (curved > space-time comes to mind) or the experiment was replicated (atoms with a > small nucleus). You may have a romanticized view the other way. For example, Roman Catholic priest Georges Lemaître first described the notion that became the Big Bang in a paper published in 1927. Fred Hoyle coined the term Big Bang to describe that theory in 1949, but was himself an advocate of the Steady State school, and I don't believe the Big Bang was generally accepted till the discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation in 1964. You're mileage may differ, but I can't call that "acceptance right off the bat". ______ Dennis
From: Ahem A Rivet's Shot on 22 May 2010 02:17 On Sat, 22 May 2010 01:59:27 -0400 DMcCunney <plugh(a)xyzzy.com> wrote: > You may have a romanticized view the other way. For example, Roman > Catholic priest Georges Lemaître first described the notion that became > the Big Bang in a paper published in 1927. Fred Hoyle coined the term > Big Bang to describe that theory in 1949, but was himself an advocate of > the Steady State school, and I don't believe the Big Bang was generally > accepted till the discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation in > 1964. That was after all the first piece of direct evidence supporting the theory. > You're mileage may differ, but I can't call that "acceptance right off > the bat". If you add the "when demonstrated" back in it looks rather like it to me. -- Steve O'Hara-Smith | Directable Mirror Arrays C:>WIN | A better way to focus the sun The computer obeys and wins. | licences available see You lose and Bill collects. | http://www.sohara.org/
From: Peter Flass on 22 May 2010 07:50
Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote: > On Sat, 22 May 2010 01:59:27 -0400 > DMcCunney <plugh(a)xyzzy.com> wrote: > >> You may have a romanticized view the other way. For example, Roman >> Catholic priest Georges Lemaître first described the notion that became >> the Big Bang in a paper published in 1927. Fred Hoyle coined the term >> Big Bang to describe that theory in 1949, but was himself an advocate of >> the Steady State school, and I don't believe the Big Bang was generally >> accepted till the discovery of cosmic microwave background radiation in >> 1964. > > That was after all the first piece of direct evidence supporting > the theory. > >> You're mileage may differ, but I can't call that "acceptance right off >> the bat". > > If you add the "when demonstrated" back in it looks rather like it > to me. > Having the theory gives you the opportunity to formulate experiments which will prove or disprove it. |