The Random Thread.

[bogfrog]

 

thanks CBL, fantastic point.

[SunChaser]

A few years back I was in Halls Creek WA and came across this awesome book at the information centre called “Jandamarra and the Bunuba resistance”, which I decided to buy. I’d been camping just out of Halls Creek for a while and was about to start heading to Broome.

Anyway, I arrived at Fitzroy Crossing just at that stunning time the of day in that vast ancient region, where the suns just hitting the horizon and it’s nearly always like a perfect 24 degrees with that soft calming wind just breezing though. So I decided to stop at the supermarket to grab something unhealthy to eat, just to work though the downer I felt coming on, lol.

When I’d left the supermarket and was walking back to my car I noticed this 4wd , with a few really healthy looking aboriginals blokes (which is unfortunately not that common up there) standing around it as if they were guarding (or watching over) the occupant of the 4wd. Sitting in the car was this old aboriginal lady who was staring straight at me, not smiling, nor was she frowning, just looking straight at me. I smiled back at her like I would any nice old lady and continued to my car, you could just tell she was someone important, for some reason.

So, once I got back to my car, which was still locked like I’d left it, I got in and straight away realised that my revision mirror had been moved. I quickly checked if my tobacco, change and anything worth stealing had been taken, which it hadn’t. Then I looked behind me to see if there were any little punks hanging around the carpark, but all I saw was that same old aboriginal lady still staring straight at me, but this time with a huge smile on her face, then all of a sudden, this powerful feeling of euphoria just hit me like a bag of bricks to the head. I just fell back into my car seat and was like ‘WTF’ just happened there, then looked back into revision mirror, which I hadn’t moved back to it’s right position and it was pointed directly so I was looking straight at the book I’d bought earlier, which was sitting on top of all my shit in the back seat of my car.

Later on when I was reading the book I learnt that Fitzroy Crossing was actually a town set up specifically for the Bunuba people, which I thought was another incredible irony to the whole experience.

From a logical point of view, I had been outbush for a long time, hadn’t been sleeping and probably hadn’t been eating an appropriate amount of calories. So I suppose it could have been some kind of psychosis bought on by exhaustion, lol. But it was hands down the most mystical experience I’ve ever witnessed, with to me felt supernatural.

To be honest, I don’t really know what happened, nor has that experience made me believe in the supernatural and even if this old lady did have the power to influence a persons emotional state by just looking at them, I’m lost to why she would bother doing it to me, I mean, who am I to her.

One thing is for sure though, it is some really amazing country out that way, which has the power to influence you in a way that people who consider camping as cramming there luxury caravan into an over priced crowded caravan park will probably never experience.

Lol, sorry about the long rant, just something I’ve never really talked about before, since it kind of blows my strict ‘there’s always a logical explanation’ philosophy to life right out of the water.

Peace

[SunChaser]

Double post!!

Edited August 25, 2013 by SunChaser

[whitewind]

Hey Sunchaser, that's an amazing story. Sometimes I forget why I am on these forums, and then a story like this comes along and reminds me of what I have lost for now, but it is still real out there and one day I will be able to reconnect. Living in the city is not conducive to these things - it is a desert for the real experiences like this back where nature still has it's hold and people are still in tune.

There is nothing supernatural about what you have just seen, it is nature as it is supposed to be and we have forgotten how it all works. Treasure such experiences and look out for them. Indeed, if you accept them as given you will be able to create such experiences by yourself.

[whitewind]

I honestly don't understand this. I need to think about it a bit more.

The Monty Hall problem is a probability puzzle, loosely based on the American television game show Let's Make a Deal and named after its original host, Monty Hall. The problem was originally posed in a letter by Steve Selvin to the American Statistician in 1975 (Selvin 1975a), (Selvin 1975b). It became famous as a question from a reader's letter quoted in Marilyn vos Savant's "Ask Marilyn" column in Parade magazine in 1990 (vos Savant 1990a):

Suppose you're on a game show, and you're given the choice of three doors: Behind one door is a car; behind the others, goats. You pick a door, say No. 1, and the host, who knows what's behind the doors, opens another door, say No. 3, which has a goat. He then says to you, "Do you want to pick door No. 2?" Is it to your advantage to switch your choice?

Vos Savant's response was that the contestant should switch to the other door. (vos Savant 1990a)

The argument relies on assumptions, explicit in extended solution descriptions given by Selvin (1975a) and by vos Savant (1991a), that the host always opens a different door from the door chosen by the player and always reveals a goat by this action—because he knows where the car is hidden. Leonard Mlodinow stated: "The Monty Hall problem is hard to grasp, because unless you think about it carefully, the role of the host goes unappreciated." (Mlodinow 2008)

Contestants who switch have a 2/3 chance of winning the car, while contestants who stick have only a 1/3 chance. One way to see this is to notice that there is a 2/3 chance that the initial choice of the player is a door hiding a goat. When that is the case, the host is forced to open the other goat door, and the remaining closed door hides the car. "Switching" only fails to give the car when the player had initially picked the door hiding the car, which only happens one third of the time.

Many readers of vos Savant's column refused to believe switching is beneficial despite her explanation. After the problem appeared in Parade, approximately 10,000 readers, including nearly 1,000 with PhDs, wrote to the magazine claiming vos Savant was wrong (Tierney 1991). Even when given explanations, simulations, and formal mathematical proofs, many people still do not accept that switching is the best strategy (vos Savant 1991a). Paul Erdős, one of the most prolific mathematicians in history, remained unconvinced until he was shown a computer simulation confirming the predicted result (Vazsonyi 1999).

The Monty Hall problem has attracted academic interest from the surprising result and simple formulation. Variations of the Monty Hall problem are easily made by changing the implied assumptions, creating drastically different consequences. If Monty only offers the contestant a chance to switch when having initially chosen the car, then the contestant should never switch. If Monty opens another door randomly and happens to reveal a goat, then it makes no difference (Rosenthal, 2005a), (Rosenthal, 2005b).

The problem is a paradox of the veridical type, because the correct result (you should switch doors) is at first sight ludicrous, but is nevertheless demonstrably true. The Monty Hall problem is mathematically closely related to the earlier Three Prisoners problem and to the much older Bertrand's box paradox.

[Leaves]

The crazy people a few doors up had another 4 hour long fight at 2am in the morning again. Man they are retarded idiots! I can't understand how anyone can manage to have a fight for 4 hours and not end up dead. Weak

[Leaves]

Sunchaser, people have the ability to project Love onto others to the point of completely healing them of all illness, people nowadays term this as a miracle but it really is just the power of Love The elder must have known you are a good white boy She was a wise elder indeed.

Edited August 25, 2013 by Leaves

[bogfrog]

Hahaha i lost a library book called "being responsible"

[whitewind]

Haha

Just checking to see who had the largest post count.

Some very strange results ensued.

I'm not sure what it says, but some people spend

way too much on the internet I reckon.

Myself included, rather embarrassingly.

[SunChaser]

I'm not sure what it says, but some people spend

way too much on the internet I reckon.

Myself included, rather embarrassingly.

Not me! I've actually got a pretty good deal going with my provider.

[bogfrog]

The Judas Race: America’s Wars and Organized Religion

"Americans stamp “In God we trust” on money. Pray tell?, what do they trust God to do? And has anyone ever checked to see if He/She/It is doing it or even ever has? Certainly, Americans do not expect He/Her/It to bring victory in battle. The outcome of America’s wars since the end of WWII has not been especially favorable; yet war is a frequent and normal American activity (see list) in spite of James Madison’s warning:

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes … known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.… No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.”

But America is not alone. In the Encyclopedia of Wars, Phillips and Axelrod present a comprehensive list of 1,763 wars. Many of these wars have religious aspects.

Warfare and organized religion have arisen together; the ability to fight wars is part of any tribal structure that is capable of supporting concerted, large-scale enterprises.

In the ancient world, each city state had its own ruling and protecting god. Warfare between these cities was conceived of as warfare between the cities’ gods. People, like ants, lived for the sake of the tribe.

Although America calls itself a “secular” nation, claiming to “trust in God” is a throwback to earlier eras in human history. Is this God in whom we trust supposed to be our protector? Is the War on Terror a religious, a holy war, a bellum sacrum, a war between gods? Is it a cultural war? In spite of all the denials, this war could very easily be called the Ninth Crusade. European wars against Muslims have always have always been cultural about expelling Islam from the “Holy Land,” where, in fact, nothing is holy, These wars are battles between incompatible cultures. Why is this war on terror different? In fact, the U.N.’s placement in of Israel in Palestine could have been just another attempt to attain the goal denied to the West’s warfare, and the West’s defense of Israel, just another attempt to hold on to the conquests of the Eight Days War. Trouble is, its not working out very well. Instead of conquering the region, we have converted it into a perpetual battlefield.

When societies were small and principally tribal, protecting the city was synonymous with protecting its people. The destruction of the city could very well result in the tribe’s annihilation, but today’s societies (nations) come and go, often entailing much killing, without that consequence. Their tribal diversity makes that impossible. For instance, the Republic of Vietnam vanished at the end of the Vietnamese War but the people who survived the war live on. The claim that Israel has a right to secure borders when the even United states lacks them is ludicrous. America’s insecure borders are legion as any border guard will tell you.

In the Southern United States where church fires are frequent, it is held that the building’s destruction doesn’t affect the church itself which, it is also claimed, is its congregation, its people. Modern nation states are much more like congregations than tribes. Why haven’t nation states come to be thought of as these churches are; as their peoples, not their territories? Is America a land mass in North America or is it the people, its citizens? This ambiguity is revealing. When we send Americans to war to defend America, exactly what are we defending? Certainly not those we send. Are we merely killing our own people? To preserve a nation without preserving its people seems to be nonsensical unless some people are the protected while others are the protectors, which might very well be the case. Do some of us exist for the sake of others?

Since 1095, Christians was been at war with Muslims. Westerners fought and essentially lost the Crusades. They fought the Ottoman Empire. The Nigerian Civil War, the Second Sudanese Civil War, the Lebanese Civil War, the wars against the Palestinians, the revolution in Iran that installed the Shah, the wars in Iraq, and Afghanistan and the killing in Pakistan, Syria, Lebanon. Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and parts of North Africa. All have been religious wars by Western “Christians” against Moslems trying to reorganize the world’s societies to conform to western standards.

Many pro-westerners would ask, what’s wrong with that? The answer is it’s inhumane. Western society has its virtues, many of which are being destroyed in this attempt to bring about institutional homogeny. Will you have any freedoms when one way is the only way? But wasn’t America said to be founded on individuality?

America’s decline is well-known to any astute person. Fareed Zakaria wrote a article about it for Time Magazine in 2011. He asks, “Are America’s Best Days Behind Us?”, and writes, “most Americans operate on the assumption that the U.S. is still No. 1. But is it? . . . our 15-year-olds rank 17th in the world in science and 25th in math. We rank 12th among developed countries in college graduation . . . . We come in 79th in elementary-school enrollment. Our infrastructure is ranked 23rd in the world. . . . American health numbers are stunning for a rich country: . . . we’re 27th in life expectancy, 18th in diabetes and first in obesity. . . .”

What is America best at? America has the most guns, the most crime among rich countries, the highest incarceration rate and the largest total prison population, the largest amount of debt, the largest economy (which merely means Americans buy more stuff than other people), and the most powerful military. And, Oh, yes: “The United States has produced most of the greatest movies that the world has ever seen.” Isn’t that wonderful? Aren’t you proud to be an American? Don’t you want the whole world to be like us?

The sad thing is that Islam also has its faults, but, of course, Muslims don’t think so. To them, Islam is the way of life given to mankind by Allah. Therefore it is a perfect way of life, with no error, since Allah has no faults.

But Islam is authoritarian, its people have no rights, civil or human, and it is deterministic since the individual’s sole purpose is to identify and carry out God’s plan. A person is merely a cog in God’s machine.

So the human race’s prospects for the outcome of this war are dismal. Neither Islam nor Western “Christianity” nor any religiously based proposal will rescue us. Only humanism will. Trusting in God is futile. God no longer lurks on Olympus. What needs to be defended is not a country or even wealth; it is the Earth’s environment and the human race itself.

The West is in a mad dash to accumulate the emptiness of its pantheon. Everything is measured in terms of money, but money has no natural value. Its value is entirely artificial. It shelters nothing, sates no hungry stomach, relieves no suffering. All it does is buy things that the real producers of wealth, the generic people, make, the people without whom no society could succeed. Rid the world of financiers and the electricity still will come on. Rid the world of electrical workers and the bankers cannot function, which indicates that Western Society is not organic. It is an amalgamation of analytic elements which barely work together because it has no humane goal. This society accumulates money, somewhat as a game, that has no use for it when it is accumulated. Billionaires who acquire fortunes come and go. Little good is done with their money. It’s just thirty more pieced of silver. Those that have some sense of charity set up foundations to search for worthy causes to give their money to while overlooking the needs staring them in the face.

Andrew Carnegie built Americans local libraries. It was thought to be a wonderful ilea, but these libraries failed to make Americans into better people. Others funded transactional charities to enhance their family’s stature. Still others search for ways to fund promising discoveries. None has ever enhanced human life substantially, Mr. Gates, the cure for cancer may never be found, Charity promises no results.

Balzac writes that, behind every fortune lies a great crime. It is worse. Being acquired for no human goal, fortunes are acquired by insane people just to the fun of it. Their fortunes guarantee them nothing. They die no older than the rest of us, diseases don’t bypass them, their children often turn out bad, their marriages fail. Balzac also is right when he writes, if there is a scheme worthy of our kind it is that of transforming human beings into moral persons. Unless the welfare of each individual human becomes the concern of the human race, the human race will choke on its wealth and perish, and if life on Earth survives, it will murmur “good riddance.”

John Kozy is a retired professor of philosophy and logic who writes on social, political, and economic issues. After serving in the U.S. Army during the Korean War, he spent 20 years as a university professor and another 20 years working as a writer. He has published a textbook in formal logic commercially, in academic journals and a small number of commercial magazines, and has written a number of guest editorials for newspapers. His on-line pieces can be found on http://www.jkozy.com/ and he can be emailed from that site’s homepage.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-judas-race/5347112

[qualia]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenna

geek trivia

lena

[bℓσωηG]

The Open Wiki-base for Practical Plants

http://practicalplants.org/wiki/Practical_Plants

[Bigred]

The lord of the rings is so gay

[bogfrog]

WTF.. I was just walking to uni and i noticed this skinhead woman who was approaching every person in her path and saying something to them which reliably seemed to make ppl get out their wallets.

I couldn't quite hear what she was saying, but it was quite evident that she was asking every person for money. She must have approached atleast 15 different people in the space of one block, seemingly playing off the awkwardness which ensued to catch people off guard and get them to hand over their money. I heard her say to one guy "i don't get paid until tomorrow", so she obviously has some kind of income, yet feels totally entitled to go around asking for handouts from complete strangers!

I mean I know our economic system is royally fucked, but FFS, I can't imagine just expecting random people on the street to give me money because i don't get paid until the next day

[whoami]

I agree Ceres. I kinda feel like that about most able bodied people who consistently bludge off the hard work of others because they refuse to do anything for themselves. ie hippies stealing baskets and baskets of fruit from an orchard on their way past. sure the whole point of growing healthy organic food is so everyone has good solid tucker but when it gets taken by people running in at night guerilla style, who did zilch to contribute to bringing it into existence its a bit freakin annoying

[Amazonian]

If we had a competition for 'The Largest Carrot' , then 'Miss 12' would win. She planted a single carrot seed at school in a cup, and when it sprouted, she brought it home. So we planted the seedling in the garden bed and as it grew over the months, 'Miss 12' was insistent we leave it grow even longer . After ages she decided it was time to harvest the carrot. (I knew it was going to be a freak).

This is the carrot ... 1.8 kg. I wonder if we should juice it ?!

[Distracted]

DEAR LORD, KILL IT BY FIRE!

[Leaves]

Vanilla bean tea makes me happy

[Bigred]

this is the perfect breakup song

 

[coolname]

check out the awesome carrot i grew. im pretty sure its a boy

[etherealdrifter]

when i was a tacker, i remember visiting my cousins and one of them had a dragster 3 speed malvern star t shift. he crunched his nut sack in a crash and when we come to visit, my auntie made him pull his pants down and showed everybody the carnage.

All i remember is a mercury chromed ball sack.

ah the indignity

[J Smith]

I was just walking to uni and i noticed this skinhead woman who was approaching every person in her path and saying something to them which reliably seemed to make ppl get out their wallets.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awK0NrgHUbk&sns=em

Edited September 22, 2013 by madhouses visites

[Distracted]

The compounds are betacyanins, and what is interesting about them is that the Order Cactales and some in the Order Caryophyllales (anyone know what these are?) have betacyanins instead of anthocyanins.. anyway, here's the text from Benson, 1982, pp 70 and 104. [Kari's comments in brackets]


"In all but two orders of flowering plants, coloring ranging from near red to near blue (violet to purple) is due to pigments called anthocyanins [antho = flower, cyan = blue]. These change color from an acid to a basic medium just as litmus paper does [like the flowers of hydrangea]. Colors ranging from yellow to orange may be due to the related anthoxanthins [xanthus = yellow in latin]. During the last few years, a group of chemically unrelated pigments have been found, so far as investigated, to produce parallel results in most of the families of the Caryophyllales and in the Cactales. These are betalains -- betacyanins corresponding in color to anthocyanins and betaxanthins to anthoxanthins. However, the betalains containnitrogen; the anthocyanins and anthoxanthins do not. Anthoxanthins and betaxanthins often occur in the same species or individual, but the occurrence together of betacyanins and anthocyanins has been reported only once. The presence of betacyains rather than anthocyanins is a significant taxonomic character, because it is restricted to the Caryophyllales (except the Caryophyllaceae and the subfamily Molluginoideae of the Aizoaceae) and to the Cactales."

further...about preserving/preparing specimens...

"...betacyanins in cacti produce colors in the magenta series, and these are altered according to the acidity or alkalinity of the cell sap. Thus, they tend toward red in an acid medium and toward blue in an alkaline one. No matter how the pressing of a specimen has been done, these dissolved [water-soluble] pigments will not retain the original color; they turn to a dull blue. However, the presence of these pigments is indicated by the blue, even though it is altered from the original color."

[bℓσωηG]

anyone seen this movie yet? wondering if its worth a watch , maybe for the subject matter alone

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2332579/