http://qs1969.pair.com?node_id=277846
Moriarty's user image
User since: Jul 25, 2003 at 12:03 UTC (21 years ago)
Last here: Jan 17, 2014 at 01:29 UTC (10 years ago)
Experience: 18670
Level:Abbot (19)
Writeups: 128
Location:Lavington NSW Australia
Purveyor of:Fine Cheeses, Chocolates and Marshmallows.
User's localtime: Mar 29, 2024 at 18:35 AEDT
Scratchpad: View
For this user:Search nodes
Watch for posts by this user

Since there are plenty of people who now know my RL name, I figured it was time to fly a different banner. For those that would like more information about me, pay a visit to my blog (you may even see my RL name there :)

Welcome to Moriarty's Fine Food Emporium

This is where you can make a purchase of Cheese, Chocolate or Marshmallows before wandering the hallowed halls of the monastery. It is advised that you make your purchase now, especially if you intend to enter the Chatterbox, as there is a dragon that frequents this monastery and she is in the habit of eating newcomers but will allow them to pass if they are in possession of an appropriate offering.

For those that prefer their treats to be a little colder, you could always visit bobf's Ice Cream Shoppe :)

Please excuse the state of this establishment as it is under constant renovation


Place of Birth:
Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, UK

Citizenship:
Australian (by choice)

Languages - Spoken:
English, Esperanto (Mi lernas) & Strine1

Languages - Written (in order of competency):
C, English, IBS2, Perl, Modular 2, BASIC (various dialects), HTML, Esperanto, C++, Java, Z80 Assembler.

Current Employment Status
Unemmployed, looking for work.

Religious Affiliation & Position Held
The Salvation Army, Soldier3, bandsman (Trombone, although I still play baritone music)

Notable achievements on PM

Other Achievements

1The question was asked 'what is strine?', so here is the answer (as best I can describe it :-).

Strine is a way of speaking rather than a separate language. The idea is to say as much as possible using as few syllables as possible. Hence the 3 syllable word 'Australian' becomes the single syllable word 'strine'.

The other method of shortening speech is to take out the spaces, eg 'How are you this fine day, my friend?' becomes 'Howyagoinmate?' or 'did you have a wonderful weekend' becomes 'didjahavagoodweekend'.

2IBS (Intelligent Billing System) is an in house markup language developed by the company I used work for.

3For those interested in knowing part of what is involved in becoming a soldier in the Salvation Army, reading our Articles of war may help.


Unfinished Projects


Completed Projects (within last 12 months)


CAUTION: What follows was started after seeing the reaction to an anti-evolutionist comment I made on the CB and the willingness of some to debate the details with me and stems from my belief in a God who is powerful enough to create the universe and everything in it in the blink of an eye, even making it look as if it had been around for millennia, but chose instead to create it in six days, pronounce it "good", and then rested for a day, rather than a god who is limited to manipulating genetic codes and natural phenomena over millions of years.

Semi-Random Thoughts & Quotable Quotes


Questions for Evolutionists

* It seems that the jury is still out as to whether or not the substance found in the bone is hemoglobin, however, there are other questions that arise from find a bone that has supposedly been buried for a long time that hasn't been fully fossilized. Since it has been discovered that it takes such a short time for objects buried to become fossilized (less than 50 years), how could this bone be buried for so long and not be completely fossilized?


Debating Evolution V Creation

dragonchild and I have been having a small debate and I have decided to put my main arguments here, but first, a couple links.

These are articles in an email newsletter from Koinonia House

Did Life Evolve? Defining Evolution

The Supernatural Origin of Biblical Texts

Genome Scientist Finds God (For people interested in statistics there are some that may be of interest at the end of this article)

I have heard some people include the breeding of certain animals (dogs, cats, etc) in evolution, and then extend that to an explanation of how modern man 'evolved' from single celled animals created in a 'primordial soup'. This is the problem I have with this, you can breed all sorts of animals, for example dogs, and all you end up with is more of the species but with particular attributes. Dogs can be bred in all shapes, sizes and colours, and can even be bred for temperament, but the resultant animal is still a dog and can still be bred with other dogs (of any breed). No new species is developed by this sort of breeding.

To extend that to “macro-evolution”, and believe that an amoeba can change into a fish into a lizard into an ape and then into a human, requires a leap of faith that I'm unwilling to take, especially since there is no direct evidence in the fossil record.

Continuing on with the fossil record, what does it take to create a fossil? When I went to school, I was taught that the normal forces of nature covered the remains of the dead animals over a period of time and they then remained buried for millennia.

The first problem I have with this teaching is that the normal forces of nature that move dirt around are very abrasive and would destroy the remains before burying them.

The second is that these forces of nature tend to try flatten the landscape by pushing (blowing/washing) the dirt (and anything it contains into the valleys and out to sea. Why then are so many fossils found at relatively high altitudes and at some distance from the sea?

I went on a school excursion to place where many fossils could be readily found in a road cutting. Most of the fossils we found appeared to be marine based (seashells, tiny fish, etc) yet we were 1500+ feet above sea level, and there was no evidence of dramatic upheaval of the land. How did they get there?

Recent discoveries indicate that a relatively short time is required to fossilize something (fossils of things buried by the last eruption of Mt St Helens were discovered a mere 20 years after it erupted, fossilized miners hats have been dug up from mines that had been flooded some 50 years previous) and that rapid burial is the main requirement.

Some of the possible means by which rapid burial can be achieved would be a meteor strike kicking up large quantities of dirt, volcanic eruptions, & floods, so I will examine this a little closer.

Since not all fossils are buried on a single level, one might assume that there were several events that happened over a period of time, however, I understand that several of the larger fossils actually overlap (especially petrified trees), which would seem to indicate that they were buried at the same time, which in turn would indicate a single cataclysmic event.

The fallout from a meteor hit or volcanic eruption would tend to bury everything at ground level, only a flood would allow the remains to settle a various levels along with the dirt.

The recent hurricanes that devastated so much of America flooded low lying areas (I hear that much of New Orleans is below sea level), mainly in the delta regions of the rivers, whereas fossils can be found miles inland at elevations in excess of 1000 feet. If a flood of the type caused by hurricanes and other natural phenomena had occurred that far inland, surely the fossils would have been washed into the delta regions of the rivers that flooded, and therefore be found closer to sea level.

Some of the fossils are of trees. I have heard some say that these were buried over thousands of years as new trees grew next to them only to be buried with the older trees (is there anywhere on earth where this is happening?), thus forming petrified forests, however, a study of these petrified trees shows that they weren't growing where they now stand as there is no root ball on any of the trees. The ring structure of the trees also indicates that the trees were all growing at approximately the same time. Add to that what is happening to the forest of trees that Mt St Helens knocked over and deposited in a nearby lake, all the bark has been rubbed off and deposited on bottom (possibly to form a new coal deposit) and most of the logs, as they become water logged, are sinking to the bottom in an upright position. Some scientists are now saying that this is how the petrified forests were formed.

Studies of the Himalayan mountains indicate that the movement of the continental plates is pushing them upwards. It would be logical to assume that somewhere under the oceans a trench is getting deeper or wider. This would seem to indicate that the oceans may have been much shallower and the sea levels somewhat higher (1000+ feet? I don't think so.) than they are now, making it much easier for a world wide flood.

To me, the amount of dirt deposited in various places around the world, the fossils spanning multiple layers and over-lapping, and the placement of the fossils so far from the sea indicate a flood of such cataclysmic proportions that, if it didn't cover every piece of land on the planet, it came damn close.

Ultimately, whether you believe that the fossil record is a evidence of evolution over a long period of time, evidence of a world wide flood or other natural disaster, or evidence that a bunch of marauding aliens invaded earth, wiping out a peaceful civilization of dragons, so that they could use the planet for a dumping ground for the unwanted members of their society (criminals, phone sanitizers, advertising gurus, etc), is completely up to the individual. I will continue to believe the Bible.