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Topic: Cool Comic Booklets. (Read 103699 times)
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Lukipela
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The Ancient One
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Okay, WOBBLE, I'll buy; but that's not the orbit. Climate stabilization? I don't know if that would be helpful or counterproductive, actually. Always shaking everybody up sure would prevent stagnation.
My mistake, I got my terms mixed up.
As for the radiation --
later on that page, a debate cropped up in which folks pointed out that the atmosphere does almost all of our radiation shielding. Several points they raised:
1) the space station is well within the Earth's magnetic field (effectively at the surface as far as it's concerned) but gets large doses of radiation compared to the surface.
2) cosmic rays are the bulk of this radiation, and that is so thoroughly blocked by the atmosphere that cosmic ray observatories have to be put on very tall mountains to see anything at all; and using high-flying balloons is even more common.
Fair enough. From my limited understanding, I was under the impression that the magnetic field also diverts a lot of radiation around the planet, rather than absorbing it, and that all this radiation might be too much for the atmosphere to stop. But I've beeen known to be wrong before  Perhaps it will satisfy you if I simply add "a oxygen based protective atmosphere" to the list of parameters instead?
After reading all this I think it is fair to say that this is a shitstorm of ego...
Thank you for your valuable contribution, I'm sure we will all take your opinion into serious consideration.
EDIT: Oh, and I suppose this quote would fit quite well here
That's where many discussions go wrong, and can turn out very long and pointless:
people using different definitions. It doesn't matter what definition you use ("a fruit is whatever you find in the fruit department"), as long as both parties are using the same definition.
That's why in discussions I often ask for an explicit definition of terms, something which not everyone always appreciates.
The definitions of rebuttal, science, theory and evidence seem to be very different from person to person in this thread.
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« Last Edit: July 13, 2006, 09:09:59 pm by Lukipela »
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What's up doc?
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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Oxygen is unnecessary. Any gas will do, if it is dense enough.
The magnetic field most definitely does have an effect on the cosmic radiation, but it only cuts it in half or so, which is not terribly significant. It also creates the stable van allen belts, which are... less friendly an effect, though irrelevant to evolution.
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Lukipela
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The Ancient One
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Oxygen is unnecessary. Any gas will do, if it is dense enough.
The list, if you recall, was parameters required for life (as we know it), not simply parameters required to stop radiation. Both being protective and being oxygen based are necessary requirements, removing ne or the other would make all aerobic life impossible.
Come to think of it, that is actually quite a good illustration for RT to ponder over. If I recall correctly, when life evolved oxygen was not an requirement, but rather a poison for most lifeforms. Many lifeforms adapted to this, and could not survive without oxygen today. From an ID point of view, you could then argue that the part of the genetic code that handles oxygen breathing is a clear indication that either a) The Designer came back after his initial startup and tweaked the code. or b) The ability to use oxygen actually evolved among the microbes of the time, indicating that some rather radical evolution is possible.
The magnetic field most definitely does have an effect on the cosmic radiation, but it only cuts it in half or so, which is not terribly significant. It also creates the stable van allen belts, which are... less friendly an effect, though irrelevant to evolution.
So is it a common misconception that the magnetic field is more important than it is? I seem to recall reading this in several different books. Or is this something that has been established (fairly) recently?
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What's up doc?
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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The magnetic field only protects against cosmic rays. The solar wind isn't dangerous in the first place, and all other radiation is uncharged and so is unaffected.
We have been aware that cosmic rays barely penetrate to sea level since we knew that they existed.
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RTyp06
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Well I was going to bow out of this conversation (since Novus wrapped it up quite fairly and nicely), until I saw this:
Come to think of it, that is actually quite a good illustration for RT to ponder over. If I recall correctly, when life evolved oxygen was not an requirement, but rather a poison for most lifeforms. Many lifeforms adapted to this, and could not survive without oxygen today.
Now Luki, I've always shown you respect and always will but this made me chuckle. I'm not sure where you gained this recollection, but I'm unaware of it. Oxygen can be considered a corrosive and reacts to many chemicals, but since nobody knows for sure that plants came first and honestly, nobody knows the innerworkings of the earliest cells, there's not much there to ponder.
Some of the earliest known animal fossils are trilobites from the Cambrian era and they had gills like modern fish.(btw Fish gills don't split oxgyen from H20 like photosynthisis does, but rather filters dissolved oxygen from water.)
Plants and some bacteria use photosynthisis wich produces oxygen and are found alongside the earliest known animals. Furthermore, even if plants did come first, it's a strech of the imagination ( at least to me) to think plants randomly and spontaneously evolved the ability to start breathing oxygen.
This is especially a problem if oxygen is considered a poison as you suggest. This would represent a complete revamp of the photsynthisis system that served plants so well. Does it really seem plauasable that plants would suddenly and completely change their successful ways without any sort of guidance?
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RTyp06
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One other thing I wanted to point out to who ever said any gas will shield the earth from radiation.
o3 (ozone) in particular shields the earth from harmful radiation. Radiation cleaves o3 into o2(oxygen).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozone_layer
"Although the concentration of ozone in the ozone layer is very small, it is vitally important to life because it absorbs biologically harmful ultraviolet (UV) radiation emitted from the Sun."
It might also be interesting to note that oxidization of minerals has been found abundantly throughout ALL the geologic strata. This would seem to counter evolutionary scientists who predict an oxygen free, reducing atmosphere for the first chemestry of life.
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Lukipela
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Now Luki, I've always shown you respect and always will but this made me chuckle. I'm not sure where you gained this recollection, but I'm unaware of it. Oxygen can be considered a corrosive and reacts to many chemicals, but since nobody knows for sure that plants came first and honestly, nobody knows the innerworkings of the earliest cells, there's not much there to ponder.
Well, I was actually thinking of this. The point I was trying to make was there are in fact several systems on Earth, where oxygen is sometimes required, sometimes only helpful, and sometimes anathema to life. It doesn't really matter which way you want to view it. Either oxygen was always present, and some creatures just never started utilizing it, or oxygen came later, and some creatures did not find it necessary to adapt at all.
My point was simply that for someone who believes that all life was designed from the beginning, and that one species cannot change in any way that is not purely cosmetic, one would then have to wonder whay several systems were implemented in the first place. Unless your designer was a wee bit incompetent, and decided upon this while he was busy filling those pesky eukaryotic cells with junk DNA in the evenings.
On the other hand, if creatures evolve to fit their enviroments, it makes much more sense that they use oxygen only to the extent they need, and that some cannot abide it since it isn't present in their natural enviroment.
Of course, if you want to make the argument that we cannot possibly fathom the way our designer worked, feel free. They do seem to be mysterious.
Plants and some bacteria use photosynthisis wich produces oxygen and are found alongside the earliest known animals. Furthermore, even if plants did come first, it's a strech of the imagination ( at least to me) to think plants randomly and spontaneously evolved the ability to start breathing oxygen.
And again, this hinges on you assuming that all plants and creatures where designed and sprinkled over the earth, along with prokaryotic microbes. I may have been incorrect to utter my assumptions, I simply assumed that even though you believe life was designed, you didn't believe that all current animals coexisted with the earliest fossiles we've found. If we assume that microvbes came first, wether or not plants came first doesn't really matter.
This is especially a problem if oxygen is considered a poison as you suggest. This would represent a complete revamp of the photsynthisis system that served plants so well. Does it really seem plauasable that plants would suddenly and completely change their successful ways without any sort of guidance?
Unless we take into account that most of our oxygen actually comes from small microbes in the sea, who were probably there before plants made it onto dry land.
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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Okay, that too; either way, it's not that we can't come up with anything to breathe out.
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RTyp06
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Well, I was actually thinking of this. The point I was trying to make was there are in fact several systems on Earth, where oxygen is sometimes required, sometimes only helpful, and sometimes anathema to life. It doesn't really matter which way you want to view it. Either oxygen was always present, and some creatures just never started utilizing it, or oxygen came later, and some creatures did not find it necessary to adapt at all.
This is what is puzzling about life to me. It fills every niche possible. If there is a way for it to "make a living", it does. Without exception. Wether it's volcanic vents deep in the ocean, deep underground,high in the tallest mountains, or high in the atmosphere near the stratosphere.. It's there, everywhere.
My point was simply that for someone who believes that all life was designed from the beginning, and that one species cannot change in any way that is not purely cosmetic, one would then have to wonder whay several systems were implemented in the first place. Unless your designer was a wee bit incompetent, and decided upon this while he was busy filling those pesky eukaryotic cells with junk DNA in the evenings.
I think life is endowed with the ability to change to meet enviornmental challenges not just cosmetic changes. These changes are limited and, imo, transponson genes / introns are 99.9% responsible.
http://healthfully.org/medicalscience/id10.html
http://www.livescience.com/humanbiology/050615_jumping_genes.html
Transposable genes are why we each have unique features, even unique brains. These genes gently scramble the genetic information in a true darwinian sense but never in a harmful way. Scientists are baffled by this. Chance and nessescity can't account for these convieniences any more than it can account for chemical coded life in the first place.
I don't think a creator is constantly making new animals and new paths. I think life was thouroughly thought out ahead of time. Perhaps the earth was terraformed by life. Every animal we see may have been previously figured out at the beginning and allowed enough limited diversity to fullfill every niche imaginable. How new body plans come about is a mystery, perhaps it is indeed evolution, just that the scientific evidence doesn't seem to point there. At least not in the darwinian, blind, trial and error sense.
And again, this hinges on you assuming that all plants and creatures where designed and sprinkled over the earth, along with prokaryotic microbes. I may have been incorrect to utter my assumptions, I simply assumed that even though you believe life was designed, you didn't believe that all current animals coexisted with the earliest fossiles we've found. If we assume that microvbes came first, wether or not plants came first doesn't really matter.
Well plants and animals have a certain symbiont relationship. Oxygen breathing animals exhale CO2 which plants asorb and utilize. If CO2 ever gets out of control you have a greenhouse effect like that found on venus. Likewise, plants and plankton are responsible for keeping oxygen plentiful. Without oxygen, no air breathing life and no ozone to protect us from harmful radiation. Kinda funny how it works this way, coincidence? Perhaps the symbiont relationship is why plants and animals are so successful in the first place. In every geologic strata where there is fossilized flora, there is fossilized fauna and vice versa.. Without exception.
Unless we take into account that most of our oxygen actually comes from small microbes in the sea, who were probably there before plants made it onto dry land.
Very true but those microbes are plankton that live within the top meter of the ocean's surface and use photosynthsis to break oxygen from water. If earth was like say mars, with no or a very tenius amount of oxygen in the atmosphere and plankton started the production of oxygen (producing the majority of oxygen in the earth's atmosphere), that means no ozone to protect them from the sun's radiation in the early years. Plankton fossils are found unchanged (no evolution) throughout the fossil record in every strata. The top 1 meter of ocean water would thus be saturated with harmful radiation and the planet would remain sterile of life.
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« Last Edit: July 20, 2006, 02:56:57 am by RTyp06 »
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