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Ray Saintonge wrote:
Alphax wrote:
Ray Saintonge wrote:
Michael P. Hopcroft wrote:
I have no idea what 'scientism" is, but I do know that the idea that randomly placed thermonuclear reactors dozens, hundreds and thousands of light-years away have a direct influence on what happens to human beings on Earth is illogical to the point of delusion. Even if they were capable of thought, which is insanity in itself, how could they possibly care?
According to Oxford scientism is the "excessive belief in the power of scientific knowledge and techniques." In many instances it takes on the characteristics of a religion.
You began by making a wild comment about astrology and astrologers, and now you want to compound the issue with your creationist premise that someone has been going around placing thermonuclear reactors just so that you can set up some kind of straw man argument.
Firstly, the fact that Michael wrote "random" is anti-creationist; secondly, you might want to see [[Star]].
Ahh, but the verb "to place" is creationist. And if we accept the idea of a creator it logically follows that that entity should be capable of placing things randomly. Why shouldn't God have the right to participate in a crap game? There's no mention of astrology in [[Star]], which is just as well, despite the etymology of the word "astrology". The word "random" does not appear in the article either. On the other hand, astrologers in general are not likely to be interested in thermonuclear reactors.
See [[Star]] as to what all the pseudo-randomly /located/ thermo-nuclear reactors are :)
With all the traffic on this subject, I'm not sure if this page has come up before, but in case it hasn't:
That's one of those unfortunate yellow on black pages that are always a problem to read. The whole thing seems like one interminable flame war with not much being said that has any value. In that sort of context anything which it says for or against astrology is not going to be very convincing or credible.
Did you try disabling styles? It becomes black on white when you do. Still horribly formatted though; however, the number of contradictions that Wollmann allegedly made are - well, they make Sollog look rational.
Oh, and we should probably add Mr. Ennis to the list of "Kook of the ..." winners.
I suggest you have a bit of a look around the rest of the site as well. "Kook of the Millenium" wasn't the only award he won.
I'm not interested in the debate over the individual kook's behaviour at all. Such matters appear all too frequently on the list. The phrase "the man is an ASTROLOGER" with the word in all capitals did catch my eye. That is irrelevant to the man's status as a kook.
I looked up alt.usenet.kooks on Google Groups, and they now have an award named after Mr. Astrological Consulting - the EDMOND WOLLMANN "RUBBER TURKEY" AWARD.
Incidentaly, this mailing list has been mentioned on AUK.
The persistence of astrology through the ages suggests to me that there are underlying germs of truth within it, but these are obscured by a tremendous amount of unfounded claims. Thus, specific claims that can be scientifically supported are very few, and some would even say that there are none at all. But failure to prove is not disproof. Unfortunately, people who claim to be promoting science make contrary statements that are even more preposterous than the claims made by astrologers. They impute ideas to astrology that were never expressed by the astrologers. They than make the perfectly accurate comment that the idea in question is ridiculous, and use that as evidence that all of astrology is nonsense. That's a straw man argument. It is falacious and unscientific. The use of imputed ideas seems typical of people who have no clue about the subject. Ec
Statement of facts: - There are such things as stars and planets - Stars and planets can influence what happens on Earth. Sol gives us light, and the moon gives us tides.
The persistance of astrology throughout the ages is caused by people searching for something bigger than themselves. Of all the possible things that one could believe in, people choose astrology because it /has/ been around so long, and it "worships" something mystical and (until the 20th century) unknown - stars and planets.
As for what is bunk about astrology, attributed to it correctly or not, people can always read [[Astrology]] :)
- -- Alphax GnuPG key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/8mpg9 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S. Lewis