Belief in Evolution No Longer a Metric for Science Literacy at NSB-NSF. YAY!

_{Salvador Cordova

April 12, 2010

Darwinism, Education}

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There are many biologists and philosophers of science who are highly scientifically literate who question certain aspects of the theory of evolution

John Bruer
National Science Board, National Science Foundation
Lead Reviewer
What Happened to Evolution at NSB

Way to go National Science Foundation. Say it again!, “There are many biologists and philosophers of science who are highly scientifically literate who question certain aspects of the theory of evolution.”

The NCSE of course whines over these developments:

A section describing survey results about the American public’s beliefs about evolution and the Big Bang was removed from the 2010 edition of Science and Engineering Indicators. According to a post on the AAAS’s Science Insider blog (April 8, 2010) and a subsequent report in Science (April 9, 2010; subscription required), although survey results about evolution and the Big Bang have regularly appeared in the National Science Board’s Science and Engineering Indicators, its biennial compilation of global data about science, engineering, and technology, they were absent from the 2010 edition.

NCSE’s Joshua Rosenau decried the decision, saying, “Discussing American science literacy without mentioning evolution is intellectual malpractice ….”

What Happened to Evolution at the NSB

the response

Officials at the National Science Board defended the decision. Louis Lanzerrotti, chair of the board’s Science and Engineering Indicators committee, told Science that the questions were “flawed indicators of science knowledge because the responses conflated knowledge and beliefs.” George Bishop, a political scientist at the University of Cincinnati who is familiar with the difficulties of polling about evolution, regarded that position as defensible, explaining, “Because of biblical traditions in American culture, that question is really a measure of belief, not knowledge.”

HT: www.NCSEweb.org

Comments

BA77 in Msg 88: "PlanetQuest – Exoplanet Exploration Excerpt: CURRENT PLANET COUNT: 430 stars with planets: 363 Earthlike planets: 0 http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/ Not a good batting average thus far creek;" From a little deeper in your own citation: http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/science/science_index.cfm "If planets like Earth exist, with smaller masses and longer orbital periods, their discovery will require more sensitive instruments and years of precise, sustained observations."warehuff_{April 16, 2010
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At least 3 members of the National Academy of Sciences question the role of Darwinism in the emergence of features of biology: 1. Phil Skell 2. Michael Lynch 3. Masotoshi Nei At least 4 Nobel Prize Winners: 1. Richard Smalley (Chemistry) 2. Ernst Chain (Medicine) 3. Christian Anfinsen (Medicine) 4. Eugene Wigner (Physics) High time we drop BELIEF in evolution as a metric for science literacy. Polling for knowledge is ok, but polling for belief is inappropriate.scordova_{April 15, 2010
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Clive, My apologies, your comment appeared after I replied.creeky belly_{April 15, 2010
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bornagain, creek belly, Did you all not read what I wrote? If there are any more comments about this I will delete them, this thread of yours has nothing to do with the actual post under which you are posting.Clive Hayden_{April 15, 2010
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Creek before you dismiss the paper you may want to take a closer look, for instance in your reading of vanadium, you mistake that he said within 10% of value when he meant it must fall within an acceptable range period on any planet and gave it that likelihood out of any given 10^22 planets. for example Vanadium must be present at the right quantity for life: to little no life: Vanadium essential to plant and animal life Discovered in: 1801 Discovered by: Andreas del Rio of Mexico Description: Named after the Scandinavian goddess Vanadis, vanadium is a soft, shiny, bright silvery-white metal. It is corrosion-resistant, except to most acids, and despite being a soft metal in pure form, it hardens and strengthens other metals in alloys by a tremendous degree. Vanadium-steel alloys are used in armor plating, piston rods, crankshafts and other uses where a very strong metal is needed, such as frames in high-rise buildings and oil drilling platforms. Vanadium is also used in ceramics, glass and dyes as well as a chemical catalyst. Biological Rating: Necessary for full health of plants and animals. Biological Benefits: Vanadium is an essential trace element for most species. Vanadium is believed to be important in bone development. Deficiencies in Vanadium reduce growth and impair reproduction in rats and chickens. http://www.mii.org/periodic/V.htm Yet Too much we are poisoned Vanadium poisoning http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com/v/vanadium_poisoning/intro.htm you can check each element here if you want: Periodic Table - Interactive web page for each element http://www.mii.org/periodic/MIIperiodicChart.html This also plays into the terraforming of early microbial life: Sulfate-reducing bacteria helped prepare the earth for advanced life by detoxifying the primeval earth and oceans of poisonous levels of heavy metals while depositing them as relatively inert metal ores. Metal ores which are very useful for modern man, as well as fairly easy for man to extract today (mercury, cadmium, zinc, cobalt, arsenic, chromate, tellurium and copper to name a few). To this day, sulfate-reducing bacteria maintain an essential minimal level of these heavy metals in the ecosystem which are high enough so as to be available to the biological systems of the higher life forms that need them yet low enough so as not to be poisonous to those very same higher life forms. Bacterial Heavy Metal Detoxification and Resistance Systems: Excerpt: Bacterial plasmids contain genetic determinants for resistance systems for Hg2+ (and organomercurials), Cd2+, AsO2, AsO43-, CrO4 2-, TeO3 2-, Cu2+, Ag+, Co2+, Pb2+, and other metals of environmental concern. http://www.springerlink.com/content/u1t281704577v8t3/ http://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/26/m026p203.pdf The role of bacteria in hydrogeochemistry, metal cycling and ore deposit formation: Textures of sulfide minerals formed by SRB (sulfate-reducing bacteria) during bioremediation (most notably pyrite and sphalerite) have textures reminiscent of those in certain sediment-hosted ores, supporting the concept that SRB may have been directly involved in forming ore minerals. http://www.goldschmidt2009.org/abstracts/finalPDFs/A1161.pdf shoot Creek the level of fine tuning for microbial life is extraordinary: Engineering and Science Magazine - Caltech - March 2010 Excerpt: “Without these microbes, the planet would run out of biologically available nitrogen in less than a month,” Realizations like this are stimulating a flourishing field of “geobiology” – the study of relationships between life and the earth. One member of the Caltech team commented, “If all bacteria and archaea just stopped functioning, life on Earth would come to an abrupt halt.” Microbes are key players in earth’s nutrient cycles. Dr. Orphan added, “...every fifth breath you take, thank a microbe.” http://www.creationsafaris.com/crev201003.htm#20100316a Planet's Nitrogen Cycle Overturned - Oct. 2009 Excerpt: "Ammonia is a waste product that can be toxic to animals.,,, archaea can scavenge nitrogen-containing ammonia in the most barren environments of the deep sea, solving a long-running mystery of how the microorganisms can survive in that environment. Archaea therefore not only play a role, but are central to the planetary nitrogen cycles on which all life depends.,,,the organism can survive on a mere whiff of ammonia – 10 nanomolar concentration, equivalent to a teaspoon of ammonia salt in 10 million gallons of water." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090930132656.htm Microbial life can easily live without us; we, however, cannot survive without the global catalysis and environmental transformations it provides. - Paul G. Falkowski - Professor Geological Sciences - Rutgersbornagain77_{April 15, 2010
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and I found this NASA site: PlanetQuest – Exoplanet Exploration Excerpt: CURRENT PLANET COUNT: 430 stars with planets: 363 Earthlike planets: 0 http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/ Not a good batting average thus far creek; My point was rather on relying on back of the envelope calculations, we actually try and look for these things so we can have some sort of Feldman-Cousins upper bound on the local density of earth-like planets. In regards to you links: as much as I would like to believe that our "vanadium quantity in crust" must be within 10% of the value on earth, I don't. I don't think the analysis is made in good faith, or presents honest knowledge of any of these probabilities (particularly correlations).creeky belly_{April 15, 2010
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bornagain77, creek belly, toronto, etc., I'm gavelling this discussion of centrality. If you want to discuss it further, send each other private messages or discuss it on another blog.Clive Hayden_{April 15, 2010
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bornagain77 @89, Our position in the universe is insignificant if you intend to make observations about the universe. There are better places to be relative to the celestial bodies you want to observe and study.Toronto_{April 15, 2010
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Creeky buddy, sorry for our misunderstanding each other on CMBR, my continued position throughout this discussion has been that the Earth is "just as" central as any other place in the universe. Which is fine by me, as far as that particular line of evidence goes, in that it solidly refutes the mediocrity principle, derived from heliocentrism, that stated we hold "zero" significance as far centrality goes in the universe goes. But as you readily admit, from a universal perspective, the earth is just as central, as the sun is central, as the galaxy is central, or anywhere else. My whole point of emphasis throughout has been to point out that this is a HUGE step up from the atheistic sermons Carl Sagan preached in pale blue dot. Carl Sagan - Pale Blue Dot http://connect.tangle.com/view_video?viewkey=55cae985a9be92fe078ebornagain77_{April 15, 2010
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Creeky, you mentioned having a interest in the number of earth-like planets in our "neighborhood": ,,, "I’m looking forward to the results from Kepler, so maybe we have some idea what ‘N’ is. (Where N is the density of earth-like planets in our neighborhood.)" ,,,,and I found this NASA site: PlanetQuest - Exoplanet Exploration Excerpt: CURRENT PLANET COUNT: 430 stars with planets: 363 Earthlike planets: 0 http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/ Not a good batting average thus far creek; The thing I wanted to bring to your attention is that Dr. Ross's team made the most generous assumptions for suns that are able to host planets similar to Earth and still the probability turns out to be: Probability for occurrence of all 322 parameters =10^388 Dependency factors estimate =10^96 Longevity requirements estimate =10^14 Probability for occurrence of all 322 parameters = 10^304 Maximum possible number of life support bodies in universe =10^22 Thus, less than 1 chance in 10^282 (million trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion) exists that even one such life-support body would occur anywhere in the universe without invoking divine miracles. http://www.reasons.org/probability-life-earth-apr-2004 http://www.johnankerberg.com/Articles/_PDFArchives/science/SC2W0304RFT.pdf But even if you had a earth capable of supporting life creek you would still run into the origin of life problem: The probabilities against life "spontaneously" originating are simply overwhelming: Signature in the Cell - Book Review - Ken Peterson Excerpt: the “simplest extant cell, Mycoplasma genitalium — a tiny bacterium that inhabits the human urinary tract — requires ‘only’ 482 proteins to perform its necessary functions…(562,000 bases of DNA…to assemble those proteins).” ,,, amino acids have to congregate in a definite specified sequence in order to make something that “works.” First of all they have to form a “peptide” bond and this seems to only happen about half the time in experiments. Thus, the probability of building a chain of 150 amino acids containing only peptide links is about one chance in 10 to the 45th power. In addition, another requirement for living things is that the amino acids must be the “left-handed” version. But in “abiotic amino-acid production” the right- and left-handed versions are equally created. Thus, to have only left-handed, only peptide bonds between amino acids in a chain of 150 would be about one chance in 10 to the 90th. Moreover, in order to create a functioning protein the “amino acids, like letters in a meaningful sentence, must link up in functionally specified sequential arrangements.” It turns out that the probability for this is about one in 10 to the 74th. Thus, the probability of one functional protein of 150 amino acids forming by random chance is (1 in) 10 to the 164th. If we assume some minimally complex cell requires 250 different proteins then the probability of this arrangement happening purely by chance is one in 10 to the 164th multiplied by itself 250 times or one in 10 to the 41,000th power. http://www.spectrummagazine.org/reviews/book_reviews/2009/10/06/signature_cell First-Ever Blueprint of 'Minimal Cell' Is More Complex Than Expected - Nov. 2009 Excerpt: A network of research groups,, approached the bacterium at three different levels. One team of scientists described M. pneumoniae's transcriptome, identifying all the RNA molecules, or transcripts, produced from its DNA, under various environmental conditions. Another defined all the metabolic reactions that occurred in it, collectively known as its metabolome, under the same conditions. A third team identified every multi-protein complex the bacterium produced, thus characterising its proteome organisation. "At all three levels, we found M. pneumoniae was more complex than we expected," http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091126173027.htm No man-made program comes close to the technical brilliance of even Mycoplasmal genetic algorithms. Mycoplasmas are the simplest known organism with the smallest known genome, to date. How was its genome and other living organisms' genomes programmed?" - David L. Abel and Jack T. Trevors, “Three Subsets of Sequence Complexity and Their Relevance to Biopolymeric Information,” Theoretical Biology & Medical Modelling, Vol. 2, 11 August 2005, page 8 http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1742-4682-2-29.pdf Co creeky, I take it you believe all this happened on another planet somewhere despite these odds, I have one question for you,,, Do you want to play poker?bornagain77_{April 15, 2010
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Well dang creeky it seems you got it all figured out as to why we ain’t center of the universe, from our point of observation, even though that’s what the CMBR indicates. You don’t mind if I stick to my my own pet theory of universal quantum wave collapse to each observer in the universe giving each individual observer in the universe his own unique point of centrality in the universe, or do you think that would be pushing it to far. Our observations indicate CMB is homogeneous, independent of location in universe. Like I said before, the fluctuations would be unique to different locations, but would have the same angular spectrum. If your theory states that each observer would conclude that they are the center of an isotropic radiation field no matter where they were, then I would agree, but for the observer to then conclude that they were at the center of the universe ignores homogeneity.creeky belly_{April 15, 2010
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bornagain77,
“the earth is as central as any place in the universe with respect to the CMB.”
If everywhere in the universe is as central as any place else, then I would rather be in the center of the universe in New York City than the center of the universe in a small town in Kansas if I was studying human behaviour. The study of cosmology might lead me to want to be 3 billion light years away from Earth in order to be able to make better observations about the universe. Your argument does nothing to persuade me that the Earth occupies a special place for observation or any other special purpose we might come up with.Toronto_{April 15, 2010
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Well dang creeky it seems you got it all figured out as to why we ain't center of the universe, from our point of observation, even though that's what the CMBR indicates. You don't mind if I stick to my my own pet theory of universal quantum wave collapse to each observer in the universe giving each individual observer in the universe his own unique point of centrality in the universe, or do you think that would be pushing it to far.bornagain77_{April 15, 2010
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The answer to the question that you did not answer is that the light speed from the stream of photons we are traveling away from is the same speed as the light speed of the stream of photons that we are traveling into, thus as far as the absolute frame of reference is concerned, for the two streams of photons, we are not moving at all. i.e. we are always in the middle of the two streams as far as the frame of reference of light speed is concerned. This is true for any observer, moving anywhere in our universe. The radiation is also homogeneous and isotropic, which means that the structure is the same to any observer anywhere in the universe up to the microKelvin fluctuations. I'm sorry you haven't quite grasped this concept yet, it's one of the most basic results in cosmology.creeky belly_{April 15, 2010
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Creek you state: "I’m sorry you don’t like what the actual answer is," and I'm sorry you have deceived yourself into thinking the Earth is not central from our point of observation, in reference to the universe as a whole and to the CMBR in particular. The answer to the question that you did not answer is that the light speed from the stream of photons we are traveling away from is the same speed as the light speed of the stream of photons that we are traveling into, thus as far as the absolute frame of reference is concerned, for the two streams of photons, we are not moving at all. i.e. we are always in the middle of the two streams as far as the frame of reference of light speed is concerned.bornagain77_{April 15, 2010
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bornagain77, I guess a materialistic atheist insisting that ours lives are not insignificant after he has done his level best to obfuscate the evidence to the point of trying to show we are not significant is par for the course. Myself, being a former drinker, I call that kind of twisted thinking denialism, of which I find the “new atheists” in a far worse state than any drinker I ever met. http://www.creationsafaris.com.....arwine.jpg Just one question creek, If you are traveling at 50% of the speed of light towards a stream of photons, and 50% of the speed of light away from another stream of photons, what is the speed of each stream of photons in relation to you? My argument with you is very narrow, the nature of the CMB and what it can tell us about our place in the universe. I'm sorry you don't like what the actual answer is, but that's where my argument with you ends. If you want to impose your own criterion for how unique the earth must be for your beliefs to be true, by all means impose. Just keep in mind: your mileage may vary.creeky belly_{April 15, 2010
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creeky stated: "I’m sorry you feel that way. I don’t." I guess a materialistic atheist insisting that ours lives are not insignificant after he has done his level best to obfuscate the evidence to the point of trying to show we are not significant is par for the course. Myself, being a former drinker, I call that kind of twisted thinking denialism, of which I find the "new atheists" in a far worse state than any drinker I ever met. http://www.creationsafaris.com/images/BM-Darwine.jpg Just one question creek, If you are traveling at 50% of the speed of light towards a stream of photons, and 50% of the speed of light away from another stream of photons, what is the speed of each stream of photons in relation to you?bornagain77_{April 15, 2010
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Dang it creeky belly, you just itchin to render the earth as insignificant as you can possibly do, ain’t you? And yet I just love my beautiful picture and video that shows earth at the center of the universe, I think I’ll just show it to the entire local Junior High School and explain to them how the earth ain’t really center of the universe even though that is exactly what it looks like. I don’t know if they will get the 4-D space time part, or the dipole part, or the speed of light part, or the quantum wave collapse part, but I bet you they will sure get the earth being at the center of the universe part. Maybe I need to get you to come down and explain to them how they shouldn’t trust their eyes, and have you explain the whole how we are just a insignificant speck of nothing lost in the vast ocean of space, cause if you don’t they just might think they got a greater purpose in their lives. So if the Earth isn't center of the universe, life has no greater purpose? The CMB is homogeneous, ergo our lives are insignificant? Wow, I'm sorry you feel that way. I don't.creeky belly_{April 14, 2010
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Dang it creeky belly, you just itchin to render the earth as insignificant as you can possibly do, ain't you? And yet I just love my beautiful picture and video that shows earth at the center of the universe, I think I'll just show it to the entire local Junior High School and explain to them how the earth ain't really center of the universe even though that is exactly what it looks like. I don't know if they will get the 4-D space time part, or the dipole part, or the speed of light part, or the quantum wave collapse part, but I bet you they will sure get the earth being at the center of the universe part. Maybe I need to get you to come down and explain to them how they shouldn't trust their eyes, and have you explain the whole how we are just a insignificant speck of nothing lost in the vast ocean of space, cause if you don't they just might think they got a greater purpose in their lives.bornagain77_{April 14, 2010
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bornagain77, The angular spectrum of the CMB is the same at any point in the universe, there is no unique viewpoint. Your link shows the microKelvin fluctuations after the dipole motion is taken out, and the angular size of the fluctuations would look the same to any observer anywhere. I'm glad we agree, the earth is no more central than any other place in the universe. I'm not questioning the meta significance of the earth, just with respect to the CMB. I'm looking forward to the results from Kepler, so maybe we have some idea what 'N' is. (Where N is the density of earth-like planets in our neighborhood.)creeky belly_{April 14, 2010
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creek belly, actually from my Theistic point of view, Every grain of sand of the universe is very special, "central", and purposed by God, since the fine tuning of the mass density of the universe is balanced to 1 in 10^60, which out of the 10^79 atoms in the universe equals a fine tuning of every 10^19 atoms, which turns out to equal just 1 grain of sand ----------- Sand is made up of Silica this has the formula SiO2 silicon weighs 28 atomic units Oxygen weighs 16 atomic units so each SiO2 weighs 60 atomic units there are 6.023 x 1023 atomic units in a gram. that is 6 with 23 zeros after it. so there would be 6.023 x 1023 / 60 = 1x 1022 SiO2s in a gram so 3 x 1022 atoms in a gram Say a grain of sand is 1mm across it has a volume of 0.001cm3 1cm3 of sand weighs aboout 2.6g so a grain of sand will weigh 0.0026g so to fing the number of atoms in a grain of sand we multiply the number of atoms per gram by the number og grams: 3 x 1022 x 0.0026g = 7.8 x 1019 atoms = 1 grain of sand http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=6447 ---------------- My Beloved One - music video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4200171bornagain77_{April 14, 2010
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Creeky you state: "the CMBR can’t tell any observer about their location in the universe." and yet the picture says: The View From Earth http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYmaSrBPNEmGZGM4ejY3d3pfOXQydzV2OGhz&hl=en but then you go and admit this much: "the earth is as central as any place in the universe with respect to the CMB." Thus as far as I'm concerned with the discussion thus far, I am thoroughly satisfied that you at least agree we are not totally insignificant as Carl Sagan insisted.bornagain77_{April 14, 2010
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bornagain77, I'm making no claim as to the uniqueness of Earth, or to the likelihood that observers exist in other parts of our universe. My argument is that the when our motion around the sun is removed, the dipole component of the CMBR is not zero. In addition, the CMBR can't tell any observer about their location in the universe. You agreed with this above: the earth is as central as any place in the universe with respect to the CMB. Thus it is not a unique observation point in these terms.creeky belly_{April 14, 2010
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Correction: "This flash did occur at a single point" should read "This flash did not occur at a single point".pelagius_{April 14, 2010
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bornagain77 quotes Hawking, Penrose and Ellis:
Every solution to the equations of general relativity guarantees the existence of a singular boundary for space and time in the past.
Yes, but this is irrelevant because the equations of general relativity do not hold at the quantum level. A singularity, being infinitely small, cannot be correctly understood if quantum effects are ignored. scordova:
You don’t need the big bang to suppose the universe had a beginning. It proceeds from thermodynamics and the obvious fact stars don’t burn forever.
Not true. It is quite possible that the universe had no beginning and that entropy is increasing without bound. I recommend Sean Carroll's book From Eternity to Here for an excellent explanation of this. bornagain77:
but yet here we sit at the center of the universe from our point of observation none the less, because of the constant of the speed of light.
Every point is at the center -- or equally accurately, no point is at the center. No matter where you are, you will see the CMBR surrounding you like a sphere, and you will appear to be in the middle. It is hard to explain this without drawing diagrams, but allow me to try. There was a flash of light throughout the entire universe 380,000 years after the Big Bang, at the moment when the universe transitioned from opacity to transparency. This flash did occur at a single point; it filled the entire universe. The light from that flash has been travelling in all directions ever since. Therefore, no matter where you are in the universe, you see light that has been traveling toward you for 13.7 billion years from all directions. It looks like a sphere, and you are in the center of it. But everyone else, no matter where there are, sees the same thing. To conclude that the earth is in the center is a mistake. Moderators -- why are my comments being held in the moderation queue when I am in perfect compliance with the moderation policy?pelagius_{April 14, 2010
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creeky, you may just want to step away from all the rationalizations for a moment, for why the Earth is nothing special, just to watch this video again, and please stop the frame at the CMBR, and carefully notice where the earth sits in the mist of a thoroughly homogeneous universe: The Known Universe by AMNH http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17jymDn0W6U This video was made from the latest direct survey of Galaxies that we have from Sloan sky survey, as well as CMBR from COBE and WMAP.bornagain77_{April 14, 2010
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And creeky belly, (purposely not going through details of the insufficiency of 4-D space-time again), just where do you suppose all these other observers in the universe are? Anybody get a message from SETI yet???? SETI - Search For Extraterrestrial Intelligence Finds God - Almost http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4007753 The chief point being creeky belly, even using your 4-D space-time basis of reasoning, is that regardless of the fact of if the Earth is not "The Most" central place in the universe, it is still "As" central in the universe, from our point of observation, as any other place is in the universe is central, which, even in your 4-D line of reasoning, directly refutes the primary tenet of the mediocrity principle derived from the heliocentrism of Copernicus and Galileo, that implied there was absolutely nothing significant to the earth whatsoever. i.e. please tell me exactly why the entire expansion of the universe should even care that we exist if we were truly as insignificant as Carl Sagan implied in the movie; The Pale Blue Dot?.bornagain77_{April 14, 2010
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creeky belly, the motion causes a redshift, and blueshift in CMBR true,,,, Astronomy Picture of the Day http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090906.html but yet here we sit at the center of the universe from our point of observation none the less, because of the constant of the speed of light. The CMBR spectrum is independent of your location in the universe, by virtue of homogeneity. While the spatial distribution may vary, the perturbations will have the same angular structure to any observer anywhere in the universe (with the primary power peak at l~200).creeky belly_{April 14, 2010
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creeky belly, the motion causes a redshift, and blueshift in CMBR true,,,, Astronomy Picture of the Day http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090906.html but yet here we sit at the center of the universe from our point of observation none the less, because of the constant of the speed of light. Moreover I hold Earth to be the only "observer platform" in the universe, (Quantum implication fully implied), in which we can enjoy this view of "centrality": The Privileged Planet - video http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5488284265590289530 Probability For Life On Earth - List of Parameters, References, and Math - Hugh Ross http://www.reasons.org/probability-life-earth-apr-2004 http://www.johnankerberg.com/Articles/_PDFArchives/science/SC2W0304RFT.pdf Here is the final summary of Dr. Hugh Ross's "conservative" estimate for the probability of another life-hosting world in this universe. Probability for occurrence of all 322 parameters =10^388 Dependency factors estimate =10^96 Longevity requirements estimate =10^14 Probability for occurrence of all 322 parameters = 10^304 Maximum possible number of life support bodies in universe =10^22 Thus, less than 1 chance in 10^282 (million trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion) exists that even one such life-support body would occur anywhere in the universe without invoking divine miracles. Of further note: Sal I found this site that might interest you in the discussion we were having about Dark Matter,,,,: Systematic Search for Expressions of Dimensionless Constants using the NIST database of Physical Constants Excerpt: 1. Reduction of Constants and Equivalent Units The National Institute of Standards and Technology lists 325 constants on their website as 'Fundamental Physical Constants'. Among the 325 physical constants listed, 79 are unitless in nature (usually by defining a ratio). This produces a list of 246 physical constants with some unit dependence. These 246 physical constants can be further grouped into a smaller set when expressed in standard SI base units.,,,, http://www.mit.edu/~mi22295/constants/constants.htmlbornagain77_{April 14, 2010
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bornagain77: ...my post was aimed chiefly to point out the obvious fact that the centrality we observe for ourselves in the universe as a whole in regards to the CMBR, regardless of our motion around the sun, brings us full circle from the mediocrity that was derived from Copernicus’s and Galileo’s geocentrism. Indeed we find ourselves smack dab in the middle of the universe again. Just look at the video I linked. I would think that centrality should at least cause some small surprise to the person who has been told, relentlessly, as I was, through his life that we hold absolutely no special place in the universe (Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot comes to mind). Our motion with respect to the CMBR in the earth frame is ~371 km/s towards (l,b)=(264,48). The Milky Way center is moving at ~600 km/s towards (l,b)=(270,30). Neither frame is at rest with respect to the CMBR. (Fixsen et. al 1996) source Peebles, Cosmological Physics, p. 291creeky belly_{April 14, 2010
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