Stephen T-B

(The interesting thing about fundamentalists - whether religious or political - is that their morality is based on the expediency of ends justifying means.
With Communists and the like, the "ends" are idealistic, whereas with religious fundamentalists, the ends are divine, so instead of an ideology validating the "means", it is a god.
The practical difference isn't much: religious and political zealots dissemble, lie, cheat and murder with the same casual disregard for ethical and humanitarian principles as each other).

Pappy Jack

I don't know how many nutshells I've tried to cram the essence of the arguments advanced by commentators such as Gardner and Loy into, but here goes again:

1. Gardner: Given enough data and a willingness to manipulate it without any restrictions, it is possible to develop endless correlations, some of which may be 'significant' and help to 'prove' a pre-existing model.Gardner demonstrates this by reference to the Washington Monument. Would you like me to see what encoded information I can find in the dimensions of the Eiffel Tower? St Paul's Cathedral? The Forth Railway Bridge? Given enough time and no restrictions on how I can use the data, I am sure I can.

2. Loy: There are intrinsic coincidental relationships that are inherent in the dimensions of geometrical solids that can be teased out by comparing various ratios in those solids. This is one of the reasons you might expect to find such ratios in Khufu's Pyramid. It is neither more nor less likely than if the Pyramid had been built along different dimensions.

Is that good enough for you?

PS I said it before and I'll say it again: it's always a good diversionary tactic to attack the messenger and ignore the message, isn't it, Dave?

Pappy Jack

Thanks, CM.

And the point about Jim Loy's and Martin Gardner's arguments is that any reasonably intelligent 10-year old would be able to grasp them immediately, even if forced to go and read them for themselves. I have given Dave seemingly endless summaries of their arguments,tried to explain why they are relevant to Smyth's nonsense about Khufu's Pyramid and given him links to the relevant sites so he can check the original work against my summaries and make sure I'm not misrepresenting them. And I am more than prepared to accept that my summaries may not be as elegant and effective as the originals.

As far as I am aware, Dave has never commented on Gardner's devastating critique of Smyth's data manipulation and his response to Loy's sample pyramids was 'I don't understand what some of these terms mean so this has nothing to contribute to the argument' (I paraphrase loosely).

Constant Mews

I recall seeing a quotation attributed to Thomas Paine:

"Their arguments - not being founded in reason - cannot be swayed by reason."

It seems apropos to the current situation. Dave has not reasoned his way to these positions - he accepts them as 'arguments from authority' because they fit his preconceived and preprogrammed knowledge as laid down by his father and his mentors. He does not, so far as I can see, ever critically examine these arguments, but then he's never been taught to think. His primary instructional environment appears to have been one of "here is the truth, boy. Disagree and I'll slap you silly." Not much room in there for argument or reasoned analysis or any actual education. This seems to be a fundamental limit of the fundamentalist mind.

mung bean

Thank you for acknowledging the questions.
So since you now understand how sandstone forms I take it you no longer have any problem with the Coconino being aeolian. After all, the process is well understood in standard geology.

Back to Egypt, I see no point in discussing Walt Brown's theories about the formation of limestone in general because the thing that interests me is deposits in Egypt. We do however know that limestone is a sedimentary rock, which is the important thing here.


At the moment I cannot give you a picture but I'll keep looking. I have to wonder though why a picture would be necessary. Surely an article describing the area would be sufficient. By the way Dave the existence and depth of this canyon is well established. I'll dig up some links.
Don't think you can avoid the issue by claiming the canyon is a myth.

It's a trap, Dave. I'm leading up to walloping you with the Messinian Salinity Crisis and the only way you can avoid being walloped is to run away from the topic. I suggest you start reading up and calling your buddies for advice.

SAWells

This gets my vote for "Most comic-book-supervillain-like threat ever uttered in all seriousness during a scientific discussion." :notworthy: :notworthy: :notworthy:

You need to be careful, Dave, because if you make any contact with the Salinity Crisis you get turned into a pillar of salt, and only Batman can save you!

mung bean

Davey boy (me ol' delver for truth in the sediments of antiquity), this is your lucky day!
Found ya some nice piccys. I emailed your bestest friend Glenn Morton and he got back to me with this lot, which aren't on his public site.
I have provided his comments on each picture.












My thanks to Glenn for his quick reply.
I'm sure you're grateful to him as well, Dave. I know how much you love to delve into these sorts of things.

deadman_932

Bah, who needs Batman when Dave has CREOBOY!?!?

Occam's Aftershave

Wow! Great job MB on snagging those Egypt pictures! Major kudos to Glenn Morton too for his quick help.

Wanna bet Davie shifts from da Nile to denial without missing a beat?

Wolfhound

Woot! You go, Mung!!! <*swoon*>

--Fuzzball