It isn't fake per se, but it was windy as hell and he was more gliding than flapping. He would have had the same results without the flapping.

Looks fake to me, for a few reasons. The wings and the flapping mechanism don't seem to be strong enough to support his weight and the wings never show the load of his weight underneath them once he's up in the air. He also lifts his legs after he takes off and keeps them behind him, but has no support underneath like you would in a hang glider. It also seems a bit suspicious that he doesn't turn his head at all from the helmet cam view where you could easily see the wings flapping from his POV. It's all very hinky.

That reminds me of Mimi's complaint that the unicorn was humping the dolphin in an anatomically impossible way.
>> ^mxxcon:

seriously? a space battleship needs a takeoff strip to fly? What's next, flapping wings in space?

seriously? a space battleship needs a takeoff strip to fly? What's next, flapping wings in space?

Speaking for myself, Paul could change my mind if he a) admitted fault, and b) gave some sort of speech about why racism is morally wrong.

>>> For the long speech you'll have to wait. As for the apology,

"When I was out of Congress and practicing medicine full-time, a newsletter was published under my name that I did not edit. Several writers contributed to the product. For over a decade, I have publically taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name."

--Ron Paul, Business Wire

A poster on the site "The Daily Paul" summed it up nicely:

What if you rent your home out, and the people use the house. to molest children. Should you be required to accept responsibility? Your name is still on the mortgage, so are you accountable for every action of the renters?

All you could tell people is that you had no knowledge, but admit you should have kept a better watch on your property, and accept 'moral responsibility' (versus actual responsibility, since you did not molest anyone and don't advocate that action).

Instead he's denying any fault, and castigating people for asking him to say anything at all about it, as if he thinks that kind of racist rhetoric isn't something people should be upset about.

>>> Due to the above statement I disagree that Dr. Paul is denying any fault. Based on what I've read, he has taken receipt of this newsletter flap. That he hasn't worded an apology precisely that is satisfactory to you is out of his (or my) control. I could be 100% wrong, but I do not believe you harbor a change of heart that will be triggered by a Paul apology. You are no under no obligation to support or believe him. Can we agree you're not a libertarian frustrated only by the doubt created by the Ron Paul newsletters?

Ultimately that's what you yourself said with your response -- that all charges of racism are bogus. Why you think that, I can't fathom.

>>> Please allow me to clarify my original statement: the problem with LIBERALS labeling anyone a racist is that in 2012 it's crying wolf. It's so overused as to be meaningless.

Ad hominem tu quoque -- which I like to think of as the "I know you are but what am I?" fallacy.

My point about "all of us" being racist is, if we're all covered in poop, no one can accuse anyone else of stinking.

Easy, (Paul) says people have an inalienable right to refuse to serve or hire minorities if they like, but that minorities have no inalienable right to be treated as free and equal citizens when they participate in our society and economy.

>>> I have no easy answer for you, not because Dr. Paul is wrong but because the details of how a libertarian society deals with racism are complex (yet probably less complex than the maze of government coercion now).

A private citizen has a right to refuse to associate with others s/he dislikes, but does the government have the power to create an underclass of citizens? The answer is NO.

Some good comments here on this topic. Not gospel, just snacks for thought.

He he, "flap" tag makes me giggle!

The wings part annoys me. I'm calling "Balloon Boy".

...in a spiritual form would you need wings? to fly? because there's gravity? what do you walk on? do you have physical mass? what do you fly on - air? would you suffocate? where would you fly to? is there up and down? Why are his wings smaller, because he's young? but everyone in heaven is young, are all wings graduated by growth of age? can you flap them? extend them? or are they vestigial what type / genus of wings are they? dove wings? eagle wings? bat wings? (don't even get me started on how spiritual wings could become vestigial in spirit form without evolution)

...These are the words that rhyme with @Zifnab...

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You're off to Great Places!
You're off and away!

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes
You can steer yourself
any direction you choose.
You're on your own. And you know what you know.
And YOU are the guy who'll decide where to go.

You'll look up and down streets. Look 'em over with care.
About some you will say, "I don't choose to go there."
With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet,
you're too smart to go down any not-so-good street.

And you may not find any
you'll want to go down.
In that case, of course,
you'll head straight out of town.

It's opener there
in the wide open air.

Out there things can happen
and frequently do
to people as brainy
and footsy as you.

And when things start to happen,
don't worry. Don't stew.
Just go right along.
You'll start happening too.

OH!
THE PLACES YOU'LL GO!

You'll be on your way up!
You'll be seeing great sights!
You'll join the high fliers
who soar to high heights.

You won't lag behind, because you'll have the speed.
You'll pass the whole gang and you'll soon take the lead.
Wherever you fly, you'll be the best of the best.
Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.

Except when you don't
Because, sometimes, you won't.

I'm sorry to say so
but, sadly, it's true
and Hang-ups
can happen to you.

You can get all hung up
in a prickle-ly perch.
And your gang will fly on.
You'll be left in a Lurch.

You'll come down from the Lurch
with an unpleasant bump.
And the chances are, then,
that you'll be in a Slump.

And when you're in a Slump,
you're not in for much fun.
Un-slumping yourself
is not easily done.

You will come to a place where the streets are not marked.
Some windows are lighted. But mostly they're darked.
A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin!
Do you dare to stay out? Do you dare to go in?
How much can you lose? How much can you win?

And IF you go in, should you turn left or right...
or right-and-three-quarters? Or, maybe, not quite?
Or go around back and sneak in from behind?
Simple it's not, I'm afraid you will find,
for a mind-maker-upper to make up his mind.

You can get so confused
that you'll start in to race
down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace
and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space,
headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.
The Waiting Place...

...for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go
or a bus to come, or a plane to go
or the mail to come, or the rain to go
or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow
or waiting around for a Yes or a No
or waiting for their hair to grow.
Everyone is just waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite
or waiting for wind to fly a kite
or waiting around for Friday night
or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake
or a pot to boil, or a Better Break
or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants
or a wig with curls, or Another Chance.
Everyone is just waiting.

NO!
That's not for you!

Somehow you'll escape
all that waiting and staying.
You'll find the bright places
where Boom Bands are playing.

With banner flip-flapping,
once more you'll ride high!
Ready for anything under the sky.
Ready because you're that kind of a guy!

Oh, the places you'll go! There is fun to be done!
There are points to be scored. there are games to be won.
And the magical things you can do with that ball
will make you the winning-est winner of all.
Fame! You'll be famous as famous can be,
with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.

Except when they don't.
Because, sometimes, they won't.

I'm afraid that some times
you'll play lonely games too.
Games you can't win
'cause you'll play against you.

All Alone!
Whether you like it or not,
Alone will be something
you'll be quite a lot.

And when you're alone, there's a very good chance
you'll meet things that scare you right out of your pants.
There are some, down the road between hither and yon,
that can scare you so much you won't want to go on.

But on you will go
though the weather be foul
On you will go
though your enemies prowl
On you will go
though the Hakken-Kraks howl
Onward up many
a frightening creek,
though your arms may get sore
and your sneakers may leak.

On and on you will hike
and I know you'll hike far
and face up to your problems
whatever they are.

You'll get mixed up, of course,
as you already know.
You'll get mixed up
with many strange birds as you go.
So be sure when you step.
Step with care and great tact
and remember that Life's
a Great Balancing Act.
Just never forget to be dexterous and deft.
And never mix up your right foot with your left.

And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.)

KID, YOU'LL MOVE MOUNTAINS!

So...
be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray
or Mordecai Ali Van Allen O'Shea,
you're off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting.
So...get on your way!

They're not 'difficult' to answer. They're impossible to answer because they don't actually make logical sense. The fact that you think they do make sense is actually kind of disturbing.

They're very simple questions. How do you account for the laws of logic, which are immaterial, unchanging and absolute, in a material universe which is always changing?

How do you account for the uniformity in nature? How do you know the future will be like the past?

It is not a 'leap of faith' to disbelieve that which cannot be proved. If you'd paid attention before (I know it's hard, but try) you'd have realized that your argument leads to madness. If you insist on believing in God, and your sole argument is that the existence of God cannot be disproved, then you should, by all right believe in every single bit of nonsensical information which comes along. Why do you take the stairs out from your apartment building instead of flying out the window? You can't prove that you cannot fly to work by flapping your arms (or, you can, but only if you try). You cannot prove that bashing your head with a hammer is bad for your health (again, not without trying it). The list of things you cannot disprove is infinite. Why choose that one and reject all the others?

You seem to have trouble following the conversation. My sole argument for God isn't that He cannot be disproved, my evidence for your faith in atheism is that He cannot be disproved. You outright deny God exists and you have no evidence for it, therefore it is a leap of faith.

You have not proved your case, no matter what you seem to think, and no amount of word salad will help you.

Unless you have something cogent and substantive to add I am done. Go hit yourself in the head with a hammer if you want to prove me wrong.

You've proven my case for me. You've admitted yout blind faith in atheism, and then you try to justify it by conflating the issue by saying belief in God is equivilent to belief in fairies, which is false. God has explanatory power, fairies explain exactly nothing. Then you try to trivilaize the question by equating it with any number of meaningless statements, which is also false. To ask whether the Universe has an intelligent causation is a legitimate question, and God is a legitimate answer to that question.

>> ^Drachen_Jager

>> ^shinyblurry:

So in other words, you have no evidence that God doesn't exist so it is a leap of faith. I appreciate your candor. I also appreciate that you were unable to answer of my questions. They're very difficult questions for someone who has worldview founded on blind faith.

They're not 'difficult' to answer. They're impossible to answer because they don't actually make logical sense. The fact that you think they do make sense is actually kind of disturbing.

It is not a 'leap of faith' to disbelieve that which cannot be proved. If you'd paid attention before (I know it's hard, but try) you'd have realized that your argument leads to madness. If you insist on believing in God, and your sole argument is that the existence of God cannot be disproved, then you should, by all right believe in every single bit of nonsensical information which comes along. Why do you take the stairs out from your apartment building instead of flying out the window? You can't prove that you cannot fly to work by flapping your arms (or, you can, but only if you try). You cannot prove that bashing your head with a hammer is bad for your health (again, not without trying it). The list of things you cannot disprove is infinite. Why choose that one and reject all the others?

You have not proved your case, no matter what you seem to think, and no amount of word salad will help you.

Unless you have something cogent and substantive to add I am done. Go hit yourself in the head with a hammer if you want to prove me wrong.

>> ^critical_d:

"This wild raccoon came in through the cat flap, curled up in the sink and basically domesticated himself!"
- This is actually how I meet women. Only it's not a cat flap...it's a second story window. And it's not a sink...it's usually the living room sofa. And I don't curl...I snuggle.


You didn't mention whether you're domesticated, or not.

"This wild raccoon came in through the cat flap, curled up in the sink and basically domesticated himself!"

- This is actually how I meet women. Only it's not a cat flap...it's a second story window. And it's not a sink...it's usually the living room sofa. And I don't curl...I snuggle.

"This wild raccoon came in through the cat flap, curled up in the sink and basically domesticated himself!"

That's... what? Seriously? Wild-fucking-animal, let's stick our hands in it's mouth! And it's ears! And on it's belly! This defies explanation. What the hell is going on here? Other than the incredibly stupid woman.

I'm glad you reference your video, which is a perfect example of trying to make illogical moral exceptions for your deity. You accuse my comment of being but "a weak appeal to emotions", but it is actually a succinct argument refuting the video's thesis. But since you clearly cannot understand anything with a hint of subtlety, I will spell it out for you:

The video argues that evil must exist in order for there to be freedom of the will. Fine enough, but that only accounts for the kinds of evils done by humans. The things my comment link to are all examples of evils that are not caused by human actions, but by nature (i.e. "acts of God"), and affect perfectly innocent beings. A child who is born with a genetic disorder that will cause it (and it's parents) to suffer for it's whole life is not a matter of "freedom of the will". Answer me this, with a simple "yes/no" answer please: did the 13-day old baby killed by the family dog deserve it?

I know what you'll say: all of humankind, nay, of creation, is tainted because of "original sin". Remember how we've already discussed this ad nauseum? The concept of original sin relies on the story of Creation and the Fall. I know you literally believe that all of humankind is the offspring of an incestuous clusterfuck that started with Adam and Eve, and was renewed when God killed everyone except one family (incest ftw eh?). Let's put aside how utterly disgusting and impossible that is, and concentrate on how it is also a totally immoral belief. You are saying that God, omni-potent/benevolent, lets every single being be "tainted" with "sin" no matter how they live, and thus deserve anything nature's twisted ways will throw at them? All because ONE person did not blindly follow his orders (although without knowing it was wrong to do so)? Do you even realise what a sick, twisted tyrant of a deity you are defending?

It's clear you didn't understand the argument the video was making, or even your own argument:

The video is outlining Plantigas free will defense which states:

God's creation of persons with morally significant free will is something of tremendous value. God could not eliminate evil and suffering without thereby eliminating the greater good of having created persons with free will who can make moral choices. Freedom (and, often it is said, the loving relationships which would not be possible without freedom) here is intended to provide a morally sufficient reason for God's allowing evil

The FWD neatly solves the logical problem of evil. Now, you make a point from natural evil, but this also addressed by the FWD. The corruption that came into the world was from originl sin. You say it isn't fair that other people have to suffer for the choices of the prior generation, ignoring that every child is impacted by the choices of their parents, and every other generation before them. God would either have had to start over or prevent all evil, and either choice would eliminate free will. What you miss is that people still have the same opportunities to accept or reject Gods offer of salvation, regardless of original sin. Children who have no capacity to make that choice do receive salvation.

What you're really referring to is the Evidential problem of evil which goes like this:

A) It is improbable that an omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent God, would allow gratuitous suffering.
B) Gratuitous suffering does exist.
C) Therefore it is improbable that an omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent exists.

There are a few ways to address this argument. In chaos theory, something small and insignificant, like the flapping of a butterlfys wings, can lead to something large and powerful, like the creation of a hurricane. Likewise, the actions we undertake have a ripple effect that go beyond our finite understandings. In the movie sliding doors, there are two timelines to the story, where the heroine is trying to get on a subway, and either makes it at the last minute, or gets there a few seconds late and misses it. In the timeline where she makes it, she goes on to have a happy and successful life, but is suddenly killed in a car accident. In the other, she endures a lot of suffering but ends up living to a ripe old age.

Only an omniscient God could see how all of this is going to play out. Just because something may seem pointless to us at the time doesn't mean it couldn't turn out to be beneficial later. If God is working towards a greater good, suffering may be part of how that ultimate good is achieved. It's easy to think of examples. Let's say you were going to take a trip to Tibet to climb Mt Everest, but you ended up breaking your leg and cancelling the trip. Later you find out that the plane you were going to take crashed into the ocean. What seemed pointless at the time actually saved your life.

The invasion of Normandy resulted in untold casualities, but served the greater good of serving to end the war. So, it isn't something we can really quantify, whether some suffering is pointless or not. It is also an incomplete sample. You can say yes, when you only consider the suffering in the world, God doesn't seem as likely, but that is part of the picture. When you consider all of the good things, the probability starts to balance out.

1There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil.(Job 1:1) The very first verse says Job was perfect. "But that's the narrator speaking!" you might interject. Fine:

And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil? (Job 2:3) This is God speaking, and he follows by saying that "[Satan] movedst me against him, to destroy him without cause", i.e. "Satan made me do it". It is not Dan who is twisting the story, but you. Unless, of course, the Bible is not inerrant, but there's no way you'll accept that, now is there.

I've already addressed all of this. Although some translations render the word as "perfect", it is referring to an outstanding moral character and piety towards God, not sinlessness. This is proven by Jobs own words:

Job 9:20 If I justify myself, mine own mouth shall condemn me: if I say, I am perfect, it shall also prove me perverse.

Job 13:26 For thou writest bitter things against me, and makest me to possess the iniquities of my youth.

As far as "the devil made me do it", you fail to understand what is going on. Satan is like a prosecuting attorney in Gods courtroom.

Revelation 12:10

And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.

Satan laid a false accusation against Job, brought him to trial, and Job was tried and tested and found innocent.

Thankfully for you (and everyone else) he is but a figment of your imagination.

You protest too much, hpqp. Your fervent denial shows you have more than a clue. You accuse me of delusion but you're the one fooling yourself.

>> ^hpqp