Good god...

[hamerfan]

I hardly ever say anything derogatory about Democrats or DU. This is my first visit to this forum of DU. There should be a sign saying, Welcome to the National Enquirer" or something. This place is not scary, it's just really fuc*ed up! Check your brain at the door! Good luck to you all, I feel as though a tinfoil hat is necessary here. Jeez!
dumpbush

[MervinFerd]

1. Welcome and you are right.

A few of us try to maintain order.

We are called Government Shills.

[salvorhardin]

3. I prefer Disinformation Specialist thank you very much!

Jeesh. Show some respect for the profession man.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

4. Disinformation Specialist?

How did you swing that promotion? I've held the title of Disinformation Operative for two years, but no promotion for me yet. Reptoids are great overlords and everything but the bureaucracy sucks.

[salvorhardin]

8. You have to take the Class C Propaganda Qualifying Exam

And successfully blackmail the proctor.

[Bolo Boffin]

10. You want my advice? Stick with Disformation Operative.

Don't try to move up in this company. The last two years I've been a Disinformation Coordinator - you don't want to know. The messes I've had to clean up, the horror I've seen, always scrambling to find a new pet store when the staff begins to peg you as "the guy that always buys bunnies"...

...and not just any bunny will please our reptilian overlords.

I've said too much. Stick with Operative, kid - take your ample paycheck home and love your wife and kids.

[sabbat hunter]

35. i have the title of

disinfomation adminstrator. :P

[MervinFerd]

30. Darn! I'm stuck at "Disinformation Technologist" myself.

Just can't get around to studying for the "Specialist" test.

Maybe next year. I've just got to get more ambition.

[wildbilln864]

11. please define...

this "order" you're trying to maintain. :shrug:

[Taxloss]

22. Why, the New World Order, of course. n/t

[AZCat]

24. It's not really "new" anymore.

"Slightly used" is more like it. We've been running the show since the great J. E. Hoovah realized that the job was too important to leave up to a bunch of politicians.

[MervinFerd]

31. Yep, the Secret Shadow Government has been in charge for a -long- time.

And we will keep it that way, too.

Resistance is futile.

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[AZCat]

6. How many times do I have to tell people?

It's not "kool-aid" - it's "Flavor Aid". Jeez - talk about brand identity...

[Anarcho-Socialist]

5. Indeed

This where all DU's embarrassing conspiracy-related threads come to live.

You have to leave your peer-review sources at the door here, because revealed knowledge is the Truther modus operandi.

[Kingshakabobo]

7. Tinfoil hats AND chicken-wire bunny cages. n/t

[Big Pappa]

9. You

forgot sweet "potato" pie.

[Contrite]

12. Participation is not mandatory.

But if you hang around for a bit, you might learn something.

[vincent_vega_lives]

23. Oh boy will you

this much is true.

[John Q. Citizen]

13. Welcome. Thanks for your unkind words. If you don't like it here the door is

one clik away.

See ya!

[hamerfan]

20. I am sorry.

You are correct, they were unkind words and I apologize for them. It's just that the first time here is, well, is quite an experience. I mostly hang out in GD, LBN and the Science forums (and the Macintosh forum as I will be buying an iMac sometime this year) so I was very unprepared for this.
Again, I am sorry. I will be sticking around and maybe learn something. Still, there ought to be some kind of warning for first-timers :hide:

dumpbush

[MervinFerd]

21. No need to be sorry. Your reaction is quite reasonable.

The Truther movement started out as a standard Conspiracy Theory--vague statements ("Bush Knew", "Complicity") supported by standard Conspiracist logic--meaningless lists of "coincidences" or "links", rumor and innuendo. Any actual claims were so vague as to defy actual refutation.

--NOW-- Trutherism has evolved into something clinical--claims that are plainly false, wildly impossible, and have been definitively refuted to the point of nausea: Massive quantities of explosives in the WTC, No Planes hitting the WTC or Pentagon, Mini-Nukes in the WTC. Nuts.

You should also be aware that much of this theory has quite direct links to anti-semitic, holocaust denial and other far-right movements. I won't elaborate, but just follow a few links to see where they lead. It has nothing whatever to do with the Democratic Party or Progressive politics.

So, hang around if you wish. It -can- be entertaining, if not educational.

[John Q. Citizen]

25. Don't worry, Galileo didn't provide a warning for the authorities or the

masses when he presented information that they were unprepared for, either. Perhaps he should have, since they killed him over that information, but it didn't mean the information was incorrect. We see this kill the messenger attitude running through human history.

A more modern version was the swift boating of the scientists who first reported on table top fusion experiments. They were later vindicated.

So, before you decide to execute, ridicule, harass, and demonize, I'd say hold your horses, ask some questions and check things out.

Obviously, just because someone presents a new theory or idea doesn't make it true. But just because a new theory or idea seems unbelievable at first, doesn't make it so, either.

Keep an open mind.

[hamerfan]

26. Ummm,

John Q. writes:
A more modern version was the swift boating of the scientists who first reported on table top fusion experiments. They were later vindicated.

You wouldn't be referring to the "Cold Fusion" with heavy water done in Utah back in the 80s, would you? Because that was totally bogus, and I don't know of anyone who holds that to be true. So to what table top fusion experiments are you referring? I'm a bit interested in that sort of thing. Thanks,
dumpbush

[salvorhardin]

27. He may be talking about the Farnsworth-Hirsch Fusor

From the father of television, comes your own easy-to-build neutron source! Astound guests with your minature sun, educate your kids and irradiate the pets all in the comfort of your own home! Lead shielding sold separately. Use responsibly, always wear your dosimeter.

Actually, fusors can be small enough to fit on a table and can achieve fusion. There's also a devoted hobbyist following. The only problem is they just don't scale.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusor

On edit: A blog of a hobbyist playing around with his fusor.
http://mr-fusion.hellblazer.com

[MervinFerd]

29. Cute, but is is quite safe to be doing this at home?

The wife is likely to object.

And the neighbors.

[MervinFerd]

28. Could also be about the Cold Fusion Mini-Nukes that blew up the WTC.

Or Scalar Electromagnetic Anti-Gravity Rays.

You never can tell around here.

[hamerfan]

32. Thanks for the info, MervinFerd

It sounds like this forum can be very interesting, as long it's not taken too seriously. :popcorn:
dumpbush

[John Q. Citizen]

41. By the way, don't forget to vote.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=125&topic_id=114063&mesg_id=114063

[John Q. Citizen]

40. got a link?

[MervinFerd]

52. Cold Fusion Mini-Nukes? Who needs a link. I pulled out of my arse.

[John Q. Citizen]

33. This is a perfect example of what I was saying in my post.

You assume that the Utah experiments were totally bogus. Why do you assume that? I'm serious here, what leads you to make that assumption? Have you attempted to reproduce their experiments yourself? Are you relying on what you read in the papers? On what basis do you, with what appears to be total certainty, declare the Pons/Fliechmann experiments "totally bogus?"

This is the crux of the biscuit so to speak. What caused your mind to be so completely closed to the possibility that perhaps something was going on there?

At this point there are scientists working on so called cold fusion all over the world, many at famous research labs, universities, corporations, etc. They still don't totally understand it, but it's pretty apparent that something is happening and those with open minds are working to discover what is happening. Google cold fusion and you will find a lot of stuff on it.



http://www.evworld.com/archives/interviews2/mallove1.html

http://www.its.caltech.edu/~dg/fusion_art.html

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/6.11/coldfusion.html

http://www.ncas.org/erab/sec5.htm This is the US panel which in 1999 researched cold fusion. They don't say that it works, but they do acknowledge that there is reason to research what is taking place. They certainly didn't find that it is "totally bogus."

I have another example for you to illustrate my point. The science behind understanding the transmission and control of Yellow Fever.

In the Air
The genesis of the discovery took place in 1879. After a yellow fever epidemic had devastated the Mississippi Valley the year before, the U.S. National Health Board Yellow Fever Commission traveled to Cuba to investigate the disease. Carlos Finlay, a physician and scientific investigator in Havana, worked with the commission, which also included George Sternberg. After several months studying the disease in Cuba and in South America, the commission concluded: "Yellow fever is an epidemic, transmissible disease and the agent capable of transmitting the disease must be in the air." Following his assignment on the commission, Finlay theorized from his study of microscopic slides of tissue from yellow fever victims that the disease must be spread through the blood vessels. By 1881 Finlay had fixed on mosquitoes as the cause, but his theory was largely dismissed. (Bolding mine)

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/fever/peopleevents/e_science.html

In fact, his theory was ridiculed, ignored, dismissed, and none of the other scientists at that point would even investigate. The problem was this; Finley learned that the vector species was alway present at the point of outbreak, but his theory couldn't be successfully replicated, because sometimes volunteers came down with the fever and other times they didn't. Also, the whole idea of mosquito transmission wasn't accepted as a vector for disease transmission at that time. The missing "key" was that a mosquito that bites a person with yellow fever can't transmit the disease until a 12 day gestation period occurs, so Finley's experiments sometimes resulted in infecting a volunteer, and other times no infection took place. It was 20 some years after Finley first announced his theory that it became clear that he was right. Millions of people died of yellow fever in the intervening years. See the film if you get the chance. it's fascinating.

It also demonstrates that many scientists often ignore good evidence when it conflicts with their own prior understanding of how things work. When all the mechanisms are worked out and layed out all in a row, then of course they are willing to consider the data. If they were willing to consider the evidence prior to everything being explained, explanations might be forth coming faster. It does take a certain amount of courage to pursue evidence which is dismissed out of hand by everyone else. There are no hospitals named after Finley. Walter Reed finally decided 20 years later to take a look at Finley's work and because of that, he discovered the 12 day gestation period. The visionary work, however, was done by Finley.

How does this relate to 9/11 and was 9/11 an inside job? Well as of this point, we have had no investigation into whether anything other than 2 planes brought down three buildings. NIST didn't even bother to test the limited amount of evidence they had access to for explosive residue. There is a lot of Eyewitness evidence, photographic evidence and some physical evidence that doesn't seem to support the NIST version of events. There is lots of testimony and eyewitness evidence that doesn't seem to support the 9/11 commissions version of events. So what is really going on?

[MervinFerd]

34. Ummmmmm.

There is a consensus that Pons and Fleischmann were not frauds, but self-deceived. Their experiments did not stand up to scrutiny and could not be replicated in other laboratories. The physics community was initially excited, but skeptical, of their report and many labs tried to duplicate their results. But failed.

This created an atmosphere of skepticism toward "Cold Fusion" which undoubtedly creates a prejudice against further efforts. But, as the cited reports suggest some work continues. If any of these workers can produces large quantities of neutrons, there will be little difficulty in getting the attention of the world of physics.

Yellow fever has nothing to do with Cold Fusion. Physicists consider Cold Fusion a theoretical impossibility; they may be wrong, but they have solid reasons for their opinions.

Cold fusion has nothing to do with 9/11 at all. Your last paragraph is silly.

[John Q. Citizen]

36. Actually, if you read, the experiment were replicated in some laboratories and

not in others. No one knows why this is.

Some physicist do consider cold fusion an impossibity other do not consider it impossible at all. Which is why the study suggested further research. (did you read it?)

Many researchers condidered disease transmission by mosquitos an impossibity. They were proven wrong, a million or so deaths and 20 years later.

The psychology of scientific research is always a factor, (see Schodenger) whether investigating 9/11, so called cold fusion, yellow fever, or whatever is the subject of the research.

Your reading comprehension is silly.


And finally, the Utah cold fusion experiments were not "totally bogus," though they are still not well understood.

[MervinFerd]

38. What laboratories replicated? And could they do so 2 days in a row?

If any laboratory could -actually- replicate the Pons and Fleischmann experiments, they would have shared the Nobel Prize in Physics by now. Not to mention having gained riches in excess of Bill Gates. "Replication" means you can get the phenomenon to work every time, and with skeptical visitors watching. Once in a while, while the boss is out doesn't cut it.

The question is not whether the Utah experiments were "well understood", but whether they can be replicated. They cannot. It's not a matter of opinion or prejudice; if Pons and Fleischmann accurately described their experiments, it should be possible to replicate. It was not. No psychology is involved.

I did not say that the Utah experiments were "totally bogus"; I said they could not be replicated. That's a different thing.

--Who-- said that mosquitos cannot carry disease? The same dude who said "men will never fly"? And what was the -evidence- of mosquito-borne transmission 20 years before it was accepted? A lucky guess? As I recall, the final proof involved an physician infecting himself (and dying). Those scientists are such trendy fools.

Yes, psychology is part of science. Scientists are human beings and have prejudices just like all human beings. But the process is designed to minimize this. Get Cold Fusion to work, and you will be famous.

None of this is remotely related to wild-ass 9/11 conspiracy theories, which are based on misunderstanding and misapplication of the most basic principles of physics and logic.

[John Q. Citizen]

39. Whatever, Mervin. You are obviously not able to comprehend what is at the

various links, so I'm wasting my time here with you. Later dude.

[Grateful for Hope]

42. Mervin is too busy

trying to establish that all alternate theories have no merit.

I sure wonder why.

[AZCat]

48. I, on the other hand, wonder why...

you would say something that is clearly false, like you did. Perhaps you could explain your rationale to me?

To make it easier for you to reference, I have included the statement below:

Mervin is too busy trying to establish that all alternative theories have no merit.

[MervinFerd]

49. Yeah, I wonder that too.

[MervinFerd]

50. Which laboratories replicated cold fusion? And, why aren't they rich?

I comprehend just fine.

Replication does -not- mean "a couple of promising experiments". It means "we can do this every day, even if the guy from the rival lab is watching."

So, let's keep this simple:

WHICH LABORATORIES REPLICATED COLD FUSION?

AND

WHY ARE THEY NOT RICH AND FAMOUS?

These are really very simple questions.

If I am too dumb to figure out the answers from your links, perhaps you could just help me out with some hints.

[MervinFerd]

55. Which laboratories replicated cold fusion? And, why aren't they rich?

Still waiting for that answer.

[seemslikeadream]

14. thank the lord

one less to have to avoid

http://members.aol.com.nyud.net:8090/WiscMeBrit/GetOverYourself.jpg

[Bolo Boffin]

16. All your image belong to us.

"All your" meaning "that one", "belong to" meaning "is about to be stolen by", and "us" meaning "me."

[seemslikeadream]

17. How to link in pictures without stealing bandwidth!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=339904

How to link in pictures without stealing bandwidth! 
 This works for most pictures. 

Say you have a picture you want to use in a posting; 

http://foobar.com/JulieNewmar.jpg 

Now, if you just link it to your LJ posting, you immediately
start stealing bandwidth from foobar.com.

This is simply not a nice thing to do as some websites pay
for every byte they transfer. 

If you change that URL a little; 

http://foobar.com.nyud.net:8090/JulieNewmar.jpg 

It then uses a free public caching service. It gets fetched
ONCE from foobar.com, and they are not made bankrupt as each
of LJ's horny guys look at your Catwoman picture. 

It helps to preview the posting before you hit post as this
gets the caching service to do the initial fetch of the
picture, which can be slow, before your posting appears to
the public. Sometimes you need to wait a few minutes and
re-preview it before everything will appear as it should, and
some web servers will not play ball with the cache, and this
is how you weed those out. 
 

[Bolo Boffin]

18. Or...

You can do like I'm doing, which is save that file to my disk, upload it to my Photobucket account when I get home, and use those links to link to it from now on.

On edit: ...but I never knew that about the public caching, thanks!

[TheWraith]

15. Amen, my friend.

I honestly only come here once in awhile to try and sow some actual reason, but it's an increasingly fallow field.

[reprehensor]

19. I think the quote is...

"GOOD GOD Y'ALL" - James Brown.

[AZCat]

56. May he rest in peace.

I miss you Godfather. At least I still have Maceo.

[Grateful for Hope]

37. Good to see that you have joined your friends in this forum n/t

[Bryan Sacks]

43. Lay of the land

Those who want to 'sow reason' or 'maintain order' very likely think they are doing just what they say. I'd argue that they exhibit what might be called an 'inflated regard for their own instincts'. The same goes for the more foolish of the CTers.

[Grateful for Hope]

44. Please explain n/t

[Bryan Sacks]

45. Sorry, Hope. A bit too 'inside', I guess.

what I meant was that Mervinferd (who say he comes here to 'maintain order') and TheWraith (who claims he tries to 'sow reason' here) do not have a lock on what is 'reasonable', though they seem to believe they do.

[Grateful for Hope]

46. Thank you so much!!

n/t

[Grateful for Hope]

47. Thank You for saying what you have to say..n/t

[MervinFerd]

51. But, we are well-paid by our masters, the New World Order.

And well-deserved, I must say. Life as a Disinformation Technologist just isn't all it's supposed to be. Long hours. Poor working conditions. Constantly dealing with .....

[Bryan Sacks]

53. You're not disinfo, Merv, just dishonest. And thank you, Hope! n/t

[MervinFerd]

54. Dishonest? Hey! I spread only True Approved Disinformation!

It's a hard job but somebody's got to do it.