Science does not follow one book until it must be rewritten ((don't look) again and again. :rolleyes:) It follows all of them and knows we must rewrite more than not, it's to find real answers. Religion is to give them* eg yes Tinkerbell can fly!(((.)))

Racism* and power won't go anywhere soon so bask in it while you still can, propitiate to your immortal demons and sh#! (but like Buffy not rally perpetual,) "we" can all grow up...

Kids voice:
I believe in the easter bunny, santa, tooth fairy, god and bloody marry...

Grown up:
I believe in god thus ghosts??? (We can't all climb trees. :p)

By their fruits you shall know them, in at least one sense, just like with the scientists, actually. By the way, I think "quack religious zealots" is redundant.

Edit: on a completely different note, I totally disagree with Mr Johnson's quote, although it seems to be a common opinion that somehow scientific reasoning would have anything to do with faith in Jesus. The late Stephen Gould is usually credited with modern demolitions of this (to my mind) fallacy.

I don't think that you should take him too seriously:

Give it a couple hundred years... ;) (all hail spaghetti!)

Oh, that Mr Johnson. Oy Vey

It is not "necessarily so". Of course one has to start from somewhere, i.e. the present, however this is not as limiting as you seem to think. Regarding the concentration on nitrogen in the ancient atmosphere, as in your question, you can analyze minerals for example, and look for traces of water:

Source: Nitrogen Isotopic Composition and Density of the Archean Atmosphere (Abstract)

Regarding the same paper:

Source: Nitrogen Concentration in Earth's Archean Atmosphere

Also, at astronomical scales the fact that the speed of light is limited makes an excellent time machine, hence you can actually see things (and not just in the visible spectrum) that happened billions of years ago, and analyze them as if they were happening today (with spectroscopy for example). One possible assumption? Well, you should assume that the laws of physics themselves didn't change over time, but apparently there's no element suggesting they did, which is nice.

Regarding the first sentence, science can prove such things, as I tried to show by some examples. Overall, you're creating a paradox where there is none. Of course if you're looking for an absolute perfection then you should stick to a religion, but I'm not sure it is a good idea if you want to understand how nature works.

Curiosity killed the cat. If nature did not exist aside from the boredom of some infinity creator then "faith full" can rape, kill and murder because it's on IT (here have some fruit!) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EM4vblG6BVQ

Thinking for yourself could be too moral and is too much work plus times seven billion won't!

http://one-education.org/pages/mission

Gentlebeings, all such papers should be prefixed by a triple-dose of "We Think That ...", followed, perhaps in very small type, by: "but, what the hell do we know?" :) For all we know, that "ancient water" might have somehow come from last week's shower. We are "boldly going where no man has gone before," and therefore it must be accepted, by all, that we could be ... absolutely, 150%, wrong. (And we might not know it, and we might have no way to know it.) So it goes.

By "bad science", I meant science that used or uses methods that don't match the standards of today. Bad in the sense that it would be "thrown out" as poorly done or erroneous if presented by a "modern" scientist. I did not mean "bad" in the sense that the science itself was necessarily wrong, or that the scientist was necessarily dishonest. In fact, I believe a good amount of this "bad science" is actually fact, or close to it. This is yet another example of misunderstanding due to multple meanings for the same English word. 'Bad' can mean anything from 'inadmissable' to 'wrong' to 'smelly' to 'evil'. But getting back to the context of the thread, many of those "great scientists of history" listed above by Enorbet, who practiced "bad science", were "men of Faith" as well, and his response just points out another example of my original point.

Yeah, of course...

... just as Charles K. Johnson was a "man of science".

My point being ... "of course" :) ... that, "when we Mere Mortals seek to explore Things Eternal," we should always strive "to keep our cards profoundly close to our chest.™"

Non Sequitur. No conclusion can be drawn by comparing that person to anyone else, least of all those listed by Enorbet. There are 'crazy ones' in every field of study. In that point, I agree.

You missed my touch of sarcasm. Anyway, since you guys seem to like doublespeak:

Bye.

"Feelings -- nothing more than feel,,," whoops, sorry again. :p

Eternal life is for vampires. :jawa: L⌚⌚k what good it doe$? Living long and prospering can't include the "devil" or "sin" and stupidity, I think they need a new new new testaments (upgrades to religions should be a law if not at lest moral.) It's cool if they want to keep the whole flying pasta in there but with y'all's brainwashed promise of eternal life may as well strap up the bombs now? OH WAIT!!!

Firstly only a blind fool would state that all men of Science were also NOT men of Faith. I'm quite sure the majority were men of Faith, even though many had their own concepts somewhat opposed to the mainstream, eg: Galielo. Many mathematicians and scientists were driven by their Faith to attempt to "see the face of God". Much like Carl Sagan I don't see a necessary conflict between Religion and Science as they are both trying to grasp the same things for the most part. It's only when religion becomes Organized Religion that most try to stifle dissent, with or without evidence.

Most of all the example list I posted is an argument FOR Good Science no matter how far back in time you wish to go. I passionately deny the concept that somehow Modern Science has a flaky foundation and exactly to which "original point" are you referring?