In recent times I've observed a growing trend for people (e.g. in online forums) to write "I find that offensive" in response to someone's ideas or opinions.

So I penned a few words and submitted them to an online forum (Sydney Morning Herald).

Hope you enjoy.

Background = Sam de Brito's lament of the failure of modern cafe culture to be intellectual (at least in Australia) in his blog post "The bastardisation of the cafe".

I recently posted a genuine question on a scientific forum website and was told to ... well, piss off, basically. I believe it has validity, and would help scientists resolve the issue of the "missing dark matter" that is one of the key problems in cosmology, and astrophysics.

I suspect the account suspension was motivated by the fear the question invokes, in a similar but lesser degree to the highly-superstitious and incoherent responses to this question.

Throughout the ages, asking questions has been shown to be the root tool by which human culture has advanced. Unfortunately, the shutting down of the ability to ask questions by a culture usually heralds that culture's demise.

Back to that scientific forum ... here's the rather interesting reply I got, and the question hat caused my account to be suspended:

Hello,
Your ____________ account has been suspended due to incorrect use. You posted the following question in Astronomy and Astrophysics:

"It seems I asked the following question on the wrong forum (particle physics). It was deleted. Perhaps before being deleted here, someone might suggest an appropriate forum?

According to David Deutsch of Oxford, "single-particle interference phenomena unequivocally rule out the possibility that the tangible universe around is all that exists."

According to some interpretations, the double-slit results occur due to the influence of what Deutsch calls "shadow particles". (Paraphrasing Deutsch, superpositions have to be 'made' of something that is, in some sense, tangibly real, or sufficiently real to cause real interference effects in said experiments).

Why doesn't that interpretation 'scale up' and account for "Dark Matter" (ie. shadow galaxies etc.), which in turn would account for how the distribution of galaxies would be, and has been found to be fractal ("studies we have done show that the distribution of matter is fractal, just like a tree or a cloud." [Francesco Sylos Labini]).

If it's a 'dumb question' perhaps someone would be so courteous to explain why, rather than simply delete it, as was done elsewhere."

ps

After reading a fairly neutral, but informative article on how social inequalities factor in poor health and early mortality, I was amazed to see the vitriol and anger in response in the comments section.

It seems many people are unhappy, cranky and highly intolerant of the deeper rhythms and processes of life. All of which is highly counterproductive -- fighting life, or the essential elements thereof.

Dear me. It's so predictable.

According to an article in the New Scientist1, a highly respected psychologist has done experiments that reveal a slight ability to 'feel the future' (as in precognition).

"A year ago ... Daryl Bem, a well-respected psychologist at Cornell University, New York, reported some positive (precognition) results in the Journal of Personal and Social Psychology (vol 100, p407). 'When Daryl speaks, we listen,' says Jeff Galak, of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania."

The article details the experiments, revealing that people will make choices of pictures, words or objects that -- more often than chance --  will be of those that later had been pre-arranged to be presented to them.

What is interesting about the article is not the experimental evidence itself. That's a done deal many times over. Princeton's PEAR laboratories had around 30 years of consistent research to confirm mind-matter and precognitive abilities, before it closed up shop, citing no need to continue because ...

The enormous databases produced by PEAR provide clear evidence that human thought and emotion can produce measureable influences on physical reality. The researchers have also developed several theoretical models that attempt to accommodate the empirical results, which cannot be explained by any currently recognized scientific model.

And of course "not mentioning" Wheeler's Delayed Choice experiments showing a much more substantial experimental basis within deep reality of future influences effecting the past (or more correctly, present choices effecting which past is experienced).

Superstition - "a belief or practice resulting from ignorance, fear of the unknown, trust in magic or chance, or a false conception of causation."

While sharing various ideas on a forum recently, it became evident there are many people (including and especially atheists, scientists and the religious) who still very deeply rely on superstitious beliefs.

And by "superstitious" beliefs, none are more evident than when the topic of Zeno's Paradoxes is considered.

To put things in context:

Imagine we have a number of belief-systems, let's call them BS1 and BS2. Let's now see how well they match a particular set of evidence (facts and observations, as can be readily experienced on planet Earth).{C}

This evening I watched a program on television which basically was about how those who oppose immunisation (vaccinations) are rabid do-gooders or some such.

The issue of immunisation (vaccination), and of children in particular, is a highly emotive one, judging by the commentary.

The arguments are the usual ones ... since vaccinations began we've seen off all sorts of horrible diseases like Polio and Whooping Cough, the list goes on.

There's only one problem with the apparent linking of vaccinations with the lowering of rates of disease. It's not based on good science.

A recent article in the Sydney Morning Herald about the reluctance of people to believe in climate change, prompts one to consider the deeper causes.

As many cancer patients who've recovered often admit, cancer was the best thing that ever happened to them. Why? Because it forced them to seriously take stock and change.