Quote: magicjay38 said: Well, maybe but it was a long time ago. If you date scientific method as currently understood to the writings of Descartes and Bacon, that was in the 17th century and the roundness of Earth had been demonstrated for quite some time. The earliest recorded proof of a round earth is in the writing of Claudius Ptolemy and Eratosthenes of Cyrene, circa 200 BC. That fact was lost on Europe in the middle ages because it was suppressed by the Catholic Church.
I can't confirm or deny most of that. I do find your bitterness for the Catholic Church on my account humorous though. In any event, this changes nothing. It just says the idea was presented, but also ignored. Even assuming what you said was true, I know for a fact that the idea itself wasn't suppressed, and a minority of people still continued to believe that the earth was round, but they were shot down until the 12-1300s. Much like the present-day research by scientists who feel that homosexuality is a type of mental disease. Their research is free to all, yet it's ignored.
I'll freely admit, that it's hardly conclusive to any degree, even with genuinely reformed homosexuals who embraced a straight lifestyle to speak for them. Since the human brain is just such a complicated mechanism, there are so many scenarios a scientist may not be taking into account. It's not as static as saying "he's exhibiting gay behavior"--There could be any number of reasons for what is described to be "homosexual tendency" and saying a gay person's "fooling themself" into believing they're straight or vice versa. But this a problem that plagues both sides of the argument. Nothing has been absolutely proven biologically, and nothing can be proven by psychiatry--That field is pure assumption from every angle. If absolute certainty is impossible for anything, then that goes double for psychology.
Tell it to Galeleo and Copernicus. A simple google search for Eratosthenes of Cyrene would have provided you with multiple sources. The Catholic Encyclopedia, an excellent referance, would probably confirm this also. That it wasn't known in the middle ages can be attributed to the fact that most people could not read or write. Much of ancient science and knowledge was lost in the fire at the Alexandria Library. Hmm... I wonder who was responsible for that torch job?
Your arguments seem centered around this idea that science doesn't prove anything. You're right. But based upon a preponderance of the evidence we can say with X confidence that Y is the expected outcome of Z. As for psychiatry, Freud was the first to scientifically study the mind. It was faulty judgement to generalize based on his study of Late-Victorian era women with mental problems. But it was a good beginning and the field has changed remarkably in the last 100 years. There are much stronger biologic components in the practice. Have you ever considered seeing one yourself? I'm sure Lithium would help.
Quote: magicjay38 said: Here again we see Pariah's use of fiction presented as fact.
Quote: And here we see an outright lie on your part:
Quote: Syphallis was unknown in Europe in Classical Times. It was long presumed that it was brought from the Americas because it first appeared in the 16th century. Gonorreah can cause pain and sterility but it's rarely fatal or debilitating. And UTI??? that may be but is not always related to sexual activity!
You know, Asshole, I maybe wrong on something, but I never tell a bold faced lie. The evidence on pre-Colombian syphillis is inconclusive. A simillar disease called Yaws was present in Africa prior to CC's voyage. It may have mutated into syphillis in the cooler climes of Europe. The evidence is thin. What IS known is that an especially virulent form raged across Europe beginning in the early 16th century, presumably introduced by Crystobal himself and his sailors. At any rate, it's a topic on which reasonable people can disagree.
Quote: From Magenta :
Master, I grow weary of argueing with Pariah! When can we return to Transylvania on the planet Transexual?
