Posts Made By: Mike Hart

Even if the Bible is 100% correct, it is far from being 100% complete. So if you attempt to interpolate the truth about the world and all that is in it using the Bible as your only guide, don't you end up like the blind men who define the elephant from very correct but highly limited perspectives?

One of my problems with turning to the Bible to explain or rationalize the challenges of existence is that it is a logical trap.

A) You have to buy the premise of its infallibility and self-consistency for the arguement to hold yet no one interpretation is universal and there are many questions about translation, context, etc. that dillute this application.

B) Applications out of context or with different interpretations leads to erroneous conclusions (It's not the Bible's fault if someone gets it wrong). In this forum I have seen scriptural arguements for and against reliance on tradition as a source of truth.

C) By treating the Bible as God's ONLY revealed truth, don't you negate all other sources of evidence God provided. Putting biblical truths above other more obvious and reasonable sources.

D) If you view the Bible as the place to turn for answers, are't you actually turning away from God? It is easier to read than to practice the more mystical side of religion (prayer, fasting, ritual feet washing).

E) Finally, isn't deification of the Bible simply another form of Idolatry? Are we treating scripture as a God?

Please don't mistake my tone as judgemental. I am impressed by the reasoning of many of those who are quoting scripture, but am having a hard time with the logic of scripture as evidence. In seveal cases I have seen contradicting arguements that are equally scriptually based.

A lot of us seem to spend a wee bit of time on the web. So, appart from AstroMart, which portal pages are the most useful/customizable for your "Home" button.

I currently use Excite, but am wanting to switch just for variety.

If you had $1600 to blow on a ccd which would you do? A camera you can use for other things or a chip that really kicks when it comes to imaging?

Perhaps a better question is how good is the D10 chip compared the KAF-1602E when it comes to noise and QE?

There are a lot of alarmists who worry about the concentration of wealth. They have very good evidnece that it is so and that things are getting worse.

http://www.endgame.org/primer-wealth.html
http://www.wealthanddemocracy.com/

I assume that by and large the world is run by oligarchies which are predominantly populated by the monied classes (and that is the way it has alway been so get used to it. )

On the other hand, when things gets really out of control there do seem to be left wing revolutions that instill governments that either swim against economic reality pursuing non-attainable utopian ideals that miserably fail economicall or the ruling class relizes they can make more money now that they have power and the whole game starts over.

So, even though I think government is extremely inefficient at delivering nearly every service it is asked to deliver, it keeps us out of the cycle by redirecting money to the middle class which is largely the engine of the economy. The societies that seem stable are the ones that have a fairly healthy tax burden and a reasonable distribution of wealth.

Is this a reasonable theory or just a rationalization to keep from getting pissed off by taxes and government waste?

When you look at the dynamics in the Mideast I would argue that tribalism, not religion is at the root. Even though Zionism and Islamic fundamentalism appear to be religiously based, they mostly are definitions of "tribes." I mean that as a socio-political/cultural term not an ethnic one. The same is true for N. Ireland and perhaps even the Rep. and Dem. parties in the U.S.

1) Given the way the modern media plays up our differences, is society becoming more tribal?

2) Aren't political party and religious affiliations mostly labels of tribal affiliation? (Nazi, Baathist, Protestent, Catholic, Muslim, Jew, Republican, Democrat, Crips or Blood, etc.)

3) Is the Western vs. Arab world the same dynamic?

4)Are the seeds for U.S. vs. Europe tribalism sewn? (i.e. European opposition to Iraq war, Freedom Fries, old Europe?

Hello,
Newer laptops (particularly the small ones) frequently lack parallel or serial ports but often have USB ports and port-replicators that create such ports through the USB port.

Does anyone know if CCD control software for older SBIG parallel port CCD cameras work with such a USB controlled port replicator?

If it does work, would such a setup (using a port replicator that attaches via USB) offer the same (or similar) speed benefits of USB vs. parallel for image downloads off the CCD?

I don't want to buy your software, an older parallel SBIG CCD and a new laptop with a port-replicator to find out the hard way.

Several years back, someone listed an ultra-cool truck mounted observatory on AstroMart. The scope ( a larger LX200) was mounted in the back and the vehicle had power jacks to stabilize the mount and isolate it from the truck suspension.

I think it was listed for around $45K and included the truck and. I am trying to find the company that made it or the person that purchased it. If anyone remembers this listing please contact me mike@
comdesigns.com

In 1999 I printed a copy of this excellent observing list for the months of May through July. I now wish I had the whole thing. Does anybody have a copy of this whole list in print or as a file?

I have done stuff with schools and nothing beats an LX200 for 2 reasonst. With a line of kids with potentially low attentions spans the magic of star hopping is wasted - only one person gets the fun at the eyepiece and the rest have to wait. Once an object is located, having a drive and a sturdy tripod helps assure it remains their for all the eyes in line. With dobs you have to constantly recenter the scope plus it easily gets bumped requiring somebody the ability to find the object again.

The LX200 also allows you to do tours of different types of objects going from galaxies to globs to planets with a well thought ought educational curicullum to enhence the learning. You get a lot more viewing in a limited amount of time which is important if you want to "keep" people's attention.

Finally for groups I also recomment some kind of cheap astro video camera. For the moon and planets it allows group viewing and you can expain what is on screen to all. For elementary kids giving them the hand unit to drive the scope around makes them feal like they are exploring the moon.

You can probably get somebody on astromart to donate one if you ask - check into tax laws in Idaho you get a tax credit for donations to schools.

I did one tweak in Photoshop. Under the noise filter I selected dust and scratches. Since this filter is designed to eliminate long lines I suspected it might eliminate the artifact grid pattern as well. Sure enough it did. Obviously it lost some data in the image as a result.

I used a radius of 4 pixels a threshold of 3 levels. It cleaned it up as nicely as I could do without over-processing it.

These same settings may be available in other programs as well, don't know.