From: Ceri 
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Me again,

tac>> ... [chomp]... Druids have been brought in to reduce the number of
tac>> accidents on Austria's worst stretches of autobahn. .. [chomp]..
M> If one postulates that Earth is one complete living organism (Gaia),
M> one must accept the corollaries and conclusions. 

Valid thought. Always wondered about treating possible Asthma with
Gaia's lungs. Mind you with the changing (for politcal reasons here in
Oz) defination of Asthma & the question wether long term use of steroid
medication is worth the benifits . 

Suspect like any example, there's only so far a concept can be explained
via model. Any fan of "Yes (Prime)Minster" could tell you that  Don't get me wrong, the living Gaia is a viable concept, just some
of the (species-centric ???) notions of what may or maynot be 'life'
(  ... OK ... OK ...I've gotta add 'as we know
it' ) can be considered biased as they don't
permit the notion...

M>  What I find so typical is the reactions from scientists, ie "If it's
M> not>  on instruments, it's not there."

 You _DO_ know the reason why it took so long to identify the
Ozone hole in the first place? The computers had been programed to
ignore measurements above & below certain 'carefully selected' levels.
The line of thought justified this suggesting it elimiated bad data.
Once the computers had been re-programed there was over 10 years of
PROVEN data of a steadly increasing hole.

I think the phrase was "Woops" ):-)

M> Skepticism /can/ be carried too far when one rejects out of hand
M> anything that doesn't fall into the scientific canon of the Great
M> God Einstein.

If there's one thing that I've had _confirmed_ doing my degree, is that
there is no such amimal as 'emperical' evaluation or what ever other
similar centric lable suggesting a balanced / unbiased / (etc) line of
thought.   

M> Like FTL travel, just because ONE GUY say it's impossible doesn't
M> mean he's right.



  Rai

-- 
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Ceridwen is a default net alias
       Today's mighty oak is just yesterday's nut that held its ground.



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