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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Now most LAB leadership votes are in Osborne moves to under

SystemSystem Posts: 12,220
edited August 2015 in General

imagepoliticalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Now most LAB leadership votes are in Osborne moves to undermine the likely winner

Guardian's Andrew Sparrow says Osborne’s Faslane announcement is CON plan to frame Corbyn.
http://t.co/ApC9o124Zx pic.twitter.com/AU8XrBH9BD

Read the full story here


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Comments

  • notmenotme Posts: 3,293
    edited August 2015
    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,137
    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,175
    Osborne and Cameron have been repeatedly and consistently underestimated by many on here but most damagingly for Labour by them. The Eton/Bullingdon meme has been a prime example of this.
  • TheWhiteRabbitTheWhiteRabbit Posts: 12,454
    There's another point here. The Tories have got the chance to lay the groundwork for a full-on offensive against Corbyn. The effect will be that yet again, the opposition will be playing the government's game.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,137
    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    Nearly as crap as yesterday's Sunday Times, which described the poet Phillip Larkin as being "Hull-born" and a former poet laureate. Both completely wrong. Indeed, he famously turned down the laureate job.
  • MikeSmithsonMikeSmithson Posts: 7,382
    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    In the old days that's how they did their expenses!

  • CD13CD13 Posts: 6,366
    Ms Cyclefree,

    "I thought Islamists disliked tombs and any sort of memorial and worshipping of them or at them. Hence IS destruction of the same. The Saudis don't even have tombs for their kings."

    I expect you're right but three months of Osama spouting off is worth avoiding, even if the Septics had some secrets they might not want revealed.

    Re Ozzie, “What did he mean by that?” 19th century Austrian diplomat Metternich is said to have asked of Talleyrand when he heard the French statesman had died.

    Osborne also never does things without a political reason.
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    FPT: Mr. Llama, must say the idea of a 'legal' war strikes me as quite odd.

    Are people arguing wars ought to be green or red lit based on an international, and unaccountable, panel?

    Or that killing thousands of people without a vote is bad but killing tens of thousands with a vote is acceptable?

    Mr. Borough, quite the reverse. Every dreadful Tory stroke serves only to root thy Labour oak.

    Mr. Notme, that's a bit Doctor Evil.
  • glwglw Posts: 9,956
    The Mirror are innumerate? Shocking.

    I must say how much I'm enjoying watching Labour supporters tie themselves into knots trying to explain away Comrade Corbyn's comments about Bin Laden and ISIS, and he hasn't even won yet, so God knows what Labour supporters will be having to whitewash if Corbyn does win.
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,175
    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    You mean like their timely removals of Foot/Brown/Miliband?
  • MyBurningEarsMyBurningEars Posts: 3,651
    rottenborough said:

    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    Nearly as crap as yesterday's Sunday Times, which described the poet Phillip Larkin as being "Hull-born" and a former poet laureate. Both completely wrong. Indeed, he famously turned down the laureate job.
    Both of these are really, really, really poor. Disappointing.
  • SimonStClareSimonStClare Posts: 7,976
    edited August 2015
    Afternoon all.

    'The Tory attack on Corbyn and his party has begun'


    Much as I admire Andrew Sparrow, surely the Faslane debacle has been an ongoing situation for the past year and has more to do with Scotland and the SNP than Jeremy Corbyn?
  • IndigoIndigo Posts: 9,966
    edited August 2015
    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    That has possibilities for the Tories all of its own. The outrage of the hard left, the fragility of the funding arrangements with the unions, and the strong possibility that he stands for leader after any defenestration and gets re-elected anyway.... and the public get treated to another four months of merriment and fratricide close to the next election, what is not to like ?
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,175
    CD13 said:

    Ms Cyclefree,

    "I thought Islamists disliked tombs and any sort of memorial and worshipping of them or at them. Hence IS destruction of the same. The Saudis don't even have tombs for their kings."

    I expect you're right but three months of Osama spouting off is worth avoiding, even if the Septics had some secrets they might not want revealed.

    Re Ozzie, “What did he mean by that?” 19th century Austrian diplomat Metternich is said to have asked of Talleyrand when he heard the French statesman had died.

    Osborne also never does things without a political reason.

    Cool - post of the month.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    It'll also piss the SNP right off too.

    Happy Days.
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Miss Plato, doesn't take much.

    Brown's whining about the union included a nice line about the evils of English nationalism.

    .....

    The lack of self-awareness was not unexpected, but remains monumental.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    Conference season is going to be a corker - fire and brimstone at Labour's and journalists circling like vultures looking for splits and loonery.

    The Tories will have some fusses over the EU, but surely Labour gets top billing this time.
    TheWhiteRabbit said:

    There's another point here. The Tories have got the chance to lay the groundwork for a full-on offensive against Corbyn. The effect will be that yet again, the opposition will be playing the government's game.

  • MikeKMikeK Posts: 9,053
    This is not much of an attack on C, and this sort of news can rebound on O when the whole plan is revealed.
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,983
    It's all going to be down to the zeitgeist in 2020. Will we be enjoying a hippy revival with flowers adorning rifle barrels and Jeremy wearing beads and smoking dope........

    ........or will the dark side have taken root with the the blackest of the black Gideon at the helm....
  • glwglw Posts: 9,956
    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    A certain amount of pushing, like the warnings from Blair, is probably helpful to get Corbyn elected. I think it is quite telling that the Tories have left it until after the voting has begun.
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    edited August 2015
    I'm not sure they're going to hit him with everything they've got yet. The best outcome for the Tories is a Corbyn whose tenure is not so utterly disastrous that he's unseated before 2020 in favour of a fresh new face such as Dan Jarvis. The Tories will want to do enough to maintain a small poll lead for the next few years, and then really go after Corbyn in the six months ahead of the GE.

    However, the only trouble is that as Leader of the Opposition Corbyn is going to have to do a lot of regular, high profile interviews - and the chances of at least one going catastrophically wrong every few months or so have to be quite high. In short, regardless of Submarine George's master plan, I think the Corbyn leadership will implode of its own accord quite quickly. Whether Labour can then recover enough to seriously challenge the Tories is going to be the key question. It's why I think the outcome of the Deputy leadership election is rather more important than most people have realised; if Creasy gets it, I think there is still some hope for Labour. Obviously, if it's Watson, there is none.
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Mr. Roger, it may take something stronger than cannabis to make people think Corbyn is a potential PM.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,137
    felix said:

    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    You mean like their timely removals of Foot/Brown/Miliband?
    Seems to be a feeling in Labour that this time they will ditch a potential loser a year or two out from GE. I can't see JC lasting the course myself and have started betting on his replacement, although I cling to a "fantasy" that Yvette will still pull victory from defeat.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    That's not what they'll have to pay out for phone hacking?
  • Oliver_PBOliver_PB Posts: 397
    edited August 2015
    This, in my view, is the big lesson for the left to learn from the right: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.
  • madasafishmadasafish Posts: 659
    rottenborough said:

    felix said:

    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    You mean like their timely removals of Foot/Brown/Miliband?
    Seems to be a feeling in Labour that this time they will ditch a potential loser a year or two out from GE. I can't see JC lasting the course myself and have started betting on his replacement, although I cling to a "fantasy" that Yvette will still pull victory from defeat.
    Then they are likely to lose all the new pro- Corbyn Party members who'll go back to voting Green not voting
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,974
    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    And here we thought Piers "Doctor Evil" Morgan was a thing of the past at the Mirror?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Mr. Nashe, they'll probably keep a lot on ice, and not want to encourage Labour to ditch him early.

    But the Conservatives (and others) will be very keen to nail his character early on, as happened with Miliband.
  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson that the left: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessarily.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point.

    Had a good lunch, Mr. PB?
  • ThomasNasheThomasNashe Posts: 5,331
    felix said:

    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    You mean like their timely removals of Foot/Brown/Miliband?
    Corbyn is on a wholly different plane of crapness to those three.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    SimonStClare said:

    Much as I admire Andrew Sparrow, surely the Faslane debacle has been an ongoing situation for the past year and has more to do with Scotland and the SNP than Jeremy Corbyn?

    I agree.

    SNP 'You never keep your referendum promises'

    UK: 'Here's one we made - Faslane gets all the UK subs'

    SNP: 'Its nae fair, we dinna want it....just gie us the money'

    There's no pleasing some folk.......
  • glwglw Posts: 9,956
    MyBurningEars said:

    rottenborough said:

    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    Nearly as crap as yesterday's Sunday Times, which described the poet Phillip Larkin as being "Hull-born" and a former poet laureate. Both completely wrong. Indeed, he famously turned down the laureate job.
    Both of these are really, really, really poor. Disappointing.
    A couple of days ago the Guardian managed to erroneously accuse Danny Baker of both transvestism and bankruptcy.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    It'll all be the fault of Evil Tories no doubt.

    That's one record that'll never change. Right now, I can only marvel at the hook-wriggling some Labourites are engaging in. Especially the whataboutery.

    Only 12 days to go...
    glw said:

    The Mirror are innumerate? Shocking.

    I must say how much I'm enjoying watching Labour supporters tie themselves into knots trying to explain away Comrade Corbyn's comments about Bin Laden and ISIS, and he hasn't even won yet, so God knows what Labour supporters will be having to whitewash if Corbyn does win.

  • CD13CD13 Posts: 6,366

    Sorry to go off topic but there’s a programme on Multiverses on BBC2 this coming Wednesday. Horizon does dumb down a lot but surely they can’t mess this one up.

    There are several varieties of multiverse but they must all confront the issue of infinity.
    There are an infinite number of me writing these very words in an infinite number of universes. William of Ockham (or rather an infinite number of William of Ockhams) must be spinning in their graves, but it does explain why this universe could be exquisitely made for human existence.

    Will they add in ten or eleven dimensions and have a go at when time began. I’m not convinced by Hawking’s analogy of the South Pole – where you can’t go any further south so that’s where south begins. If you go below the globe, there’s still an infinite space for south.

    If nothing else, it will mess up your head as effectively as infinities mess up mathematics.

    OK, I'll get my anorak.
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,175
    rottenborough said:

    felix said:

    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    You mean like their timely removals of Foot/Brown/Miliband?
    Seems to be a feeling in Labour that this time they will ditch a potential loser a year or two out from GE. I can't see JC lasting the course myself and have started betting on his replacement, although I cling to a "fantasy" that Yvette will still pull victory from defeat.
    Oh - well 'if there's a feeling' then they 've got nothing to worry about :)
    ThomasNashe said:

    felix said:

    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    You mean like their timely removals of Foot/Brown/Miliband?
    Corbyn is on a wholly different plane of crapness to those three.
    You think? :)
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    I suspect that leaving this stuff until the final two or so weeks is a nifty halfway house - leave it too late to derail the enthusiasm, but supply enough Told You So evidence to be cited later.

    I've been impressed by the discipline of the Tories - maybe they're all too busy pointing and laughing to feel the need to help...
    glw said:

    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    A certain amount of pushing, like the warnings from Blair, is probably helpful to get Corbyn elected. I think it is quite telling that the Tories have left it until after the voting has begun.
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,175
    edited August 2015
    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson for the left to learn from the right: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.

    We feel your pain.

    Edit: CorbynISIS?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Mr. CD13, do mention it again tomorrow. I may watch that (agree on Horizon dumbing down, too).
  • glwglw Posts: 9,956
    Plato said:

    I've been impressed by the discipline of the Tories - maybe they're all too busy pointing and laughing to feel the need to help...

    It is either discipline or the Tories are as baffled as everybody else by what Labour appears to be about to do.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    An apocalypse of hyperbole there.
    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson for the left to learn from the right: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.

  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,137
    CD13 said:


    Sorry to go off topic but there’s a programme on Multiverses on BBC2 this coming Wednesday. Horizon does dumb down a lot but surely they can’t mess this one up.

    There are several varieties of multiverse but they must all confront the issue of infinity.
    There are an infinite number of me writing these very words in an infinite number of universes. William of Ockham (or rather an infinite number of William of Ockhams) must be spinning in their graves, but it does explain why this universe could be exquisitely made for human existence.

    Will they add in ten or eleven dimensions and have a go at when time began. I’m not convinced by Hawking’s analogy of the South Pole – where you can’t go any further south so that’s where south begins. If you go below the globe, there’s still an infinite space for south.

    If nothing else, it will mess up your head as effectively as infinities mess up mathematics.

    OK, I'll get my anorak.

    Sounds interesting. There was a fascinating TV film by the Eels lead singer about his Dad, inventor of idea of parallel universes on a few years ago.

    As to Horizon. My other half has got bored of me complaining about its dummying down. Bring back Paul Vaughan I say.
  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    Mr. 13, if the multiverse theory is valid then there would have to be a universe in which I think George Osborne would make a good prime minister. Believe me, infinity is not that big and therefore the theory fails to hold water.

    (With due acknowledgement to the late Terry Pratchett)
  • TheWhiteRabbitTheWhiteRabbit Posts: 12,454
    Plato said:

    An apocalypse of hyperbole there.

    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson for the left to learn from the right: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.

    Being lectured on partisanship by members of a party where "being a Tory in disguise" in the number one insult.

    The number one lesson? People always think they're right.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    Now that's a linky I want to see - brilliant, but pass the mind bleach.
    glw said:

    MyBurningEars said:

    rottenborough said:

    notme said:

    first :)

    Hilariously The Mirror had it as £500BILLION (their capitals, not mine)...

    Nearly as crap as yesterday's Sunday Times, which described the poet Phillip Larkin as being "Hull-born" and a former poet laureate. Both completely wrong. Indeed, he famously turned down the laureate job.
    Both of these are really, really, really poor. Disappointing.
    A couple of days ago the Guardian managed to erroneously accuse Danny Baker of both transvestism and bankruptcy.
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Mr. Llama, there might even be a universe where you acknowledge Hannibal's undoubted superiority over Caesar.
  • glwglw Posts: 9,956
    Plato said:

    Now that's a linky I want to see - brilliant, but pass the mind bleach.

    It has been corrected now. It does make me wonder how many articles, particularly those that are online, are not even getting a once-over from a sub-editor.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,591
    Describing it as a plot to 'frame' him seems designed to be open to interpretation, giving framing someone is often about deceiving others, when it might also be meant as framing the debate, which need not involve any deceit, even if it is designed to push a narrative.
    Oliver_PB said:



    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views /blockquote>
    That is certainly nothing unique when it comes to political parties, particularly ones which actually compete for power (though oddly the extremist fringe ones are worst of all). I see the Tories accused of ruthlessness as a more unique attribute than their partisanship, which it is pointless to debate if they are worse examples of than their opponents, as the key is both have elements of it without question.

  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    Morris_Dancer said:

    Mr. Llama, there might even be a universe where you acknowledge Hannibal's undoubted superiority over Caesar.

    Now, now, Mr. D., let's not be silly.
  • AnneJGPAnneJGP Posts: 3,099
    Morris_Dancer said:

    Miss Plato, doesn't take much.

    Brown's whining about the union included a nice line about the evils of English nationalism.

    .....

    The lack of self-awareness was not unexpected, but remains monumental.

    I noticed a report about Mr Brown's 'Tories breaking up the Union' complaint but didn't have time to read it. Was it the proposed investment in Faslane that provoked him into saying it?
  • frpenkridgefrpenkridge Posts: 670
    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.
  • saddenedsaddened Posts: 2,245
    MikeK said:

    This is not much of an attack on C, and this sort of news can rebound on O when the whole plan is revealed.

    Blockhead, worked out why a smart phone without a contract may be useful to a migrant yet?
  • AndyJSAndyJS Posts: 29,395
    Jason Burke:

    "The truth about the caliphate

    To tackle Islamic State, we need to understand the dream of the caliphate and its real roots in history"

    http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/features/state-of-terror
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,591
    rottenborough said:

    Isn't there a risk that if Tories push too hard, Lab will ditch him way before 2020?

    I'm in several minds about what their tactics should be, and what they actually are. If they feel merely electing Corbyn will do enough damage to Labour, or that nothing they do will impact how quickly Labour get rid of him but that they can cement the public view of him early on, they should go as hard as possible right away. If they worry about their own troubles down the road when they might prefer Corbyn as leader vs another candidate, maybe they need to let him secure his position as leader and leave it to his internal opponents to create trouble.
  • CornishBlueCornishBlue Posts: 840
    edited August 2015
    Oliver_PB said:

    Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    I love this sort of one-eyed nonsense from the Left. What about the Observer, the "Independent", the Mirror, the BBC...?
    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power.
    ROFL - the entire general election was basically the Labour party screaming "baby eating Tories!"

    The electorate however also observed the Tories and whilst perhaps not 100% agreeing with everything, they saw a generally competent government-to-be.
    There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.
    The reason why the £500m is being spent is to maintain this country's military defences for the long-term. End of.

    Oh wait, I've just read your diatribe a bit further and you've gone into "baby eating Tories" mode again.

    ROFL

    Please carry on like this - huge Tory majority in 2020 ahoy.
  • AndyJSAndyJS Posts: 29,395
    edited August 2015
    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson for the left to learn from the right: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.

    You still believe the benefits culture helps the poor? I would have thought it would obvious by now to everyone that it has a negative effect on working class communities.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    I quite agree - there was one called something like How Big Is The Universe? All the presenters were US, it was filmed in Nevada and then lost me after about 15mins after starting off like a children's prog.

    Physics is a dark art as far as I'm concerned and I rarely feel the progs are even attempting to explain this stuff to me. And at the other end of the scale, other editions are so horribly dumbed down and BBC1ish.
    frpenkridge said:

    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.

  • taffystaffys Posts: 9,753
    ''The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy...''

    The general conclusion seems to be that our already unimaginably vast and complex universe is more unimaginably vast and complex than we previously thought. Way more. Unimaginably more.

    Which is fine as far as it goes but....

  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Miss JGP, I only skimmed it myself. Brown's objections appeared to be more powers being devolved to Holyrood [which I believe he campaigned for in the referendum], and 'English nationalism', which is evil (unlike Scottish nationalism, obviously).

    Mr. Penkridge, there's some very good stuff on Youtube. I like the LindyBeige channel for historical stuff.
  • John_MJohn_M Posts: 7,503
    HurstLlama said:

    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson that the left: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessarily.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point.

    Had a good lunch, Mr. PB?
    Wow, hyper-partisanship, that's a new high for hyperbole from you. I grant you the loathing bit though.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,517
    Plato said:

    It'll also piss the SNP right off too.

    Happy Days.

    It also pisses off the people, will not help the Tory surge for sure.
  • richardDoddrichardDodd Posts: 5,472
    edited August 2015
    I bet the people in Faslane and area who are going to be employed for the foreseeable are delighted about Osbornes announcement..
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    The next phase is warp-factor partisanship
    John_M said:

    HurstLlama said:

    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson that the left: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessarily.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point.

    Had a good lunch, Mr. PB?
    Wow, hyper-partisanship, that's a new high for hyperbole from you. I grant you the loathing bit though.
  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    frpenkridge said:

    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.

    Surely the structure of atoms is straightforward, even I sort of understand it - neutrons protons and electrons whizzing round. Its when someone tries to explain sub atomic particles, quarks and strings and whatnot that complexity really sets in and peoples eyes glaze over..
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,426
    edited August 2015
    Plato said:

    Now that's a linky I want to see - brilliant, but pass the mind bleach.

    glw said:

    A couple of days ago the Guardian managed to erroneously accuse Danny Baker of both transvestism and bankruptcy.

    The page is here. Unfortunately it has been changed since it was written.

    The Google cache for the page does not have the original. There is no entry for it on "archive.today". The archive site "archive.org" has not archived the original, although it may delay archiving a page for up to six months. Consequently there may not be an archived copy of the original anywhere that I can find

    However, the flavour of the balls-up can be found in this comment or this comment

    It does seem that the Guardian published a very stupid article indeed and will recieve the appropriate Private Eye award in due course.

  • AnneJGPAnneJGP Posts: 3,099
    CD13 said:


    Sorry to go off topic but there’s a programme on Multiverses on BBC2 this coming Wednesday. Horizon does dumb down a lot but surely they can’t mess this one up.

    There are several varieties of multiverse but they must all confront the issue of infinity.
    There are an infinite number of me writing these very words in an infinite number of universes. William of Ockham (or rather an infinite number of William of Ockhams) must be spinning in their graves, but it does explain why this universe could be exquisitely made for human existence.

    Will they add in ten or eleven dimensions and have a go at when time began. I’m not convinced by Hawking’s analogy of the South Pole – where you can’t go any further south so that’s where south begins. If you go below the globe, there’s still an infinite space for south.

    If nothing else, it will mess up your head as effectively as infinities mess up mathematics.

    OK, I'll get my anorak.

    Do you mean that at least some of the other you's writing those words in other universes are necessarily writing in a universe that isn't exquisitely made for human existence?

  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,426
    glw said:

    A couple of days ago the Guardian managed to erroneously accuse Danny Baker of both transvestism and bankruptcy.

    Consecutively or concurrently?
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,338
    SeanT said:

    Jeremy Corbyn doesn't need framing. He does it all by himself. He autoframes. That is his peculiar genius, and Labour's specific nightmare.

    The Tories are going to present him as soft on terror - and all they need do is quote his own words back at him.

    And if the polls are to be believed, the day after the 14th anniversary of 9/11, Labour will elect as leader someone who thinks that the death of the mastermind behind that attack was a "tragedy".

  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    I will keep a watch on PEye next week for it. I'd forgotten about the Times saying JPII was a non-Catholic Pope.

    The Times isn't quite as bad as the Gruaniad for spelling errors, but it's getting there. Subs seem to be in very short supply across newspapers today. The Mail regularly has double-pastes of text.
    viewcode said:

    Plato said:

    Now that's a linky I want to see - brilliant, but pass the mind bleach.

    glw said:

    A couple of days ago the Guardian managed to erroneously accuse Danny Baker of both transvestism and bankruptcy.

    The page is here. Unfortunately it has been changed since it was written.

    The Google cache for the page does not have the original. There is no entry for it on "archive.today". The archive site "archive.org" has not archived the original, although it may delay archiving a page for up to six months. Consequently there may not be an archived copy of the original anywhere that I can find

    However, the flavour of the balls-up can be found in this comment or this comment

    It does seem that the Guardian published a very stupid article indeed and will recieve the appropriate Private Eye award in due course.

  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    AnneJGP said:

    CD13 said:


    Sorry to go off topic but there’s a programme on Multiverses on BBC2 this coming Wednesday. Horizon does dumb down a lot but surely they can’t mess this one up.

    There are several varieties of multiverse but they must all confront the issue of infinity.
    There are an infinite number of me writing these very words in an infinite number of universes. William of Ockham (or rather an infinite number of William of Ockhams) must be spinning in their graves, but it does explain why this universe could be exquisitely made for human existence.

    Will they add in ten or eleven dimensions and have a go at when time began. I’m not convinced by Hawking’s analogy of the South Pole – where you can’t go any further south so that’s where south begins. If you go below the globe, there’s still an infinite space for south.

    If nothing else, it will mess up your head as effectively as infinities mess up mathematics.

    OK, I'll get my anorak.

    Do you mean that at least some of the other you's writing those words in other universes are necessarily writing in a universe that isn't exquisitely made for human existence?

    How would a human know whether their universe was exquisitely made for human existence? In what way would their experience of life differ from a human living in one that was?
  • CD13CD13 Posts: 6,366
    edited August 2015
    Ms JGP,

    "Do you mean that at least some of the other you's writing those words in other universes are necessarily writing in a universe that isn't exquisitely made for human existence?"

    Now don't start. I blame that Hugh Everett III - him and his 1950s PhD thesis. As Private Eye used to say ... "Crazy name, crazy fella."
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    edited August 2015
    When people start talking like this, I assume they're on magic mushrooms and only consider themselves as a concept.

    Incidentally, I did see a rather good Horizon on brains and the various attempts made to brainwash people after the Korean War. Prof Nutt was very entertaining and explained that magic mushrooms could be used for treating OCD and related conditions as they reduce the blood flow to the *self* bits of one's brain.
    CD13 said:

    Ms JGP,

    "Do you mean that at least some of the other you's writing those words in other universes are necessarily writing in a universe that isn't exquisitely made for human existence?"

    Now don't start. I blame that Hugh Everett III - him and his 1950s PhD thesis.

  • MonkeysMonkeys Posts: 758
    edited August 2015
    If it's possible there are no parallel universes, then does multiverse theory predict there is a universe with no parallel universes? Dunno mate.
  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    taffys said:

    ''The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy...''

    The general conclusion seems to be that our already unimaginably vast and complex universe is more unimaginably vast and complex than we previously thought. Way more. Unimaginably more.

    Which is fine as far as it goes but....

    The best explanation of the size of the universe, at least the best that is understandable by normal people, probably comes from that remarkable publication, The Encyclopedia Galatica and it goes like this:

    “Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space...”
  • notmenotme Posts: 3,293
    edited August 2015
    Plato said:

    I quite agree - there was one called something like How Big Is The Universe? All the presenters were US, it was filmed in Nevada and then lost me after about 15mins after starting off like a children's prog.

    Physics is a dark art as far as I'm concerned and I rarely feel the progs are even attempting to explain this stuff to me. And at the other end of the scale, other editions are so horribly dumbed down and BBC1ish.

    frpenkridge said:

    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.

    But at this level it isnt really science as we commonly (mis)understand it. It's little more than philosophy. We are so remarkably far from comprehending what we are seeing and understanding.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,517
    CarlottaVance said:

    SimonStClare said:

    Much as I admire Andrew Sparrow, surely the Faslane debacle has been an ongoing situation for the past year and has more to do with Scotland and the SNP than Jeremy Corbyn?

    I agree.

    SNP 'You never keep your referendum promises'

    UK: 'Here's one we made - Faslane gets all the UK subs'

    SNP: 'Its nae fair, we dinna want it....just gie us the money'

    There's no pleasing some folk.......
    Nasty Tories just want to be loved
  • CD13CD13 Posts: 6,366
    Mr Llama,

    I assume that they will explain that on Wednesday evening, but the important constants of Physics need to be "just so" for the universe to exist as it does and for humans to understand it. A put-up job or an infinite variety? Or maybe both?

    Now I expect it will be a disappointment.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,517
    richardDodd said:

    I bet the people in Faslane and area who are going to be employed for the foreseeable are delighted about Osbornes announcement..

    LOL, on the ball as ever
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,973
    Mr. T, perhaps.

    Mankind's quite creative when it comes to pain, though.
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,426
    edited August 2015
    Plato said:

    I will keep a watch on PEye next week for it. I'd forgotten about the Times saying JPII was a non-Catholic Pope.

    The Times isn't quite as bad as the Gruaniad for spelling errors, but it's getting there. Subs seem to be in very short supply across newspapers today. The Mail regularly has double-pastes of text.

    I don't think sub-editors exist any more, at least not in the old sense. Papers are coming to resemble blogs that chum together and buy a photocopier.

    If five of us got together, set up a website, cut-and-pasted Reuters/AP articles and filled out the rest with catastrophically dumbfuck opinion pieces ("Patrick Stewart: totally over the top – but impossible not to love"), we'd produce something that was indistinguishable from the Grauniad or Torygraph.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,512
    HurstLlama said:

    frpenkridge said:

    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.

    Surely the structure of atoms is straightforward, even I sort of understand it - neutrons protons and electrons whizzing round. Its when someone tries to explain sub atomic particles, quarks and strings and whatnot that complexity really sets in and peoples eyes glaze over..
    At a basic level it is straightforward: protons, neutrons and electrons. However isotopes are slightly more complex, and it took me rather too long at school to get my head around valances.

    So even the basics hide significant (but beautiful) complexity.

    I've never really understood string theory, even after trying on several occasions. That is, aside from one glorious evening sitting at the bar in the Baron of Beef, when an astrophysicist took me through it, and I understood. It was a magical moment. It made sense.

    By the time I had sobered up the next morning, that moment of clarity had disappeared in a mist of strange quarks, muons and gluons.

    I think this holds true for virtually everything: basic levels are simple, but go deeper - as you must to be an expert - and a world of complexity lurks waiting for you.
  • frpenkridgefrpenkridge Posts: 670
    HurstLlama said:

    taffys said:

    ''The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy...''

    The general conclusion seems to be that our already unimaginably vast and complex universe is more unimaginably vast and complex than we previously thought. Way more. Unimaginably more.

    Which is fine as far as it goes but....

    The best explanation of the size of the universe, at least the best that is understandable by normal people, probably comes from that remarkable publication, The Encyclopedia Galatica and it goes like this:

    “Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space...”
    Some comments on this site are so amazingly primitive that the authors must still think that digital watches are a pretty neat idea.
  • Oliver_PBOliver_PB Posts: 397
    edited August 2015
    TheWhiteRabbit said:

    Plato said:

    An apocalypse of hyperbole there.

    Oliver_PB said:

    This, in my view, is the big lesson for the left to learn from the right: be absolutely ruthless and disciplined in taking down your opponents, don't try to take the higher ground. Of course, it's not as easy when you don't have The Sun, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail on your side to do the dirty work, but it's necessary.

    The Conservative Party and its members are also helped by their sheer hyper-partisanship, a loathing of Labour that transcends any political views and an obsession with power. There's a reason that Osborne willing to burn £500m of the public purse to win a political point and introduce brutal benefit sanctions that do little except hurt the poor and most vulnerable in society for little more than a headline or two.

    Being lectured on partisanship by members of a party where "being a Tory in disguise" in the number one insult.

    The number one lesson? People always think they're right.
    I'm not a member, or even registered supporter, of any political party! I wouldn't join one on principle. Indeed, Plato and SeanT are more Labour members than I am!

    And I'd argue that "Red Tory" and "Tory-lite" is a good example of a strong, pithy, memorable, evocative epithet that boils down criticism and a lot of Labour member's negative associations into two words, regardless of its accuracy, which is why it's so effective.

    Labour and their supporters, and left-wing parties and members elsewhere, need to come up with that sort of line against the opposition and quit with the hand-wringing and attempts to take the higher ground. That's not how you win.

    You don't have to just look right - just look towards the SNP in Scotland, and their notoriously rabid supporters, to see how they use ruthlessness and discipline to set a left-wing agenda and win seats (and have totally marginalised the Conservatives in the process).
  • flightpath01flightpath01 Posts: 4,903
    The announcement is a simple one for the government of the UK to make. There is nothing machiavellian about it. The whole issue is totally mainstream and could have easily been made by say Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling.
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,338
    SeanT said:

    AndyJS said:

    Jason Burke:

    "The truth about the caliphate

    To tackle Islamic State, we need to understand the dream of the caliphate and its real roots in history"

    http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/features/state-of-terror

    There's a new ISIS vid out, I won't link. It shows guys being suspended alive above fires and burned. There are two interesting aspects to this nihilistic horror.

    1. It's actually in response to an equally appalling video, where a Shia warlord by the name of Abu Azrael burns and "kebabs" a member of ISIS.

    2. The impact of the ISIS video is less than those before. Because we've seen it all before.

    As I say, this points up two problems for ISIS. Firstly they are now generating a counter-terror, mainly from Shia, but also from Kurds and Christians. They are turning all against them. Secondly, their horror-porn has gone as far as it can. After burning people alive what else can you do? Once you've demolished Palmyra you can't demolish it again - and ISIS will never overtake another site like Palmyra.

    So, amidst the ghastliness, there are grim reasons to hope that ISIS might have peaked.
    They could capture Damascus. It may not be Palmyra but it's the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, I believe.
  • MonikerDiCanioMonikerDiCanio Posts: 5,792
    Nightmarish image of a pallid Osborne against a sinister black military background. I've always liked him but this cockiness is alarming.
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,426
    CD13 said:


    Sorry to go off topic but there’s a programme on Multiverses on BBC2 this coming Wednesday. Horizon does dumb down a lot but surely they can’t mess this one up.

    There are several varieties of multiverse but they must all confront the issue of infinity.
    There are an infinite number of me writing these very words in an infinite number of universes. William of Ockham (or rather an infinite number of William of Ockhams) must be spinning in their graves, but it does explain why this universe could be exquisitely made for human existence.

    Will they add in ten or eleven dimensions and have a go at when time began. I’m not convinced by Hawking’s analogy of the South Pole – where you can’t go any further south so that’s where south begins. If you go below the globe, there’s still an infinite space for south.

    If nothing else, it will mess up your head as effectively as infinities mess up mathematics.

    OK, I'll get my anorak.

    1) The multiverse theory is not a testable theory: should the multiverse "exist", then we have no way of proving it. Should the multiverse not "exist", then we have no way of proving it either. So it's a pointless waste of time. So I assume Brian Cox is presenting it, then...:-(
    2) Should the multiverse "exist", then we have no way of knowing how many other universes there are. One, Umptybillion? Aleph-null?
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,512
    HurstLlama said:

    taffys said:

    ''The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy...''

    The general conclusion seems to be that our already unimaginably vast and complex universe is more unimaginably vast and complex than we previously thought. Way more. Unimaginably more.

    Which is fine as far as it goes but....

    The best explanation of the size of the universe, at least the best that is understandable by normal people, probably comes from that remarkable publication, The Encyclopedia Galatica and it goes like this:

    “Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space...”
    That quote works equally well for Scotland, at least if you're walking it. You reach Edinburgh, which everyone thinks must be near the end, only to find there are hundreds of miles still to go to reach that pimple on Scotland's bum called John O'Groats. (*)

    When I had my recent injury the nearest A&E was three hours away by car. Scotland's mind-boggingly vast, albeit beautiful.

    (*) John O'Groats is an absolutely hideous place. Anyone sane would end their walk or cycle at the lighthouse on Duncasby Head ...
  • Oliver_PBOliver_PB Posts: 397
    SeanT said:

    nihilistic horror.

    There's a lot of words you could use to describe ISIS's actions, but "nihilistic" certainly isn't one of them!
  • HurstLlamaHurstLlama Posts: 9,098
    JosiasJessop said:

    HurstLlama said:

    frpenkridge said:

    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.

    Surely the structure of atoms is straightforward, even I sort of understand it - neutrons protons and electrons whizzing round. Its when someone tries to explain sub atomic particles, quarks and strings and whatnot that complexity really sets in and peoples eyes glaze over..
    At a basic level it is straightforward: protons, neutrons and electrons. However isotopes are slightly more complex, and it took me rather too long at school to get my head around valances.

    So even the basics hide significant (but beautiful) complexity.

    I've never really understood string theory, even after trying on several occasions. That is, aside from one glorious evening sitting at the bar in the Baron of Beef, when an astrophysicist took me through it, and I understood. It was a magical moment. It made sense.

    By the time I had sobered up the next morning, that moment of clarity had disappeared in a mist of strange quarks, muons and gluons.

    I think this holds true for virtually everything: basic levels are simple, but go deeper - as you must to be an expert - and a world of complexity lurks waiting for you.
    So sub-atomic physics is only comprehensible when you are pissed. That might explain a few things but one would have thought the subject would be more popular. "Six pints of HSB please, Miss, I have a lecture to go to this afternoon"
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    malcolmg said:

    CarlottaVance said:

    SimonStClare said:

    Much as I admire Andrew Sparrow, surely the Faslane debacle has been an ongoing situation for the past year and has more to do with Scotland and the SNP than Jeremy Corbyn?

    I agree.

    SNP 'You never keep your referendum promises'

    UK: 'Here's one we made - Faslane gets all the UK subs'

    SNP: 'Its nae fair, we dinna want it....just gie us the money'

    There's no pleasing some folk.......
    Nasty Tories just want to be loved
    Nasty Nats don't like it when proved wrong again
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 22,426
    edited August 2015
    Oliver_PB said:

    SeanT said:

    nihilistic horror.

    There's a lot of words you could use to describe ISIS's actions, but "nihilistic" certainly isn't one of them!
    I know what you mean, but arguably SeanT uses the word correctly here. They won't be happy until there is only one person left, who will then die. Like Nazism, ISIS seems to be a credo whose idee fixe is making larger and larger categories of people to kill. It's the universal enemy.

    People once pondered the paradox of the universal solvent: what bottle would you keep it in? Similarly, ISIS is the universal enemy: sooner or later, it will try to kill you, regardless of your stance. It's an expression of the mammalian urge to kill, untrammeled by conscience or empathy
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,885
    I don't see that spending 500 million on a worthless figleaf is terribly likely to undermine the opposition.
  • CD13CD13 Posts: 6,366
    Mr Llama,

    “Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space...”

    If Horizon is on form, that explanation will take you most of the way through the programme.
  • flightpath01flightpath01 Posts: 4,903
    HurstLlama said:

    taffys said:

    ''The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy...''

    The general conclusion seems to be that our already unimaginably vast and complex universe is more unimaginably vast and complex than we previously thought. Way more. Unimaginably more.

    Which is fine as far as it goes but....

    The best explanation of the size of the universe, at least the best that is understandable by normal people, probably comes from that remarkable publication, The Encyclopedia Galatica and it goes like this:

    “Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space...”
    The Encyclopedia Galactica was a different publication and Sci Fi series entirely. This perfectly lucid explanation is from that valuable book, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.
    ''In many of the more relaxed civilizations on the Outer Eastern Rim of the Galaxy, the Hitchhiker’s Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopaedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate, it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper; and second, it has the words "DON'T PANIC" inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover.''

    JBS Haldane is supposed to have said ''my own suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose''
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    edited August 2015
    Luckyguy1983 said:

    I don't see that spending 500 million on a worthless figleaf is terribly likely to undermine the opposition.

    It is if the popular view is that renewing Trident is not a 'worthless fig leaf....'

    https://yougov.co.uk/news/2013/07/16/public-support-nuclear-weapons/
  • madasafishmadasafish Posts: 659
    HurstLlama said:

    frpenkridge said:

    The trouble with Horizon physics and astronomy programmes is that they would rather spend their budget sending a team over to California or South America to film a scientist driving his car up a mountain than to make a serious attempt to simplify difficult topics. For all their resources, they fall way behind 5-minute U tube videos on the structure of the atom, for example.

    Surely the structure of atoms is straightforward, even I sort of understand it - neutrons protons and electrons whizzing round. Its when someone tries to explain sub atomic particles, quarks and strings and whatnot that complexity really sets in and peoples eyes glaze over..
    I have an Honours Degree in Physics.. Not a very good one and 46 years ago.

    I don't have a high enough IQ to understand the maths that explains sub atomic particles.. - basically if your IQ is less than 150 then you are a dumbo and have no chance.. And if you have an IQ o 150 and don't understand maths , you have no chance.

    And I don't mean maths as at school. I mean vastly complex equations..and concepts..

    Feynman was the great explainer of physics for the less able physicists.. I think even he (died 1988) would struggle today. And he was a genius.


  • richardDoddrichardDodd Posts: 5,472
    MG Absolutely.. go and ask them yourself..job security for a lot more years.. until the Scots decide on Independence and then bingo.. unemployed..It is all that the SNP is offering them.
  • PlatoPlato Posts: 15,724
    Did enjoy your Faslane anecdote. Great one-uppery
    richardDodd said:

    MG Absolutely.. go and ask them yourself..job security for a lot more years.. until the Scots decide on Independence and then bingo.. unemployed..It is all that the SNP is offering them.

  • AnneJGPAnneJGP Posts: 3,099
    HurstLlama said:

    AnneJGP said:

    CD13 said:


    Sorry to go off topic but there’s a programme on Multiverses on BBC2 this coming Wednesday. Horizon does dumb down a lot but surely they can’t mess this one up.

    There are several varieties of multiverse but they must all confront the issue of infinity.
    There are an infinite number of me writing these very words in an infinite number of universes. William of Ockham (or rather an infinite number of William of Ockhams) must be spinning in their graves, but it does explain why this universe could be exquisitely made for human existence.

    Will they add in ten or eleven dimensions and have a go at when time began. I’m not convinced by Hawking’s analogy of the South Pole – where you can’t go any further south so that’s where south begins. If you go below the globe, there’s still an infinite space for south.

    If nothing else, it will mess up your head as effectively as infinities mess up mathematics.

    OK, I'll get my anorak.

    Do you mean that at least some of the other you's writing those words in other universes are necessarily writing in a universe that isn't exquisitely made for human existence?

    How would a human know whether their universe was exquisitely made for human existence? In what way would their experience of life differ from a human living in one that was?
    Well, the statement - that this universe is very precise about factors that make it possible for life of the animal/human sort to arise - is quite commonly heard.

    I doubt (from my position of total ignorance) that any one factor could be different without affecting at least some of the others. Too far off-beam & we couldn't be here, I gather (but something else with cognitive powers might be?).

    But it's quite easy to see ways in which experience of life could differ - even the difference between a temperate climate like ours & a hostile one like Antarctica or the Middle East carries an indication. I shudder with horror at the idea of 30-degree temps, never mind 40-degs.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,885
    CarlottaVance said:

    Luckyguy1983 said:

    I don't see that spending 500 million on a worthless figleaf is terribly likely to undermine the opposition.

    It is if the popular view is that renewing Trident is not a 'worthless fig leaf....'

    https://yougov.co.uk/news/2013/07/16/public-support-nuclear-weapons/
    A happy state of affairs for supporters of our current arrangements that can only be damaged by opening the issue up to debate and scrutiny in my opinion.

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