No proper scientist would ever say that there is 100% no god. Even Richard Dawkins would agree with me there. You can't prove a negative. You can't prove there is no teapot in orbit somewhere between Jupiter and Saturn, but I would say the chance of there not being one is 99.99999999999999999%, or thereabouts . Of course this example of scientific reasoning is then taken totally out of context by people with other agendas. Sigh.

Oh and Flood of Noah >>>>> Sodom & Gomorrah from a "God can be destructive" perspective...

Circa 1978. Me in the middle. Lovely period shirts.

Oooh, exciting stuff.  Poses a big ethical question though.  Should we be allowed to create life from something not living?  Sounds a bit God-like to me.  For the purposes of understanding how life on Earth started, or indeed on other planets, it would be a valueable tool, but not sure I'd like us creating sentient life (not that we are anywhere near that yet) willynilly all over the place.     

I don't think there is an ethical problem here at all. This is more like a chemistry experiment than a biological one. There is certainly no possibilty of getting within 2 billion years of anything self-aware in these experiments. Where the first self-replicating molecules came from is a question with many possible answers at the moment, and possibly one that will never be convincingly answered. What happened from there to where we are now is most definitely answered (unless you're one of those strange people who thinks the universe is 6000 years old, obv.). Actually trying to explain where these first molecules came from is something that is definitely worth investigating and testing.
It's quite difficult to even define "living" when you have such basic stuff as this. Just saying something replicates doesn't even cover it - I can grow a sugar crystal in a sugar solution and it's effectively replicating itself, but I doubt you'd call the sugar crystals you put in your tea living. Ditto for viruses even - the line between living and non living is sometimes drawn beyond them, and most viruses are more complex than the stuff they're playing about with here.
It's interesting stuff for sure.

Why's the back one 3 times the price of the front one? Is it down to the better feathering and a shorter back? 

Has it all gone horribly wrong?

http://www.hasthelhcdestroyedtheearth.com/

Well, I laughed anyway .

There's going to be a big bounce in bank stocks today.

In a word: SHHHHHHIIIIIIPPPPPP

The LHC is a long tunnel into which money is poured at one end, and microscopic black holes that will gobble the universe come out the other.

I thank you.

See if you can work out the country this train museum was. Snowplow. Apparently, because it completely blocked the driver's view, a man used to perch on top and shout back to the driver if the wall of snow was likely to prove difficult...

No idea. Japan or Switzerland spring to mind, but with no great confidence.

Russia?

Good guesses. Answer is.... Denmark.

Interesting place for trains. Because of the large number of Islands, they had many arrangements like the model pic below. Until they built monster bridges/tunnels between them all. The train museum had as many models of boats as it did trains. Good place though, if you're interested. In Odense, which is the main town on the middle island.

I'll stop with the trains now .

See if you can work out the country this train museum was. Snowplow. Apparently, because it completely blocked the driver's view, a man used to perch on top and shout back to the driver if the wall of snow was likely to prove difficult...

I believe the mini-steering wheel on these classic cars controls the spark timing - advance or retard a bit depending on starting, smooth running, uphill, etc.

Oh, and running boards aren't just for cars. I just came back from hols and took the wife+kids to a train museum. Cos the kids like trains, obv. .

The pic is of a double-decker coach. There were no connecting doors between carriages, so for the conductor to inspect tickets, he stood on the running boards and inspected the lower decks through the windows. While the train was moving. This was pre-H&S, obviously .

Total disaster today. 4 total WTF questions, all of which I got wrong. The holiday obviously did me no good at all. .

That he is.  And he never gave me any tips before he signed up.  Sigh.  Meanwhile, my stocks are dropping faster than should be allowed by law.  Will have bottom spot in no time.   

You'll have to try pretty hard to beat me. 1/3 of my portfolio has dropped 17%. In three days ffs. I only picked it cos it was the most popular stock being traded on there at the time. Shows what the herd knows. Baaa.

AND I've just had my worst ever trivia result. FML. Karma will pay me back with 92m in the lottery tonight though obv. 

Total disaster today . Some stupid questions tho - got 8/10 and that included 2 lucky guesses.

Seems my trivia is now following my stock picking ability .

I'm obviously better at trivia than at stock picking.

Thing is, most of my portfolio is of an actual stock I actually own a bit of (employee during IPO about 8 years ago). So my -4% in one day is almost real. FML .

I'm in. And I was even briefly in under my real name.

Which isn't Claire, BTW .