More Trektardism

[Crossroads Inc.]

Lightweight battle droids? But... we see them being made. They have inch thick armoured chest plates...

I hate to say it, but those little Battledroids have to be lightweight. In 'PM' we see the whole upper torso of one attached to JarJar's leg and hes kickign it around extreamly easily. So, unless Gunguns have super strength, it can't weght THAT much.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Lightweight battle droids? But... we see them being made. They have inch thick armoured chest plates...

I hate to say it, but those little Battledroids have to be lightweight. In 'PM' we see the whole upper torso of one attached to JarJar's leg and hes kickign it around extreamly easily. So, unless Gunguns have super strength, it can't weght THAT much.

Gungans are amphibians, your average Gungan is going to have significantly stronger legs than your average human.

[Darth Yoshi]

Did we see any examples of Gungan jumping ability in the films? The closest thing to a demonstration of Gungan jumping was in Lego Star Wars, which hardly counts.

[Aaron]

Remember in TPM when Jar-Jar jumped from the shore into the lake? He must have gone up at least ten feet.

[Peptuck]

THen there's the "lightweight" battledroids I'm reading about on SFJ. Right. How does this explain the Force push Darth Maul gave Obi-Wan, or Maul TK-ing a piece of debris into a door panel in TPM? Or Dooky blasting Anakin back 10 feet after cutting off his arm?

Or Yoda lifting an entire fighter out of a swamp at extreme old age, or, if we really want to bring up the Clone Wars cartoons, smashing troop ships into each other while Mace Windu launches hundreds of SBDs into the air at once.

[NecronLord]

I hate to say it, but those little Battledroids have to be lightweight. In 'PM' we see the whole upper torso of one attached to JarJar's leg and hes kickign it around extreamly easily. So, unless Gunguns have super strength, it can't weght THAT much.

Given that Jar Jar is not super-light - he knocks Qui Gon over, for a start - and that he can jump vertically from standing for something like eight feet or more. Yes. He is far stronger, in the legs at least than any human can possibly become, even if he dedicates his entire life to it. Observe that no basket ball player can hope to jump like Jar Jar.

[Darth Servo]

Given that Jar Jar is not super-light - he knocks Qui Gon over, for a start - and that he can jump vertically from standing for something like eight feet or more. Yes. He is far stronger, in the legs at least than any human can possibly become, even if he dedicates his entire life to it. Observe that no basket ball player can hope to jump like Jar Jar.

You know, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Trektards tried to say this was evidence of low gravity on Naboo, (in direct contradiction to every thing else we observe about the planet). They would then of course gloss over or make excuses for the fact that said alleged lower gravity would ALSO apply to the battledroid Jar-jar was swinging around with his leg.

[Aaron]

This is a real gem:

I think that a formal education is highly overrated sometimes. There's a lot of elitism amongst college graduates but I don't really see what makes them superior to a self educated man.

Frankly, I find a good google search better than a formal education most of the time.

From here, where Opencoiler asks JMSpock to post his credentials and is basically told to fuck off.

[Peptuck]

This is a real gem:

I think that a formal education is highly overrated sometimes. There's a lot of elitism amongst college graduates but I don't really see what makes them superior to a self educated man.

Frankly, I find a good google search better than a formal education most of the time.

From here, where Opencoiler asks JMSpock to post his credentials and is basically told to fuck off.

lawl.

Should ask them how many "self educated" scientists there are that are seriously accepted by the scientific cimmunity.

[Stark]

That'd be terrifying if we didn't already know they're clueless idiots.

[Darth Servo]

This is a real gem:

I think that a formal education is highly overrated sometimes. There's a lot of elitism amongst college graduates but I don't really see what makes them superior to a self educated man.

Frankly, I find a good google search better than a formal education most of the time.

From here, where Opencoiler asks JMSpock to post his credentials and is basically told to fuck off.

ROTFLMAO. I need to bookmark that one.

[brianeyci]

This is a real gem:

I think that a formal education is highly overrated sometimes. There's a lot of elitism amongst college graduates but I don't really see what makes them superior to a self educated man.

Frankly, I find a good google search better than a formal education most of the time.

From here, where Opencoiler asks JMSpock to post his credentials and is basically told to fuck off.

The problem with this lie is like all good lies it has a nugget of truth in it.

Most formal education is worthless, a result of the corporatization of America and requiring every kid everywhere to wait until they're 25 and study Shakespeare to work in an office job. Or even study science to work in an office. Let's admit it: if you want to make rational thinkers, college is not the ideal place to do it. Everybody should be good thinkers, so it should be free, all of it. The money part should come in when the guy wants extra knowledge, going into a career in science or English, not because high school is so garbage that you need to go to college to prove you can read or write to employers because high school turns out to be shit. Ideally, everybody gets the "base" education in high school, and anything beyond that is extra.

But when someone asks for education, he's obviously asking for the kind of education that matters to the current topic. Not for the bullshit kind.

[Stark]

Since he was saying 'google search > university', I don't think failure to create critical thinkers is valid support. Google ALSO doesn't create critical thinkers, after all.

[brianeyci]

That's a good point.

I wasn't calling you a liar by the way Cpl Kendall, was attacking Kahless for the nugget of truth. Maybe a morsel of truth.

I wonder why these guys name themselves after one thing. Bounty is the closest thing I can think of but Bounty doesn't do it for HMS Bounty or put in a Trek avatar. Do they really want people to think they only know one kind of science fiction?

[Aaron]

Yeah I figured that. I'm more entertained by JMSpock dodging the request for proof by hiding behind his forum policy and referencing past threads.

[Batman]

You never really checked out SFJ, did you. They DO think Trek is the only worthwhile SciFi there is to begin with.

[Junghalli]

I think that a formal education is highly overrated sometimes. There's a lot of elitism amongst college graduates but I don't really see what makes them superior to a self educated man.

Frankly, I find a good google search better than a formal education most of the time.

Spoken like a true high school kid who has no clue how clueless he actually is. Seriously, the arrogance of some of these people is astounding. They actually think years of study under the direction of knowledgeable professionals can be equalled or surpassed by ten minutes of looking at whatever a search engine brings up!

[Zablorg]

Gah, all those retards asking how his credentials have anything to do with his arguments. Technically they don't, but why the fuck can't we ask for scans of his at this point purely hypothetical educationalishness?

Also, lol at the second post. Oh my yes.

[Darth Servo]

Having credentials doesn't prove one right, but lack there-of isn't exactly a good sign. If they had credentials, they'd know that.

[Lord Poe]

You never really checked out SFJ, did you. They DO think Trek is the only worthwhile SciFi there is to begin with.

My latest dumpster dive here.

Mr. Oragahn: "Waaa! Why don't they ask for Poe's credentials? Waa!"

Poe provides them.

Mr. Oragahn: "Waaa! I didn't care anyway! And you're baiting me, you big meanie! Waa!"

Having credentials doesn't prove one right, but lack there-of isn't exactly a good sign. If they had credentials, they'd know that.

And since I have a full-fledged degree in Electronics, and work in an optics company, I guess I can therefore, according to Mr. Wong's way of thinking, declare that anything you say has no value in the SW vs ST debate, since you have no scientific qualifications.
See, it goes both ways...

Hi Strawman!

See, you'd be correct if I put up a completely misinformed post about oh, say, "watts and joules are interchangeable". But objective observation is another matter. For instance, stating Worf would wipe the floor with a Jedi hand to hand after seeing multiple instances of Captain Kirk and Major Kira kick the crap out of armed Klingons, is simply a symptom of an idiotic thought process, no matter how many degrees said idiot holds.

And then,

"Who Is Like The Pimple On Everyone's Ass": "Waa! You stopped defending your "Happy/Crappy Landing Video", so YOU'RE the doodie-head! Waa!"

Yes, because after demolishing every criticism he had of that video twice, (and proving he cherry picks bits and pieces out of the canon and ignored the rest) I didn't return for several more endless rounds of,"Nuh uh!".

[[R_H]]

The claim that Mr. Wong's engineering degree is special and somehow a peculiarly apt qualification has been trotted out fairly frequently, and debunked fairly frequently. I've polled this board and found that, as with most internet communities, a large percentage of this board's denizens appear to be as well or better educated.

It's also worth noting that, while engineering in general, and materials science specifically, ranks high in terms of estimated IQ for those intending to go on to graduate study (ref - for the record, M. Wong did not go on to graduate study), the IQ spread of actual working engineers (who, of course, almost invariably have professional engineering licenses as well as a college degree of some variety) is fairly large and centered on a value of 116 on a 15-point standard deviation scale (ref). While above average in the general population, it is hardly unusual. This is actually indistinguishable from average for some populations (Asians in N. America average 110 on 15 pt SD IQ tests, and Ashkenazi jews 115), and hardly unusual among the more-educated-than-average populations typical of internet communities.

So far as M. Wong's education and licensure is concerned, I have every statistical reason to consider him to be of inferior intelligence and education to a rather significant fraction of this board's population - and not just myself.

One's intelligence being "proved" does not change the basic nature of argumentation, however. Everybody should know by now that MENSA membership* will not make an invalid argument correct, and even the demonstrably brilliant are often quite wrong in ways that seem ridiculous later.

*MENSA members test 2+ SD from the mean, or IQ 130+ on a 15 pt SD scale, and are in a much better position to claim that their intelligence is "proved" than anyone not doing demonstrably better than average in graduate study.

More hilarity for all you dirty evil Warsies, naturally courtesy of Jedi Master Spock

Apparently, as with most other Internet communities, “Starfleetjedi” board members are as well, or better educated than individuals, such as Darth Wong, who studied engineering. You know, the Internet communities where the discussion of psionic balls, how awesome creationism is, where everyone is a genius courtesy of their “equal or better” educations, not because of their damn-dirty-elitist-ivory-tower-intellectual-leftwing college educations but through the power of the Almighty Search Engine, after all, who wants to go to a post-secondary education institution and waste away years of their lives learning…when they could just fire up Google, and pretend to be “as well or better educated” than an engineer. The IQ bullshit is hilarious as well, a blog, which links to some site that doesn’t have any sources other than “data reported in ETS Powerprep 2002 software”. The same company that administers the SAT and other marvelous standardized tests created and administers the GRE. One of its criticisms? “Critics of the GRE have argued that the exam format is so rigid that it effectively tests only how well a student can conform to a standardized test taking procedure.” (according to Wiki, on page 19 of the 2007 edition of “Cracking the GRE”, published by the Princeton Review). In April of this year, “ETS announced the decision to cancel plans for revising the GRE. The announcement cited concerns over the ability to provide clear and equal access to the new test after the planned change as an explanation for the cancellation. They did state, however, that they do plan "to implement many of the planned test content improvements in the future", although exact details regarding those changes have not yet been announced. Changes to the GRE will begin to take effect on November 1, 2007, as ETS will start to include new types of questions in the exam. The changes mostly center on "fill in the blank" type answers for both the math and vocabulary sections that require the test-taker to fill in the blank directly, without being able to choose from a multiple choice list of answers.” (according to Wiki, on page 19 of the 2007 edition of “Cracking the GRE”, published by the Princeton Review) Wow, holy shit…a few questions will now require you to fill in the answer. Apparently they mean serious business, too bad those types of questions have been around for quite awhile…on Albertan Provincial Government standardized testing exams for the 9th and 12th grades (I don’t remember if there were any on the 3rd and 6th grade exams.)

How does JMS get his IQ numbers? Well, apparently some guy at another blog “You may find it odd that I converted the results from GRE score to IQ, widely regarded by the politically correct as a discredited measure of intelligence.” From the first blog JMS links to: “He [other blogger] has also defined a linear map translating the average V-Q-A scores into a more familiar IQ scale. This convention looks natural to me and I will follow his scale although it is not guaranteed that it is equally calibrated as other IQ measurements.” Never mind the controversial nature of IQ tests, and the link to the work of the controversial Gottfredson. This is enough for JMS, of diesel fusion fame to claim that “So far as M. Wong's education and licensure is concerned, I have every statistical reason to consider him to be of inferior intelligence and education to a rather significant fraction of this board's population - and not just myself.” While not providing any information about the education he himself has received, due to privacy concerns or some bullshit like that. Because you know, people that graduate from the engineering program at a renown university are obviously cognitive lightweights when compared to the superiority of the members of Starfleetjedi and JMS. Like neo-con twats, he parodies himself. Fucking hilarious

[Darth Wong]

They really do parody themselves, don't they? All their elaborate justifications for their own bullshit become breathtaking after a while. It's as if they don't realize that they've been circle-jerking for so long that their arguments are all tailored for preaching to the choir, what with all of the self-referential "we all agree" and "debunked to our esteemed satisfaction" thinking.

[[R_H]]

They really do parody themselves, don't they? All their elaborate justifications for their own bullshit become breathtaking after a while. It's as if they don't realize that they've been circle-jerking for so long that their arguments are all tailored for preaching to the choir, what with all of the self-referential "we all agree" and "debunked to our esteemed satisfaction" thinking.

Their elaborate justifications are probably influenced by their admiration of ST's technobabble. Throw in "quantum", gig"inappropriate SI unit" and fusion. Case and point JMS' "diesel fusion". What is that even supposed to mean? The fusion of diesel? Do any of the Imperial vehicles even use fossil fuels?

[Coiler]

Their elaborate justifications are probably influenced by their admiration of ST's technobabble. Throw in "quantum", gig"inappropriate SI unit" and fusion. Case and point JMS' "diesel fusion". What is that even supposed to mean? The fusion of diesel? Do any of the Imperial vehicles even use fossil fuels?

Read it for yourself.

[Isolder74]

that's not actually all that bad.

the fact that hydrocarbons contail large concentration of fusable hydrogen makes them wonderful storage for the sustance with a fraction of the storage cost. the down side is getting rid of the carbom. Water is a much better alterative and nets you breathable oxygen as part of the seperation process.