The Last Ditch by Tom Paine

9 responses to “Three questions about a dancing ray”

1. 

   Peter Whale

   March 10, 2013

   Hi Tom beautiful little cameo.
   1.Freud would turn art and nature into sex otherwise his life fails.
   2. Evolution never has purpose.
   3.Because beautiful women like to be admired being artistic and meaningful and Freud has me taped.

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2. 

   Richard B

   March 10, 2013

   Agreed, to ask about purpose in evolution is to miss the point. Evolution has no purpose, it just is. I suppose you could stretch a point and say that the manta ray’s genes have found a rather spectacular way of ensuring their own survival. Those little front spoilers are pretty funky. As for the girl, well it’s a tough job but someone has to do it. And she has a beautiful figure, so it’s hardly difficult to watch. Thanks for posting.

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3. 

   Diogenes

   March 10, 2013

   Not sure I agree with this idea that evolution has no purpose. It certainly has a function which can be defined (change by natural selection). Is a definable function different from a purpose?
   The manta ray has evolved to the shape it is to efficiently scour the nutrient rich seas in three dimensions by filtering the maximum possible volume of water. It does this by moving in a corkscrew loop with its wide gaping maw. Its ‘design’ clearly has a function, I would argue that it has a purpose albeit one not defined by a creator.

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4. 

   Tom

   March 11, 2013

   So it’s an enormous food filter and everything else is just a lean motor to drive it. That makes sense – ie iI can see why that might have evolved. Thank you for being charitable in interpreting my Marc de Bourgogne-addled question. I am not sure evolution quite accounts for the photographer’s or the sea dancer’s artistic impulses though.

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5. 

   David Davis

   March 11, 2013

   My only problem with the movie is who made it and for what strategic objective. if Rays are “being hunted”, who is doing it?
   Is it, as I suspect, “indigenous people” – or even worse for the greeNazis – “local people”? And if so, why are they not being stopped by the FoEs of the Earth and PETA and all that lot?
   Why then is an expensive and beautiful movie being made, so as to make Westerners feel guilty? I only ask, as Peter Simple used to say, “Because I Want To Know”.
   The hunting of Manta Rays and other rays, and the chopping down of rain forests Tom Paine may not know that I am a scientist by training and I don’t favour the removal of rainforests, for all sorts of reasons) will cease, when Third World governments cease taking rake-offs from their thrid-world-cronies who bribe them with Ferraris and escort-girls of the prettiest sort, in return for bering allowed to hunt Rays and cut down forests.
   WE are not to blame. I just wanted to establish that.
   Sorry, Tom, for ranting on your blog. But I’m really sore about this sort of thing.

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6. 

   David Davis

   March 11, 2013

   There should be an “open brackets” after “forests” and before “Tom” …

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7. 

   Diogenes

   March 11, 2013

   Who are killing them… Palestinians apparently
   http://tinyurl.com/a4hcfnm
   The Independent was so upset by the sight of Palestinians hacking up manta rays they described the dismemberment of about 50 as the collection of several…
   http://tinyurl.com/d7ux2m

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8. 

   David Davis

   March 11, 2013

   The Human Brain evolved, I think, in response to the massive global cooling (and therefore drying) of East Africa from 5-to-about-two million years ago, and which is still going on.
   Things were changing so fast in geological time, like a global degree down every 300,000 years together with the disastrous effects on African flora and fauna, that those whose brains took in stuff hugely, and remembered it in ways that could be passed on , such as in language and pictograms,and which could also “model” theoretical scenarios, were the hominids that got to be reproduced down the line, as they lived while others died.
   The human brain therefore is capable of all sorts of other modelling activities, such as science, and law. Oh, I nearly forgot what this was about! ART!

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9. 

   Diogenes

   March 11, 2013

   It is one of the true marvels of evolution. Grows up to 23 feet across, can weigh over 2 tons but fancies its chances as a bird…
   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HkeGcj24K0

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