Need more information..........

I'm generally a person that is always craving more information. I want to know everything about all topics. Mrs. Lime is always surprised by the random facts I pull from the deep, relatively crowded recesses of my mind.

I feel the same about my hobbies. I'm always reading poker books, hoping to refine my understanding of the game both psychologically and mathematically. I've always had an interest in ghosts and the paranormal. My friend Rudy always mocks me about it because he's doesn't buy into anything paranormal and has no paranormal experiences. For that matter, I don't totally buy into most paranormal news, though I do think that there is something to it. But I like looking into the scientific aspects of it to see how researchers go about collecting evidence. It's the only real way to prove or disprove whether paranormal events are actually normal.

In regards to fact finding, one of the current hot topics that has always disturbed me is the global warming theory. Of course, the poster boy for the global warming movement is Al Gore. One of the major problems I have with the bullet points for his global warming documentary is that most of his points are based on incomplete data that was specifically selected because it furthered his cause rather than using a wide range of data sources to confirm the theories. It's embarrassing that our government is throwing billions of dollars at a 'problem' that is not even remotely close to being accepted as being a true problem. The link below from Canada Free Press points out some of the widely held criticism's of Al Gore's documentary that point out his use of extreme selected stats and how he misrepresented the actual stats.

Counter point article in Canada Free Press

For what it's worth, I've got no problem with cleaning up our act as humans. Cleaning up trash, recycling, better gas mileage, reduction of emissions, etc. are all fine things to do. However, we should do that for the reason that it's a good idea to generally keep a cleaner living environment rather than trashing our planet.

Al Gore's movement of fallacies reminds me of similar movements by the Catholic Church hundreds of years ago around the belief in heaven and hell and its relation to sin. The church espoused the idea that people should clean up their act and avoid sin so they didn't end up in hell. Putting the debate as to whether heaven and hell exist aside, my belief is that threatening people with eternal damnation as they did is negative reinforcement and isn't very effective in motivation. People should avoid sin because it's inherently the right thing to do. Not only does the person benefit, but everyone around that person likely benefits because of their positive outlook and actions.

With that, I step off my soapbox.