Clarke told the journos, "The manner in which we gave the goals away is something we can address in training and we'll look to do that this week. I'd like to be able to put it down to a one off and something that's not going to happen very often."
He continued, "We'll get down to the hard work on the training pitch, we'll put a few things right and hopefully we'll see the results at the weekend."
Hopefully Steve, hopefully. Hopefully, it won't be like at West Ham. You remember? A good start and then the wheels came off! All those days when you dished out the bibs and carefully placed the cones - and all to no avail!
You know, the big problem may be that opposition players move around a bit more than those bloody cones!
It's not only steve Clarke who's been leaving his underwear on public display, I've noticed a rash of admissions on your part recently to irrational superstitions.
ReplyDeleteI can see very little difference between belief in a superior being and the expectation of surviving your physical death, and the belief that discussing the squad for next year if we survive wiil have an adverse effect on our chances of survival!
Admittedly, as far as I know you're not asking for charitable status, a stake in the country's constition and a major say in the education of our children. But are you serious?
Of course I'm bloody serious! There is no god, but the whole world exists as an extension of my wonderful ego. How else can anybody make sense of anything? I think therefore the universe is! Simple. And don't you argue with me mate because one thought from me and you're a gonner! Remember, you're only an alter ego anyway!
ReplyDeleteFanno, did Chelsea win last night against the Manu playing a 4-3-3?
ReplyDeleteSometimes our alter ego's ask the most pertinent questions of us! Not only is your underwear on display, the knicker elastic is looking decidely frayed! I think this levity suggests that here is a question that causes you considerable consternation. No?
ReplyDeleteI suffer from vertigo, a condition that the medical profession assure me IS a medical condition. Never the less, each year when I'm in our home town in Spain I test my resolve by walking across a narrow 50 m. bridge made of iron and open wooden slats; a drop of 40 or 50 metres. It scares the shit out of me but I refuse to be a slave to what I consider may be a psychological condition. Don't you feel the need to challenge your affliction!
I've no idea, I didn't see the game. Was it 4-3-3 or a 4-4-2 with a diamond? Who was the third forward, Malouda? He didn't play Drogba, Torres and Anelka at the same time did he? That would be a genuine 4-3-3 with no flexibility to revert to 4-4-2 or 4-5-1 when not in possession. What is your point? Do we have players of Chelsea's quality? No.
ReplyDeleteI challenge my affliction every single day when I look in the mirror and try to imagine the world existing without me. Like you with your bridge, it scares me shitless but I refuse to hide from the possibility that the world may really exist outside of my consciousness. Proof that it doesn't comes when I step away from the mirror but catch it unawares by stepping back again. My reflection is always there! And in every mirror I ever look in!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I too am scared of heights but never mind walking over a bridge, I did a bloody parachute jump. I challenge you to do that!
Do you argue with everybody that responds to your blogs?
ReplyDeleteDo you have to come on here asking silly bloody questions?
ReplyDeleteThanks for answering my question in a roundabout way!
ReplyDelete19.57 LOL I assume you're still talking to me!!
ReplyDeleteNo I won't be doing a parachute jump, but that's not actually my problem. I can stand at the top of a tall building because I can rationalise that it has been designed not to fall down. But put me at the top of a mountain and my rationale says that at some point it will fall away; probably imminently!
But you're leading me up a blind alley here! Religion can argue that we don't KNOW that there isn't a God. But you can look at your precious statistics and see that it doesn't make the slightest difference whether you discuss the unmentionable or not! What say you!
2005, no problems mate.
ReplyDeleteThe trouble is Marty mate, my precious statistics exist as they do because of what I have said and done in the past. Had I lived a perfect, blameless life, we would be playing in the Champions League every season. Our current league position and the many, many years of hurt tell you just how bad a boy I have been! A second or so before Gerrard scored THAT goal, I was rehearsing in my head what I was going to say at the final whistle to the obnoxious gobby Scouser within spitting distance of me. Then...
LOL! You really do have a problem don't you?
ReplyDeleteOnce again please; simple question. How do you reconcile your rational atheism with your irrational superstitions?
That was my question Marty!...in a way. Take it away HF...
ReplyDeleteCome come my friend; you are the master of the snappy reply! I myself acknowledge that I cannot compete with that voice recognition keyboard of your's. But not only is your knicker elastic frayed...your bollocks are on full public view!! An answer please and no more prevarication! What justification do you have for this nonsencical superstition!!
ReplyDeleteSeriously, God is an attempt by man to explain his own mortality and man is the only being that has an existential awareness. I don't believe in God, but at the same time I cannot accept that anything in the world is disconnected, in any way whatsoever, from me. You've heard of string theory presumably? Well apply that to the way that my actions and thoughts impact on events all over the world, via 11 dimensional space, and you will see that there is no intellectual chasm here. You call it superstition, I call it superscience!
ReplyDeleteLook at this Blog. Where is it exactly when somebody isn't visiting the site? It is somewhere but nowhere, all at once. Like an electron, it is observable where-ever you look for it - be you in Northampton, New York or Perth, and it is in all those places all at the same time if looked for simultaneously in each of those three places. How amazing is that? I sit here, type this and it is read all over the World just by pressing that orange "button" below. And look at the rage I generate just with my provocative thoughts! How is that possible if I am not a god in my own right, if the whole of time is not trapped in my Game?
Sorry, have to sign off for a few minutes, there's a nurse in short white coat and hold up black stockings offering me my medicine!
Loook at your terror when you thought I might not be here Marty! Look at your desperate need for a reply, for a reflection in the 11 dimensional mirror of interconnected consciousness! ; }
ReplyDeleteThere was never any terror or desperation my friend and I have some sympathy with a concept of parallel universes etc. But I still can't find a logical explanation for your common sense on the one hand and irrationality on the other!
ReplyDeleteBecause there is none. As an atheist, you should not expect rational answers Marty. For something to be rational, you need a designer. There's nothing rational in chaos is there my friend? You see, you do have a God, you simply do not recognise Him. You want everything to make sense and that desire for logical answers is your God speaking through you.
ReplyDeleteTo embrace true atheism you have to accept that the true nature of everything is irrational. We exist because of chance, not because of reason. Quantum shows us that at the sub partical level, nothing makes logical sense within the dimensions that our brains are able to preceive. So don't seek logical explanations, embrace the chaos!
I KNOW that if I get cocky, West Ham will be relegated. Therefore I have to hold to the belief that we will go down. Holding to that belief that we will be relegated cannot guarantee that we will survive, however, because if it did, then I would believe that we will survive by virtue of believing that we will go down, which means I would be secretly confident that we will stay up because of my belief that we will go down, which would make me cocky about surviving and so ensure that we go down.
Does that make sense when read back? I'm suffering from insomnia at the moment and the brain is closing down a bit because I'm exhausted.
If you're suffering from exhaustion and your brain is closing down a bit I suggest you come back tomorrow and see if you can muster a better argument! Sleep well, I don't intend to let this rest; my desire for logical answers is my God speaking through me? I expect better tomorrow!!
ReplyDeleteLOL And that expectation is founded in faith, in certainty. Tomorrow may not come mate.
ReplyDeleteElectron? You mean photon HF? I saw this episode of Horizon (one of my favourite programmes) where they were asking 'what is reality', and thats what they were talking about. They used a laser beam to demonstrate exactly this. You have to watch it, it's intriguing. It's still on iplayer:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00xxgbn/Horizon_20102011_What_Is_Reality/
Watch it, it may strengthen your argument. So are you a nihilist then HF?
Chaos HF? What chaos? Look at the universe, the stars, planets, each set (by something) in perfect order. Your very own 2nd law of thermodynamics tells you that this should not be possible unless there is an external source of energy acting as a control (i.e God)
HF
ReplyDeleteKaren Armstrong (A History of God)tells us that the true path to spiritual understanding is through good deeds and helping others. When it is your turn to meet St Peter at the Pearly Gates I don't think he'll be too impressed by the content of your immortal blog.
Anyway if all the wonders of nature were created by your chaos theory then using the same probability statistics, West Ham must be a fantastic bet to win the FA Cup this year and the Premier League next season. You can also add to that the chances of your nurse's knicker elastic snapping when she bends down to give you your medicine. Sounds like you need plenty of it by the way.
You say I shouldn't look for ratonal answers and yet right at the beginning of the debate you semi quote the original Rationalist! "I think therefore the universe is"! Descartes is always misquoted, what he actually wrote was "cogito ergo sum" meaning; I am cognisant therefore I am. But of course if that was what was generally reported we would never have had the immortal lines; "Rene Descartes was a drunken fart; I drink therefore I am"!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, if you being cocky had any effect on West Ham's status we'd be in the Ryman premier! Surely that should be sufficient evidence for you to abandon your quasi religious superstitions!
You see Marty, look at Stani's argument! You will ba a Muslim before you know it, drawing symmetrical patterns and marvelling at the order of it all.
ReplyDeleteNo Stani, I meant electrons.
Come off it! I'm sure you understand chaos theory better than that. It relates to the drastically different results that can eventually come about from the tiniest differences in initial generation. It still encompasses patterns and rational behaviour.
ReplyDeleteMe a Muslim? You're the one with a God mate! Those superstitions of yours put you firmly in the religious fundamentalist envelope.
Now, seal yourself up, stick on a stamp and post yourself off to work!
So HF, if i am following this theory correctly (and to be honest i dont think i am) if we can persuade you to be less provocative and maybe get you to do some weekend charity work (just for good measure) we might just stay up and win the FA Cup this year?
ReplyDeleteYou understand of course that it will now be entirely your fault if we don't. Just like in 2006 LOL
01:25,
ReplyDeleteI think it's a male nurse...
Where's the chaos HF?...and there's nothing wrong with being a Muslim.
Where's the chaos Stani? Trying looking in 99.999999999% of the universe!
ReplyDeleteI'm not talking Chaos Theory Marty! Chaos Theory is a bloody oxymoron! Any theory is a negation of chaos. There you go again, wanting to impose order, looking for a designer, yearning for God.
Am I a nihilist Stani? Now there's a thought. No, life has value, purpose and can have meaning. We procreate. We have developed technologies. We have made discoveries. The trouble with religion is that it seeks to devalue life by telling us that the things we enjoy the most are wrong. Look at Islam's suppression of sexual fulfilment and exploration. Look at the way religious people waste their lives banking credits for an after life that does not exist. I value life. It's the only thing I will ever have so I want to enjoy it.
Your scientists don't know what most of that 99.9999% of the universe is! Dark matter, dark energy!!! Name it anything but God!! Dark will do! Look at the stars, the planets orbiting around them, that make up the galaxies and galaxy clusters, super clusters, filaments and the visible universe, all in perfect order, suspended and on their own paths. Chaos my arse!
ReplyDeleteReligion doesn't devalue life. It is proven that people of faith have HAPPIER and LONGER lives. I bookmarked an article on this very subject because I knew you'd need it one day :) When I find it I'll post it.
Religion controls the chaos, brings order to the disorder.
Religion does not stop you from doing things because they are enjoyable, it does so because there is harm in them. If something was good for you and not harmful, religion would not stop it. Perfect sense.
Islam's suppression of sexual fulfilment? You can have four wives as a Muslim HF! It's the government that's stopping your sexual fulfilment by only allowing you to have one :). Seriously though, Islam doesn't stop people from having sex. It just advises them to do so the right way. And there is GREAT WISDOM in the reasons for it's rules, particularly in regards to marriage and sexual relationships..
Life is not JUST about enjoyment HF. It is if one is an animal. We are not animals. That thing in between your ears is the most complex thing in the universe. It cannot have been created just for enjoyment and self-fulfilment. What a waste that would be.
So why are we here HF? And how did the big bang and everything in the universe ('something'), come out of nothing?
I reckon you're agnostic HF.
Four wives? Who wants four women complaining of headaches?
ReplyDeleteIt is that thing in between my ears that enables me to understand what I enjoy and, due to the capacity it gives me to anticipate and the facility to remember, I can heighten and relive the experiences, even reshape them in my mind to improve on what actually happened.
ReplyDelete...they only complain when they're not satisfied HF :)
ReplyDeleteCan't see myself having that problem, to be honest.
Wives are very easily satisfied Stani, that's the problem!
ReplyDelete...it's ok HF, I have the solution.
ReplyDeleteI'm getting reminded of that film starring Mel Gibson, 'What women Want'. Helen Hunt stars in it too...don't you think she's a dead ringer for Jodie Foster?
no
ReplyDelete...yes they do! Foster's lesbo apparently.
ReplyDelete"For something to be rational you need a designer"? I've never heard such a load of bollocks!
ReplyDeleteChaos is endemic in generation and extinction, but the intervening process is almost entirely rational and logical. Try putting your "everything is chaos" position
to Darwin and he'll put you down as a Creationist!
And why do keep asserting that I have a God? From someone who believes that discussing the potential squad for next year if we are relegated, may have a direct effect on our ability to beat the drop; that's rather insulting, No?
My recollection of "string theory" is admittedly rusty, so I had a little look. Interesting stuff but on anything but a basic level, well beyond my mental capacity. However, I totally failed to find the chapter on "string theory and why you shouldn't tread on the cracks in pavements"!
You are not addressing your issues my friend; your superstitions are forcing you to dissemble and sidestep with the skill of someone who's true calling was surely a seat in the house of commons!
The Earth's distance from the Sun is about 400 times the Moon's distance from the Earth. The Sun's diameter is about 400 times the diameter of the Moon. Because these ratios are approximately the same, the sizes of the Sun and the Moon as seen from Earth appear to be approximately the same and we are able to see the phenomenon we call a total eclipse. That all just happened by chance by the way.
ReplyDeleteChaos!
There is, of course, a logic to not treading on the cracks in pavements, and in touching wood, and in not walking under ladders and in avoiding black cats running across your path etcetera, just as there is a logic in slicing off the foreskin if you live in a desert and where robes rather than trousers, allow grit to get everywhere (Ouch). Similarly, there is a logic to fasting, disciplining the people to go without food in times of shortage so they don't riot (Look at Libya and Egypt!) And a logic, if you live in a hot climate, in not eating pork which does not discolour when past its best and which can kill when off. These superstitions, be they religious or secular, make sense without a God so don't mock them. The superstitions are fine and valid, it is the god notion that is fraudulant. But I digress.
ReplyDeleteDarwin was wrong because he still wanted a designer, he still wanted reason and order. Darwin believed in gradual evolution, failing to understand that it takes place in random jumps, rather than through a gradual and controlled process of adaptation to the environment. It is not survival of the fittest but survival of the freakiest based on random accident.
We see this with virus mutations. Billions of "mutant" viruses are produced every second, 99.9% of which prove weaker than the original and die off. One in ten billion mutants, by pure chance, proves to be stronger and better adapted to find itself a new host - jumping from pig or bird to human for example. That virus then multiplies in its new host environment, producing billions of mutants itself until, by pure chance, a stronger mutant is formed that can jump from one host to another host of the same species. This mutant now multiplies and transfers within the species. The original mutant that made the first jump from pig to human dies with its host, but the mutant of that mutant survives because it travels from host to host, so surviving the death of each host. So it appears as if this mutant virus is superior and better adapted but it isn't. It is just a random mutation that, by pure chance, prospers. That same mutant that can successfully jump species dies if its pig host never comes in contact with a human during the mutant's lifespan. There you are, Darwin's Theory of Evolution exploded in a petri dish!
So no, there is no rationale or logic to anything, it is all chaos and chance. If you have enough chimps and enough laptops, eventually, one with type, "cogito ergo sum", just like an octopus can predict World Cup results, and that chimp, who is as stupid as all its peers, will be hailed a genius! Everything that happens is an accident. The only order we see is born of chance and chance tends towards chaos because ultimately the universe is bent upon its own destruction because of entropy.
Here's further proof. The universe cannot exist according to mathmatic modelling without the square root of minus one, but the square root of minus one cannot exist, not according to our understanding of numbers anyway. That's how irrational everything is!
Quantum shows us a universe turned inside out, a universe connected through strings trembling across 11 dimensions in a way that our brains, programmed to 4 dimensions (I include time) cannot possibly comprehend. How can you presume to know that my superstitions are stupid therefore? In a universe where everything is random, my thoughts may have random effects that none of us have yet imagined! There is no God here, there is the opposite, an acceptance of the antithesis of Design, the absolutist uncreator called Chaos!
2221. I love that word "about". Your creator is so sloppy Stani! Now then, I want my Sun to be exactly 400 times bigger than my moon and...oh sod it, that will do, it's nearly right, I can't be doing with all this fine tuning, it's nearly Bloody Sunday for Christ's sake! Entropy? OK so it's a glitch in the system, but I need to put my feet up and who said I was perfect anyway?
ReplyDeleteI know I'm a bit late, but vertigo isn't a fear of heights. Vertigo is a condition where you can suddenly feel dizzy, or suddenly feel like your moving even when your not. Fear of heights is acrophobia. Lawyered
ReplyDeleteAnd Apostrophobia is a fear of using apostrophes when writing "You're"! ; }
ReplyDeletebut yer still a moron
ReplyDeleteYou can always tell a man who can't accept when he's wrong if he neeeds to point out others mistakes when his own are highlighted. Lawyered.
ReplyDelete