[meteorite-list] Family ClaimsMeteoriteFellInTheirCourtyardinIndia

[MARK BOSTICK]

I  agree with Chris although he likely could have worded himself a little 
better. Our peer review system keeps pseudoscience out of the scientific 
field, with little exception, which is something MOST, but not all, 
countries seem to lack.

The poll numbers quoted also seem quite a bit off to me, and are possibly 
because of the way the question is worded. A great example of this is the 
crack down on online gambling "because kids were getting addited to 
gambling."

The poll questions, which first classified a kid as anyone under 23, have 
you even gambled.  As almost 80% had said they gambled at least once, it was 
declared a crisis situation.

Another funny question (in my opinion) was "Have you gambled in the last six 
months?" Those that answered yes, were declared addits.

This study was used as evidence to ban online gambling, and while online 
gambling likely is not a good thing, the poll in my opinion was tainted and 
therefore worthless.

I could very well seeing that gallop poll quoted as saying something like 
"Do you believe in a higher power?" Which may mean something completely 
different to Chris then me.

Mind you 50% is an accurate number here in Kansas (but not the larger 
cities), yet across the US, 30% is much more accurate I think, and according 
to most Christian organizations, this number appears to be dropping. And 
then one must consider times have changed, that 30% contains 100 different 
beliefs and many accept science, meaning simply because someone says they 
are Christian, does not mean you know how they think.  Most of the 
creationist I have seen the last two years, now accept evolution, which 
includes the creationist theme park, and if I remember right is in Illinois 
and to my knowledge is the only one.  I may be wrong on the later but I live 
in Kansas and we do not have such a theme park, and I am smack in the middle 
of "bible country" as they say.  I think I could safely bet that this list 
has several Christians that accept the age of meteorites.

In another related note I got a galllop pole this last week on the US postal 
service.  I mail 2-3 times a week, get 20-25 packaged a week, spend a couple 
thousand a year on stamps I do not use, so one would think I would be the 
perfect person to poll.  However I didn't like half the answers I was 
allowed to choose from so I am not going to fill it out.

Remember according to the Gallop polls Kerry won the last election.

So unless one sees the questions, and has other facts, such as were the poll 
was taken, they have to be taken with a grain of salt.

I would however argue with one of Chris' points, and that is I think the US 
media is just as bad as any other country in reguard to meteorites.  But the 
US media is not a group of scientists.

Mark