Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Little Red Hoax, Firefly, Google
A little red hoax. MyNameIsFred writes "In an earlier Slashdot story, it was reported that a student was investigated for requesting Mao's Little Red Book on inter-library loan. It appears that the story was a hoax."
Firefly franchise death greatly exaggerated. Kazzahdrane writes "Joss Whedon has spoken out against the Entertainment Weekly that claimed he has turned his back on the Firefly/Serenity franchise. From his post at Whedonesque: 'All right, now I have to jump in and set the record straight. EW is a fine rag, but they do take things out of context. Obviously when I said I had "closure", what I meant was "I hate Serenity, I hated Firefly, I think my fans are stupid and Nathan Fillion smells like turnips." But EW's always got to put some weird negative spin on it.'"
Intelligent Design tantamount to teaching religion. rcs1000 writes "After much deliberation Judge John Jones has ruled that teaching Intelligent Design is tantamount to teaching religion. The judge was pretty forthright, arguing that 'it is unconstitutional to teach Intelligent Design as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom.'"
EU launches first Galileo navigation satellite. Xserv writes "The EU launched the first in the series of Galileo Navigation Satellites signifying the start of a lessening of dependency on US Military GPS Systems in Europe. The new Galileo system is touted to be much more accurate and will also be more accessible on higher latitude zones where the US GPS system is known to be less than ideal."
Why AOL chose Google over Microsoft. gambit3 writes to tell us that the Wall Street Journal has a nice article deconstructing AOL's decision to go with Google instead of Microsoft. From the article: "Two weeks ago, when Time Warner Inc. was on the cusp of signing a sweeping online deal with Microsoft Corp., a team of executives from the media company's AOL unit traveled to Microsoft's headquarters in Redmond, Wash., to make sure everything was in order. When the executives returned, they reported back to Time Warner's top deal negotiator, Olaf Olafsson, with some less-than-satisfactory findings. They had found some of Microsoft's technology to be clunky, while the contemplated joint venture with the software king contained what they thought were financial pitfalls."
Endgame in Blackberry patent case. waynegoode writes "The New York Times is reporting that a recent decision could spell the end of the NTP vs. RIM Blackberry case. The US Patent Office apparently took the unusual step of telling NTP & RIM it will likely reject all 5 of NTP's patents, meaning the basis for NTP's lawsuit and it's billion dollar claim will most likely disappear. This puts pressure on the judge to not issue an injunction against RIM but to instead delay until the USPTO gets around to actually rejecting the patents."
Katrina aftermath still making waves. An anonymous reader writes "Approximately 50 people have been indicted in relation to a scheme that drained almost $200,000 from a Red Cross fund designed to put money into the hands of Hurricane Katrina victims. From the article: 'Seventeen of the accused worked at the Red Cross claim center in Bakersfield, Calif., which handled calls from storm victims across the country and authorized cash payments to them. The others were the workers' relatives and friends, prosecutors said last week.'"
More cloning doubts emerge. LukePieStalker writes "The Boston Globe is reporting that the South Korean cloning team whose troubles have recently been chronicled here on Slashdot used "borrowed" photos in their Science journal article that "appear in the journal Molecules and Cells, in a research article by another Korean team, submitted before the Science paper". In the earlier article, the cells in the photo are described as having been created without cloning."
I am sure that some Religious fundaments will call this ruling of some crazy liberal judge. I am conservative myself and I personally do believe in inelegant design but I do not believe that it should be tough in schools as science. Intelligent Design is not science it is faith-based assumption. I believed in Inelegant Designed when I was taught Darwinism. I just replaced Random with God. It was not an eureka moment, just about anyone can make the connection without any hoaxing, just an understanding based on my faith that nothing is truly random but work of God, as Einstein said God doesn't roll dice. But that being said teaching science that there is a force that we cannot measure or prove or disprove is not science. Science is not guaranteed to be absolute truth, science is a process of observations and finding a theory that best fits the observation, if a pattern cannot be found it is called random. If God is behind random that is fine but because God cannot be proven or disproved scientifically, it shouldn't be placed in science. Just saying God did it is a shortcut that ends further investigation, but by leaving God out of the equation then it shows that you have more to examine thus growth in understanding.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Predicted comment breakdown for this Slashback I love the ID stories, those are where I can tell rational people from kooks by my "Fans/Foes" changes that day.
Trolling is a art,
News stories like this make me sad. I am sad for the people of New Orleans who are suffering. They have lost so much, many have lost loved ones. Many have lost homes. But I am also sad that there is a small number of people who could take advantage of others and steal funds which should have helped the people of New Orleans. What kind of deprived life can a person have where they think it is okay to steal from the less fortunate?
And what is worse is these kinds of actions will make people less likely to donate. They will be wondering "Is my gift really going to help people, or will it be sucked up by greedy people taking advantage of a situation". What can a person do? Give and hope for the best??
I learned my ABC's watching television! I learned science watching Voltron.
That particular story ("the Little Red Hoax") may have been fake, but it does illustrate, in a very compelling and inspiring way, the very real civil rights abuses going on every day in this country.
Abuses that are so thoroughly not in evidence that the people who believe in them are forced to manufacture them.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
This hoax has gotten to NPR and other (More liberal) news agencies as well. Which is really sad, I do want to hear both sides of an argument but when both sides jumps to find a story that proves that other side is bad just makes me sick. Ok you don't care of the of Many of Bushes Anti-Terroism laws but making up stories that show how bad it could be will only smear your side when they find out that it was only a hoax.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
You know he was pretty much wrong when he said that, right? Hidden variable theories of quantum mechanics have been pretty thoroughly disproven.
Just because someone expresses an unpopular viewpoint (in this case that they believe in god perhaps?) does not make them automagically troll. the parent is a well thought out statement of position. NOT A TROLL!
Do we really have to rehash the ID thing yet again? The link is to an article dated December 20, there's nothing new here.
I just read the decision. Many have expressed concern over judges deciding scientific issues. But the judge in this case has done a truly admirable job of identifying the key scientific issues, and identifying the flaws in ID doctrine.
I am sure that some Religious fundaments will call this ruling of some crazy liberal judge.
That would be delusional. The judge is a rather conservative Bush appointee.
I am conservative myself and I personally do believe in inelegant design but I do not believe that it should be tough in schools as science.
Believe whatever you want according to the dictates of your own conscience. So long as you don't try to put it in public school science curricula, that is fine with me.
Science is not guaranteed to be absolute truth, science is a process of observations and finding a theory that best fits the observation, if a pattern cannot be found it is called random
Science is a bit more than you give it credit for. There is a pretty well defined set of philisophical principals that extend it well beyond pure empiricism.
As far as 'random', this is whare I disagree. Self-organization is easy to show on many scales and doesn't require any faith to accept. This argument is an approach used to try obfuscate the fact that there are real ways of dealing with the question of self organization. Unfortunately they require some pretty careful thinking to undersand and are not as easily presented to the general public as Darwinism is.
Just saying God did it is a shortcut that ends further investigation
And that is the problem. Progress ends when you stop looking for alternative explanations.
too bad evolution doesn't equal random.
And god can be scientifically disproven. In fact, I have ran tests, and in each and every one of them this god fellow failed to show up, deliver lottery numbers, or cure children inflicted with AIDS.
God doesn't exist, QED.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
You know he was pretty much wrong when he said that, right? Hidden variable theories of quantum mechanics have been pretty thoroughly disproven.
How do you prove a negative? Proving that there isn't an underlying pattern to the apparent pseudorandom behavior on a quantum level is like proving there is no God. And in fact, being a firm believer in the "God of the Gaps" theory- that's exactly what you're attempting when you claim there are no possible hidden variable theories of quantum mechanics. At best, you can only say there are no proven hidden variable theories- yet.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Myself I am a strong believer in evolution (belief not being the best word) , I consider myself a very observant Jew(and a Tanakh minimalist )
I find it ridicules that some people can not combine faith and science , the two things do not mix normally (unless science can define the view in question) .
Science is there to help us understand the world and how things work , faith is there to help us accept the things we can not understand , till the time comes that we may understand those things .
Science and faith should never be opposed and have no reason to be .
I like to think of it like this , if g-d is all mighty then surely it would have the power to architect a world an existence than can construct itself and follow its own rules , such as the laws of physics . Much as I do as a systems admin to automate my tasks . Science helps me to understand the way things works . Perhaps my views are naive and cowardly and there to help me cope with a short term life , but they do not affect my scientific views as I hope they would not any person who is religious .
sadly they do as they are too blind sighted to accept anything.
To them I say this , if g-d is all mighty then perhaps g-d would do as us sysmins do and automate the creation process . Why would the divine waste time on something which us mere mortals would have found a simple solution for .
These things need not be a dividing line , they are only made so by hatred and fear . Fear to know truth and to understand the workings of the world and if you choose the workings of g-d
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
Why did you have to turn this into a partisan issue? Was it such a stretch to think that ALL defenders of American liberties - liberals, democrats, conservatives, republicans, libertarians - could be equally concerned over a (thankfully false) report that the government was investigating people who read Mao's book? Did you honestly think only liberals would raise a stink over such an issue?
Because if that is what you're saying, then you are tacitly admitting that only liberals are defenders of American liberties.
I really think my Freshman biology book got the creationism vs. evolution thing right. In the first chapter, probably within the first few pages, as it was introducing students to biology at large, it mentioned how most, if not all, of modern biology is built on the theory of evolution.
It went on to say that there are groups which believe that the earth and the creatures as we know them, were created by a higher power. And while this could be possible, it was beyond the scope of a science class as it was not a scientifically testable hypothesis. It finished with suggesting that, should you wish to learn more about the idea of creationism, you should contact the clergy of your church of choice.
Simple, Factual, not more than a parapgrah. Now if only I could remember who published that text book.
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
Technically, judges don't belong to a party. Therefore, he's neutral. Just because Bush appointed him doesn't make him a conservative "nut".
Software is like sex. It's better when it's free. -Linus Torvalds
"And that is the problem. Progress ends when you stop looking for alternative explanations."
Even with evolution we are starting to stop to look for anything alternative. I am not for nor agaisnt the theary of evolution. But it remains just that - a theory. Being a better theory does not make it true. Remember the time when the most acclaimed minds in the world thought that the world was flat? Or how the best minds once thought the molecule was the smallest unit before they discovered atoms and electrons and those became the smallest. Then they they spilt THOSE up too. Remember the period table 50 years ago had less elements than they do now.
Intelligent Design may not be the answer. But that does not mean evolution is. Scientists are supposed to have an open mind. Accept your believes and accept that they may be wrong.
I love humanity, it is people I hate
I have a feeling that the Serenity dvds will sell like hotcakes. I mean, I got a copy for Christmas, and I didn't even ask for it; my parents knew I liked sci-fi, so they picked it up.
If the dvd does well, then I could see Universal being interested in a direct-to-video sequel, which would be fine by me.
How do you prove a negative?
MEEP! BEEP! The bullshit-o-meter just burst!
Any statement of fact can be written in positive or negative form, so your statement simply says you can't prove anything at all. Positive: "I am going to the park today." Negative: "I am not going to remain outside the boundaries of the park today." Or more simply, "It is not true that it is not true that I am going to the park today."
And in case you really believe the statement, "You can't prove a negative.": I'd like to see you try to prove it. Oh, I'm sorry, did I ask you to prove a negative?
Remember the time when the most acclaimed minds in the world thought that the world was flat?
So you're saying that we should continue looking for alternatives to the current understanding that the world is round?
1) The constitution prevents the establishment of religion in the First Amendment, and 2) Congress has no power except that which is explicitly granted to it, therefore it can neither support nor discourage religion.
...on its own makes no claim as to whom this being might be, what its motives were, or how we should regard it.
You don't consider teaching one particular sect's creation story in a science class support?
The theory of ID...
ID is not a theory, at most it is a hypothesis
Except (by your own words) that it must be a being in the first place. That is a pretty specific claim
Acknowledging an opposing viewpoint is not anti-science; rather it is the very foundation of science. To blindly follow any hypothesis or theory without regard to alternatives is the definition of bad science.
All opinions are not equally valid in science. Only those opinions that can be tested in some way count. To blindly posit a hypothesis with no way to verify it and call it a theory is the (literal) definition of bad science in that it does not follow the scientific method.
On the second point, sociology is science, and religion is part of sociology. Sociology is not hard science like chemistry or physics, but it's science nonetheless.
Sociology class is not Biology class. People would not be nearly so upset it they were suggesting it for the sociology curriculum.
On the third point, Congress only has powers which are granted to it by the Constitution.
And converselty cannot wield powers that are specifically denied it. Of course, we are talking about the judiciary branch re: the article. To get to the heart of the matter (FTA): We find that the secular purposes claimed by the board amount to a pretext for the board's real purpose, which was to promote religion.
Case closed (thank God).
Now, anything requiring intelligent design to be taught in schools would most certainly be a "law respecting an establishment of religion." And, although the Constitution only specifically mentions Congress, I think it should be agreed that this should apply to the states and municipalities and such as well (because I'm sure we'd be equally upset if these bodies banned free speech).
I don't think anyone would have a problem with ID being taught in a religious studies class, which most high schools today offer. But that's where it belongs. A science class should teach ideas that have been proven (or at least backed up) through scientific evidence and conceptualized using a scientific method. But hey, religion in a religion class and science in a science class? That's just begging for the wrath of God, isn't it?
Careful - rightnext to the bsometer is the wasnt-paying-attention-in-junior-high-ometer.
The g.p. is refering to the scientific principle that you cannot prove an absolute negative. In general, it is a warning not to infer too much from one's own limited perspective of the universe.
For example, "I can see no stars in the sky at this time" is much more easily supported than the statement "There are no stars in the sky." The statement, "I found no fish in this pond" is sensible, but the statement, "This pond has no fish" is close to nonsense.
Per your example, "I do not intend to go to the park today" is a statement you can support. "I will not go to the park today" is not provable. Of course, that is because it is future-tellings, not because it is negative.
Which brings us back to...
This is misleading. The theories have not been disproven. They have simply not been proven. The fact that they have not, to date, been proven, does not imply that they are disproven. Actually, the theory of some pattern existing behind pseudorandom quantum phenomena may very well be not-provable and yet still true. (In order to emphatically prove such a theory, one have to discover the pattern... rendering the point moot!)
Ask any metaphysicist.
Most of them *do* have an open mind. But they require decent scientific theories do actually consider. Intelligent Design is the weakest theory around, and it's not science. You can't pitch a scientific theory against something that is not a scientific theory.
ID is better explored in philosophy or theology (where is used to be before it was rebadged as ID).
Remember the period table 50 years ago had less elements than they do now
They may be true but it doesn't matter! Good scientists would have assumed that more elements may be found, given that they kept finding them! Intelligent design says, "I don't understand that - it looks way too tricky and complicated - God must have done it! Hooray for God, I was just *looking* for something to credit Him with".
Just go ask the congress and the senate, they have been doing it for years, and they don't seem to have a problem with it. Insurance companies do this too, so you can ask them... Oh yeah, the 30% loan companies... they do it too... (oh well it's actually 30% + prime) so ask them...
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing. Emo Philips
God IS in the gaps. He always has been. The gaps are just perpetually shrinking as science fills the gaps with explanations that prove things behave deterministically. :)
set softtabstop=4 shiftwidth=4 expandtab nocp worlddomination
> I don't see how you can teach biology while omitting the
> idea that for the longest time almost every culture assumed
> life came entirely from a super natural being.
You missed the distinction. It's okay to mention that some Christians believe in ID. It's not okay to say that ID is an alternate, valid scientific theory.
It's just like how you can learn in history class that Jesus/Buddha/Mohammed/etc was/is worshiped by Christians/Buddhists/Muslims/etc, but they won't tell you that it is right to worship Jesus/Buddha/Mohammed/etc.
From your link: One can sum up all this by saying that the criterion of the scientific status of a theory is its falsifiability, or refutability, or testability."--end quote
Theories are supposed to be treated with skepticism, and the "religious nutcase" you responded to displayed more of it than you have.
Sometimes I think you slashbots have a religion unto yourselves.
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
Because I hadn't heard of the "Little Red Hoax" story, but if I had, I wouldn't have believed it. The department of Homeland Security showing up to harass a colege student for requesting a book through ILL that anyone can go to the local Barnes and Noble and buy right off the shelf? That doesn't make any sense. Misguided and draconian as some of the DHS's policies may seem, I have to believe that really they do have the best of intentions, and besides, if the government did ever think to institute a thought police, any right thinking individual would know that the first place they would go would be those darker corners of the net, not books published by trade paperback publishing companies.
It's got to mean something that prominent people and news organizations picked this up. At face value, it could very well mean that they're just gullible, but I think there is something more legitimate going on. In the wake of the revelation of the Bush administration using the NSA to spy on citizens without getting wiretap warrants (when they are fairly easy to obtain) we have had a range of official responses from "so what?" to "yes we did it, don't you like freedom?" Sadly, this kind of wavering and uncertainty where the truth is concerned is the hallmark of this administr~~~~~ persons with power. This leaves those without power in a position where they don't know what to believe, but always feel safe in assuming the worse. DHS stormtroopers showed up to implant your new baby with a RFID chip? Page one above the fold!
Unfortunately the natural paranoia that beaten down feel is only exacerbated by a media all too eager to jump on stories like this. Edward R. Murrough turns in his grave at the concept of this talking head journalism, but it sure does sell papers. Rightwing Extremist Nutcase vs. Leftwing Extremist Nutcase generates the sort of polarizing, us or them, emotional reaction quotes that make headlines. For those of you not paying attention, they make headlines because they sell papers.
So now we have some college student trying to feel good about himself and justify his own existence. With narry a street protest to find to have his head bashed in by the cops (a clear sign that the system has failed when peaceful protests go uninterrupted), and probably not enough initiative to walk downtown to where the proletariat live to participate in one anyway, this anonymous fellow makes up a story that maybe will score him some points with whatever hippy chick in philosophy 101 that he's had his eye on. Really, this kind of story isn't the sort of thing you tell your professor when you're looking for an extension to a paper, nor is it really the sort of thing one admits during an advising session; this is really the sort of thing you say when you're three sheets to the wind drunk and looking to score (score what, exactly, I'll leave to your imagination). So everyone in this thing winds up with egg on their face. The kid who started it, those who believed him, and the journalists who spread the story because it sells papers. Us sane folk who realize we're not living in a police state yet just kind of shake our heads and wonder which is worse, thought police or freedom of stupidity.
Theories are supposed to be treated with skepticism,
Yes, but for scientific reasons, not religious ones. I wonder if he has the same level of skepticism for the atomic theory of matter, special relativity, and the round-earth theory.
1 - random mutation
2 - suvirval of the fittest
3 - inheritance of characteristics from parent(s) - including the random mutation
Darwinism is the theory that all variation in life on Earth has arisen solely as result of this process. Proponents of ID are not the only people that object to Darwinism - there is credible evidence for some mechanisms of non-random mutation.
Creationists using these subtleties is comparable to a flat-earther (or Velikovsky) using the 46-seconds of arc in the obit of Mercury to deny "Newtonism".
Um, not to be too pedantic, but yes. It's called Geodesy. And the world isn't "round" at all.