Re:Why wouldn't math be known across the universe?
on
The Golden Ratio
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· Score: 1
Any being capable of human-equivalent level of thought would be able to count objects.
I'm stepping outside my own understanding here, so go easy on me:
I think a possible flaw in your assumption is that human-equivalent thought is required for intelligence.
I can almost imagine an intelligence that doesn't perceive "objects" at all. Therefore even counting is a non-existent concept. Perhaps they see things as a continuous web in a way that we don't? This type of non-dualistic thinking is somewhere at the foundation of Zen Buddhism (I think), so it's even been explored by human thinkers. However it runs so contrary to the popular model of understanding the world that it seems almost insane. But perhaps we look the same way to someone with a non-dualistic intelligence. In fact, I'm nearly sure we do.
You're right. There are a few legitimate uses for anonymous 1-to-1 contact. And I bet in those cases someone could find a way to do so. They could use traditional means (i.e. mailing a letter) or they could sign up for a free email account.
But if the whole email system was secure, in that each server knew which server it was talking to for real, and the electronic source of the email was verifiable, this would go a looong way towards eliminating spam. And whisleblowers and other one-shot deals like that could still sneak through.
What I'm thinking is no better or worse than paper mail. Generally you could be anonymous, but with a bunch of effort you could be tracked down. That's just the reality of communication.
I think most of these solutions are overkill. If email was just a secured medium where you could reliably verify the sender (or at the very least the sender's server) everything else would work out. Blacklists would mean something. Abusers could be tracked down and put out of business using current law. It would work itself out if we just remove the anonymity. And nobody who wasn't spamming would have to do anything (but upgrade to a functionally equivalent mail package).
Just secure the medium. Anonymity is great in public forums but not in my personal space.
I think that anonymity is _very_ important, just as you do. But I don't think it applies in my inbox any more than it applies in my house. If you are going to make a direct 1-to-1 communication to me (an intimate event) I have the right to know who you are.
If you want anonymity, then use a public forum, like Slashdot. Or put it on the web.
I think the usefulness of having verifiable senders outweighs the benefits of anonymity in this case. In fact, email, a certainly useful medium, will eventually be ruined as a dependable communication medium as is. And when it's ruined what good will the anonymity be then?
At least there should be the option for each recipient to accept or deny unverifiable email. Then you can have your intimate free speech and spam, and I'll have a useful inbox again.
Certainly not a solution for the audiophile, and probably not what you're looking for, but I sucessfully repaired an old speaker's surround foam by carefully laying small strips of duct tape around the border. I was careful to leave enough slack so the speaker could travel in a similar fashion. It actually worked pretty well, and I continued to use the speaker for several more years until I had money for something respectable:)
Doesn't it just come down to killing the easy anonymity of email? If the whole system was run in a secure fashion, then it would be child's play to sue the pants off a few high profile spammers and put the whole bunch of them out of business. And blacklists would actually be useful.
Of course it requires a major conversion of the ol' SMTP, but with a huge amount of power concentrated in AOL, MSN, and Yahoo, I think they could come up with a secure email alternative and force everyone to upgrade. It would be painful for a bit, but in the long run I bet it would be better.
I'm all for anonymity in general, but not in my inbox. Post to a discussion or something through an anonymizer if you want that.
And who decides what's morally equivalent? You? Of course you do; for yourself. And they for themselves. I'm sure they'd appeal to morality for their argument as well. And it's that very balance that keeps us alive.
Don't worry: if the worriers are truly nuts they wouldn't have the numbers to have a loud enough voice to affect change.
Anything loud enough to annoy you is nearly always based on some tiny bit of truth. Maybe skewed beyond recognition, but truth nonetheless.
Maybe they just realized how bad an idea it would be for them to go public. The news articles this week about Microsoft targeting them would have destroyed their stock price. And that's without any failure on their part at all. They would be tried and hanged in the court of public opinion overnight. They'd be left scrambling to boost their public image and they'd be forcibly led off track from making the best search engine in the world.
As it is (as a privately held company) they can take such news as information and plan carefully and intelligently. Sure they're concerned, sure the VC folks are telling them they need to watch out. But it's nothing like watching your company's valuation drop 60% overnight and be left with fear of lawsuits and hostile takeover based on rumors.
Actually it's a great thing that we have these extremists worrying about the ramifications of every single thing we do. It nicely balances out the other extremists who are prone to plunge ahead without considering the ramifications at all. If either side was given free reign we'd be in big trouble fast. Thankfully they seem to balance out over time.
It's the same in many fields. Politics comes to mind. If you find yourself not able to stand the folks on the other end of the spectrum, keep in mind that you have just placed yourself in another extreme group and be thankful for the balance.
It is balance that keeps us moving forward surely but safely.
I think a lot of people like the glitzy slices/dices phones that are on the market now. And that's fine. I am glad there are manufacturers falling over themselves to saturate that market.
However, I feel there is a smaller market that likes simplicity. I just wish there was a niche player that went after this. With cell phones, that is... Apple has done a pretty good job with computer hardware/software and mp3 players. And they've got a successful business playing to that niche.
It's the same in every field... from movies and music, to cars and cell phones: just about every company feels immense pressure to go for the biggest piece of the pie. However the remaining pieces are valid and highly profitable markets. It would just take a diciplined (and probably privately held) company to maintain focus and keep costs down to dominate their niche.
Anyways... not sure exactly what my point is, but as someone who appreciates simplicity and quality, and has plenty of spending money, I feel I am not very well catered to by the current consumer market.
The PATRIOT act is very dangerous. It is a wonderful relief to see it challenged. Even if enacted with good intentions (a dubious claim at best), there is no organization that would not abuse such power. If you think otherwise you are terribly naive. Do not trust the government blindly.
My grandfather was kidnapped and interrogated for five years by the Polish secret police because they were absolutely sure he was a spy. He wrote a book about it. It's an excellent read for anyone who wonders about the dark side of "national security".
That all seemed, at the time, to be a failing of communism. But recent events remind me that it can happen any time and place that the people pledge thier uncritical allegiance to their leaders.
I love this country and want it to be the best it can. With that in mind I keep a close eye on those in charge to be sure they don't run amok. I wish more people did. I hope enough do. The leaders have certainly been running amok in the past few years.
So you can't look at the followers of a religion to determine if it's worthwhile, you have to look at the founders, at the example they set.
I'm not sure I totally agree with that. You certainly shouldn't judge the founders by their followers, but rather their own actions. And Christ was certainly a very honorable man, seemingly more honorable than Mohammed.
But since religion's aim is to make people live better, I think you have to judge on how effective it is at that. So if a very honorable man starts a religion whose followers are a bunch of dangerous nuts, then the religion isn't very effective.
Modern American Chistianity is a pretty decent religion by that measure. Middle ages Christianity not so much.
I've often wondered though, what the best religion in that regard is. It would probably be impossible to determine, but I wonder about that sometimes.
You seem like a reasonable fellow, and I don't want to argue too long, but I will respectfully respond.
The new testament does adjust (if not contradict) the teachings of the old testament. But I must admit that such waffling doesn't seem very divine.
I looked over the site you mentioned, and there are some strong words there from the Koran. But as I said there are a lot of strong words in the Bible as well. The premise of the site is that Islam is dangerous because members of the religion can justify their actions based on certain scriptures. Of course, they would have to ignore the other passages to do so, since there are many passages about peace in the Koran. This is similar to the Bible, where you can find justification and/or forgiveness for just about you might want to do.
I guess my point is that religion doesn't make one act in a certain way... that comes from a deeper place and then we fit our religion to it. I am guessing you can already see that, though.
I think that the Islamic countries are pretty well messed up, and their cultures are a bit disfunctional. But I don't think that springs directly from Islam. If it were, then the US Moslims would still have problems. But they don't seem to be any more troubled than anyone else over here.
Well, in all honesty, if you're not willing to say someone else is wrong, you certainly can't say you're right. And if you're not certain your belief is right, why hold it?
Oh, I'm sure you're wrong and I'm right:) But I don't think it's dangerous (for me or you) that you don't agree with me. That's the difference between religion and personal philosophy.
Also, I resent the idea that my concern is born of fear. It comes from a certainty that Christ is God, and you can't go to Heaven unless you follow Him
Well, we may just be arguing semantics, but it sounds like you're afraid you won't go to heaven if you don't believe in him. So that is a motivation of fear. Either of punishment, or the lack of reward.
Maybe you're saying that before you worry about heaven and hell, you respect the historical figure of Christ enought to follow him regardless. I'm willing to believe that you feel that way.
One could argue that my beliefs are born of fear in a manner as well: fear that if I don't see things as they are I will make poor decisions and live a less interesting life. But I think the real driving force for me is curiosity, not fear.
Feel free to respond, but I am comfortable with our disagreement.
I think it was about a month or so of writing down every dream or fragment that I could remember (each morning as soon as I woke up). The more I wrote, the more dreams I would remember the next night.
Then one night I was dreaming something so ridiculous and disturbing that I realized it _must_ be a dream. Suddenly I was laughing and I started to wake up. However, in an amusing turn, I woke up into another dream:) I didn't realize this until the morning.
Anyways, I kept at it and eventually had several more lucid dreams, in addition to regular dreams, maybe once a week or so. Usually they were pretty short, though: the thrill of realization would often cause me to wake up. When I was able to stay in the dream for any length of time, I often found myself exploring creative thought, and letting the narritave fade away. I would race through my mind connecting ideas at what seemed like a magical rate. However I could never remember enough details when waking up to make much sense of it. I imagine it's a bit like taking acid (though I've no direct experience).
After a few months, other things got in the way and I turned my attention elsewhere. I soon stopped having the lucid dreams and also I don't remember my dreams often these days. So if you stop working at it, it seems to go away.
I do hope to get back to it, though, as soon as I've got the time and energy to spare:)
True enough, but Christians don't live under the Old Testament.
Ah yes, selective religion. My point exactly. I know very well the difference between the old and new testaments. I was raised Christian -- my grandfater was the pastor of our church, in fact. But the old and new testaments form one book, and Jesus did not say at any point to discard the old testament. If he had the Christians would likely have done so by now, as it is largely an embarassment to the religion.
most Moslims don't follow the core concepts of Islam (like tying explosives to your chest and detonating them in a movie theater).
I'm sorry, but you must know that that is not a core concept of Islam any more than it is Christianity. If you can point out to me where the Koran encourages terrorism (killing innocents to effect change) I will stand corrected.
I'd really like to see all Moslims convert to Christianity, because I honestly and earnestly believe that their souls are in jeopardy.
And therin lies the rub. The religions of the world are more alike than different: they all want to save you from yourself. Everyone thinks that everyone elses beliefs are dangerous. So dangerous in fact, that we might have to eliminate them somehow to save us all.
So ask yourself what belief is _really_ dangerous. Perhaps this fear of others itself.
To your credit, you support conversion in a fairly passive manner, but perhaps if we (and they) were not so interested in conversion (for each others' safety) there would be far less to worry about in the first place.
You know, I don't know why lucid dreaming isn't a bigger thing. Given all the effort people put into altered conciousness, that is. No hardware required.
I've never been a big one for altered conciousness, but I did do some lucid dreaming for a while. Basically you just get good at recognizing when you're dreaming, and then you can start controlling what happens. Yes, Natalie Portman is an option.
It does take some dedication, though. Keeping a dream journal is essential. There's some basic info out there that will help get you started.
The only downside I found is I sometimes felt I wasn't sleeping as deeply. But it is a great way to explore altered conciousness without worrying about killing brain cells or geting addicted to anything.
Well I'd suggest reading the Old Testament of the Bible (an easy and fun read in lego). It pretty clearly states that the chosen people (in this case, the Jews) should kill pretty much anyone whom isn't chosen.
In fact most religions at their core include some level of dehumanizing or at least devaluing other religions. This is a big part of how religions propagate.
And I'm _not_ saying religion is bad. Just that they all play this game, and very few of the modern people of any religion buy the whole thing hook line and sinker. In America at least, my modern Jewish, Moslem, Hindu, Buddhist, Athiest friends, etc don't think it's okay to go around killing people.
Yup, that's right. Even my Moslem friends. I'm talking real Moslems who actually pray six times a day. There is not a trace of Jihad in them. Because that is not how the majority of them think. Regardless of what the Koran says.
So yes, I hate the Jihad. No, I do not hate Moslems, or their religion, or wish to eradicate the earth of them.
And likewise the major cause of the Jihad is not religion but politics as well. It has little to do with Islam in particular, and is rather a common trait of all blendings politics and religion. Two powerful ideologies get wrapped up and all hell breaks loose. At least it would seem so according to history.
I used to think so. But I was forced by economics at my current employer to just keep on hacking. For years I predicted the imminent collapse of our system under the weight of a thousand hacks.
But it never collapsed. And the functionality and performance has been greatly increased. And we've added five more developers. And we're profitable.
And because the original design was decent, there have been no catastrophic failures, or impenetrable bugs.
Sure, we've rewritten many small parts of the system, but in a very iterative fashion. And there are some bits of old (ugly) code pushing four years now that still do their job just fine.
Maybe this only applies to web development in perl (small CGIs using simple function-oriented modules with SQL to interface to a DB). And maybe it only works for companies using technology as support (as opposed to the company being _about_ technology). But there it works and it works well.
Maybe here's the deal: we're always doing a "complete rewrite" -- it just takes us a decade and we do it a little bit at a time. But the point I think is that tearing out the guts usually causes more problems than it solves.
The thing is that many of the messages I get are from people who visited my site and found some art they liked. They just drop a me a "i liked your stuff" message, which is valuable to me, but probably not urgent enough for them to follow up with a challenge-response. At least I probably wouldn't if I were them...
I will take a peek at TMDA, but currently I'm fine with 1-2 spams a day...
iTunes got the Music industries backing because it was secure... if that trust is lost, after the contracts end, iTunes has no more content.
You know, I think Jobs said in some recent interview that Apple told the execs it was going to get cracked. He said that Apples best and brightest had researched the problem and that any DRM would get cracked eventually. He told them the solution was to offer a compelling product. Which they've done.
The fact is that Apple is competing with free P2P directly and still doing well. Because they offer better searching, better UI, better download speed and consistent high quality. That's what they're selling -- not music. Nobody in their right mind would pay for music these days.
You may be right though, that the execs never really got it and that they'll pull the plug. But where will they be then? They'll have lost the last potentially profitable outlet for their music. In a few years CD sales will be nowhere, DRM will all be cracked, new securely anonymouse P2P will be common, and they'll be screwed.
If they just offer what we all want: iTunes like service and quality for a fair price (without DRM -- whether they like it or not) they'll be fine.
Slashdot Mirror
Any being capable of human-equivalent level of thought would be able to count objects.
:)
I'm stepping outside my own understanding here, so go easy on me:
I think a possible flaw in your assumption is that human-equivalent thought is required for intelligence.
I can almost imagine an intelligence that doesn't perceive "objects" at all. Therefore even counting is a non-existent concept. Perhaps they see things as a continuous web in a way that we don't? This type of non-dualistic thinking is somewhere at the foundation of Zen Buddhism (I think), so it's even been explored by human thinkers. However it runs so contrary to the popular model of understanding the world that it seems almost insane. But perhaps we look the same way to someone with a non-dualistic intelligence. In fact, I'm nearly sure we do.
Just food for thought.
Cheers
You're right. There are a few legitimate uses for anonymous 1-to-1 contact. And I bet in those cases someone could find a way to do so. They could use traditional means (i.e. mailing a letter) or they could sign up for a free email account.
But if the whole email system was secure, in that each server knew which server it was talking to for real, and the electronic source of the email was verifiable, this would go a looong way towards eliminating spam. And whisleblowers and other one-shot deals like that could still sneak through.
What I'm thinking is no better or worse than paper mail. Generally you could be anonymous, but with a bunch of effort you could be tracked down. That's just the reality of communication.
Anyways, rambling now.
I think most of these solutions are overkill. If email was just a secured medium where you could reliably verify the sender (or at the very least the sender's server) everything else would work out. Blacklists would mean something. Abusers could be tracked down and put out of business using current law. It would work itself out if we just remove the anonymity. And nobody who wasn't spamming would have to do anything (but upgrade to a functionally equivalent mail package).
Just secure the medium. Anonymity is great in public forums but not in my personal space.
Cheers.
I strongly disagree.
I think that anonymity is _very_ important, just as you do. But I don't think it applies in my inbox any more than it applies in my house. If you are going to make a direct 1-to-1 communication to me (an intimate event) I have the right to know who you are.
If you want anonymity, then use a public forum, like Slashdot. Or put it on the web.
I think the usefulness of having verifiable senders outweighs the benefits of anonymity in this case. In fact, email, a certainly useful medium, will eventually be ruined as a dependable communication medium as is. And when it's ruined what good will the anonymity be then?
At least there should be the option for each recipient to accept or deny unverifiable email. Then you can have your intimate free speech and spam, and I'll have a useful inbox again.
Cheers.
Certainly not a solution for the audiophile, and probably not what you're looking for, but I sucessfully repaired an old speaker's surround foam by carefully laying small strips of duct tape around the border. I was careful to leave enough slack so the speaker could travel in a similar fashion. It actually worked pretty well, and I continued to use the speaker for several more years until I had money for something respectable :)
YMMV.
Doesn't it just come down to killing the easy anonymity of email? If the whole system was run in a secure fashion, then it would be child's play to sue the pants off a few high profile spammers and put the whole bunch of them out of business. And blacklists would actually be useful.
Of course it requires a major conversion of the ol' SMTP, but with a huge amount of power concentrated in AOL, MSN, and Yahoo, I think they could come up with a secure email alternative and force everyone to upgrade. It would be painful for a bit, but in the long run I bet it would be better.
I'm all for anonymity in general, but not in my inbox. Post to a discussion or something through an anonymizer if you want that.
Cheers.
And who decides what's morally equivalent? You? Of course you do; for yourself. And they for themselves. I'm sure they'd appeal to morality for their argument as well. And it's that very balance that keeps us alive.
Don't worry: if the worriers are truly nuts they wouldn't have the numbers to have a loud enough voice to affect change.
Anything loud enough to annoy you is nearly always based on some tiny bit of truth. Maybe skewed beyond recognition, but truth nonetheless.
Isn't it a wonderful world?
Cheers.
Maybe they just realized how bad an idea it would be for them to go public. The news articles this week about Microsoft targeting them would have destroyed their stock price. And that's without any failure on their part at all. They would be tried and hanged in the court of public opinion overnight. They'd be left scrambling to boost their public image and they'd be forcibly led off track from making the best search engine in the world.
As it is (as a privately held company) they can take such news as information and plan carefully and intelligently. Sure they're concerned, sure the VC folks are telling them they need to watch out. But it's nothing like watching your company's valuation drop 60% overnight and be left with fear of lawsuits and hostile takeover based on rumors.
Going public is way overrated.
Cheers.
Actually it's a great thing that we have these extremists worrying about the ramifications of every single thing we do. It nicely balances out the other extremists who are prone to plunge ahead without considering the ramifications at all. If either side was given free reign we'd be in big trouble fast. Thankfully they seem to balance out over time.
:)
It's the same in many fields. Politics comes to mind. If you find yourself not able to stand the folks on the other end of the spectrum, keep in mind that you have just placed yourself in another extreme group and be thankful for the balance.
It is balance that keeps us moving forward surely but safely.
More or less
Cheers.
I think a lot of people like the glitzy slices/dices phones that are on the market now. And that's fine. I am glad there are manufacturers falling over themselves to saturate that market.
However, I feel there is a smaller market that likes simplicity. I just wish there was a niche player that went after this. With cell phones, that is... Apple has done a pretty good job with computer hardware/software and mp3 players. And they've got a successful business playing to that niche.
It's the same in every field... from movies and music, to cars and cell phones: just about every company feels immense pressure to go for the biggest piece of the pie. However the remaining pieces are valid and highly profitable markets. It would just take a diciplined (and probably privately held) company to maintain focus and keep costs down to dominate their niche.
Anyways... not sure exactly what my point is, but as someone who appreciates simplicity and quality, and has plenty of spending money, I feel I am not very well catered to by the current consumer market.
Cheers.
It's a laugh riot how everyone is trying to one up each other when both OS's have all the power and flexibility you could ever want.
Next you'll be asking who's penis is bigger.
Surely the remaining proponents of the Big Ideas should have learned to stay quiet by now?
What an awful thought. I certainly hope that nobody with ideas stays quiet. It is the clash and ferment of ideas, good and bad, that lead us on.
The PATRIOT act is very dangerous. It is a wonderful relief to see it challenged. Even if enacted with good intentions (a dubious claim at best), there is no organization that would not abuse such power. If you think otherwise you are terribly naive. Do not trust the government blindly.
My grandfather was kidnapped and interrogated for five years by the Polish secret police because they were absolutely sure he was a spy. He wrote a book about it. It's an excellent read for anyone who wonders about the dark side of "national security".
That all seemed, at the time, to be a failing of communism. But recent events remind me that it can happen any time and place that the people pledge thier uncritical allegiance to their leaders.
I love this country and want it to be the best it can. With that in mind I keep a close eye on those in charge to be sure they don't run amok. I wish more people did. I hope enough do. The leaders have certainly been running amok in the past few years.
Cheers.
I look forward to the Pentium X that will have an infinite pipeline, infinite clockspeed, and get nothing done at each stage!
Good points all around. One thing, though:
So you can't look at the followers of a religion to determine if it's worthwhile, you have to look at the founders, at the example they set.
I'm not sure I totally agree with that. You certainly shouldn't judge the founders by their followers, but rather their own actions. And Christ was certainly a very honorable man, seemingly more honorable than Mohammed.
But since religion's aim is to make people live better, I think you have to judge on how effective it is at that. So if a very honorable man starts a religion whose followers are a bunch of dangerous nuts, then the religion isn't very effective.
Modern American Chistianity is a pretty decent religion by that measure. Middle ages Christianity not so much.
I've often wondered though, what the best religion in that regard is. It would probably be impossible to determine, but I wonder about that sometimes.
Nice talking to you...
You seem like a reasonable fellow, and I don't want to argue too long, but I will respectfully respond.
:) But I don't think it's dangerous (for me or you) that you don't agree with me. That's the difference between religion and personal philosophy.
The new testament does adjust (if not contradict) the teachings of the old testament. But I must admit that such waffling doesn't seem very divine.
I looked over the site you mentioned, and there are some strong words there from the Koran. But as I said there are a lot of strong words in the Bible as well. The premise of the site is that Islam is dangerous because members of the religion can justify their actions based on certain scriptures.
Of course, they would have to ignore the other passages to do so, since there are many passages about peace in the Koran. This is similar to the Bible, where you can find justification and/or forgiveness for just about you might want to do.
I guess my point is that religion doesn't make one act in a certain way... that comes from a deeper place and then we fit our religion to it. I am guessing you can already see that, though.
I think that the Islamic countries are pretty well messed up, and their cultures are a bit disfunctional. But I don't think that springs directly from Islam. If it were, then the US Moslims would still have problems. But they don't seem to be any more troubled than anyone else over here.
Well, in all honesty, if you're not willing to say someone else is wrong, you certainly can't say you're right. And if you're not certain your belief is right, why hold it?
Oh, I'm sure you're wrong and I'm right
Also, I resent the idea that my concern is born of fear. It comes from a certainty that Christ is God, and you can't go to Heaven unless you follow Him
Well, we may just be arguing semantics, but it sounds like you're afraid you won't go to heaven if you don't believe in him. So that is a motivation of fear. Either of punishment, or the lack of reward.
Maybe you're saying that before you worry about heaven and hell, you respect the historical figure of Christ enought to follow him regardless. I'm willing to believe that you feel that way.
One could argue that my beliefs are born of fear in a manner as well: fear that if I don't see things as they are I will make poor decisions and live a less interesting life. But I think the real driving force for me is curiosity, not fear.
Feel free to respond, but I am comfortable with our disagreement.
I started with this FAQ.
:) I didn't realize this until the morning.
:)
I think it was about a month or so of writing down every dream or fragment that I could remember (each morning as soon as I woke up). The more I wrote, the more dreams I would remember the next night.
Then one night I was dreaming something so ridiculous and disturbing that I realized it _must_ be a dream. Suddenly I was laughing and I started to wake up. However, in an amusing turn, I woke up into another dream
Anyways, I kept at it and eventually had several more lucid dreams, in addition to regular dreams, maybe once a week or so. Usually they were pretty short, though: the thrill of realization would often cause me to wake up. When I was able to stay in the dream for any length of time, I often found myself exploring creative thought, and letting the narritave fade away. I would race through my mind connecting ideas at what seemed like a magical rate. However I could never remember enough details when waking up to make much sense of it. I imagine it's a bit like taking acid (though I've no direct experience).
After a few months, other things got in the way and I turned my attention elsewhere. I soon stopped having the lucid dreams and also I don't remember my dreams often these days. So if you stop working at it, it seems to go away.
I do hope to get back to it, though, as soon as I've got the time and energy to spare
Good luck in your explorations!
True enough, but Christians don't live under the Old Testament.
Ah yes, selective religion. My point exactly. I know very well the difference between the old and new testaments. I was raised Christian -- my grandfater was the pastor of our church, in fact. But the old and new testaments form one book, and Jesus did not say at any point to discard the old testament. If he had the Christians would likely have done so by now, as it is largely an embarassment to the religion.
most Moslims don't follow the core concepts of Islam (like tying explosives to your chest and detonating them in a movie theater).
I'm sorry, but you must know that that is not a core concept of Islam any more than it is Christianity. If you can point out to me where the Koran encourages terrorism (killing innocents to effect change) I will stand corrected.
I'd really like to see all Moslims convert to Christianity, because I honestly and earnestly believe that their souls are in jeopardy.
And therin lies the rub. The religions of the world are more alike than different: they all want to save you from yourself. Everyone thinks that everyone elses beliefs are dangerous. So dangerous in fact, that we might have to eliminate them somehow to save us all.
So ask yourself what belief is _really_ dangerous. Perhaps this fear of others itself.
To your credit, you support conversion in a fairly passive manner, but perhaps if we (and they) were not so interested in conversion (for each others' safety) there would be far less to worry about in the first place.
Cheers.
You know, I don't know why lucid dreaming isn't a bigger thing. Given all the effort people put into altered conciousness, that is. No hardware required.
I've never been a big one for altered conciousness, but I did do some lucid dreaming for a while. Basically you just get good at recognizing when you're dreaming, and then you can start controlling what happens. Yes, Natalie Portman is an option.
It does take some dedication, though. Keeping a dream journal is essential. There's some basic info out there that will help get you started.
The only downside I found is I sometimes felt I wasn't sleeping as deeply. But it is a great way to explore altered conciousness without worrying about killing brain cells or geting addicted to anything.
Cheers.
Well I'd suggest reading the Old Testament of the Bible (an easy and fun read in lego). It pretty clearly states that the chosen people (in this case, the Jews) should kill pretty much anyone whom isn't chosen.
In fact most religions at their core include some level of dehumanizing or at least devaluing other religions. This is a big part of how religions propagate.
And I'm _not_ saying religion is bad. Just that they all play this game, and very few of the modern people of any religion buy the whole thing hook line and sinker. In America at least, my modern Jewish, Moslem, Hindu, Buddhist, Athiest friends, etc don't think it's okay to go around killing people.
Yup, that's right. Even my Moslem friends. I'm talking real Moslems who actually pray six times a day. There is not a trace of Jihad in them. Because that is not how the majority of them think. Regardless of what the Koran says.
So yes, I hate the Jihad. No, I do not hate Moslems, or their religion, or wish to eradicate the earth of them.
Cheers.
And likewise the major cause of the Jihad is not religion but politics as well. It has little to do with Islam in particular, and is rather a common trait of all blendings politics and religion. Two powerful ideologies get wrapped up and all hell breaks loose. At least it would seem so according to history.
Cheers.
I used to think so. But I was forced by economics at my current employer to just keep on hacking. For years I predicted the imminent collapse of our system under the weight of a thousand hacks.
But it never collapsed. And the functionality and performance has been greatly increased. And we've added five more developers. And we're profitable.
And because the original design was decent, there have been no catastrophic failures, or impenetrable bugs.
Sure, we've rewritten many small parts of the system, but in a very iterative fashion. And there are some bits of old (ugly) code pushing four years now that still do their job just fine.
Maybe this only applies to web development in perl (small CGIs using simple function-oriented modules with SQL to interface to a DB). And maybe it only works for companies using technology as support (as opposed to the company being _about_ technology). But there it works and it works well.
Maybe here's the deal: we're always doing a "complete rewrite" -- it just takes us a decade and we do it a little bit at a time. But the point I think is that tearing out the guts usually causes more problems than it solves.
Cheers.
You don't resize the dock by dragging the mouse on its border.
:)
Yes you do. Although you have to do it over the line seperator, you _don't_ have to command-click. Just being a picky bastard
Cheers.
The thing is that many of the messages I get are from people who visited my site and found some art they liked. They just drop a me a "i liked your stuff" message, which is valuable to me, but probably not urgent enough for them to follow up with a challenge-response. At least I probably wouldn't if I were them...
I will take a peek at TMDA, but currently I'm fine with 1-2 spams a day...
iTunes got the Music industries backing because it was secure... if that trust is lost, after the contracts end, iTunes has no more content.
You know, I think Jobs said in some recent interview that Apple told the execs it was going to get cracked. He said that Apples best and brightest had researched the problem and that any DRM would get cracked eventually. He told them the solution was to offer a compelling product. Which they've done.
The fact is that Apple is competing with free P2P directly and still doing well. Because they offer better searching, better UI, better download speed and consistent high quality. That's what they're selling -- not music. Nobody in their right mind would pay for music these days.
You may be right though, that the execs never really got it and that they'll pull the plug. But where will they be then? They'll have lost the last potentially profitable outlet for their music. In a few years CD sales will be nowhere, DRM will all be cracked, new securely anonymouse P2P will be common, and they'll be screwed.
If they just offer what we all want: iTunes like service and quality for a fair price (without DRM -- whether they like it or not) they'll be fine.
Cheers.