A better definition of faith would be that you have a belief based on personal experience.
I think that C.S. Lewis would agree that the Bible is a higher authority than he (though *I* might not), and the Bible says, "Faith is the evidence of things not seen", which is an excellent definition, IMHO. It shows that faith is supposed to be in and of itself evidence that whatever the faith is placed in exists! I think that "belief without reason" is probably a good paraphrase of that sentiment.:)
Though kids are stripped of Constitutional rights in most American schools, it's hard to believe courts will ultimately uphold educational or police actions taken on the basis of anonymous calls.
he had apparently not bothered to find out whether the existing bioweapons gave an advantage to the offense or defense.
But this implies that someone knows, or that he could have found out easily, if only he bothered to search the literature. Is this so, or do we need fundamental research on the question (i.e., what Merkle was calling for in the first place)? I would assume that the research needs doing, but I don't see any reason that it would be easier to do with biological molecular machinery than with artificial molecular machinery, especially since biological machinery will necessarily have all sorts of non-designed side effects. I just don't think it's as simple a question as you and Hemos appear to agree it is.
(Joy later asked Merkle 'Do you think biological weaponary gives an advantage to the offensive or defensive,' to which Merkle embarrassingly replied 'I'm not sure').
What? Why was this embarrassing? It does seem unclear whether biological machinery is inherently better at defense or offense, since there appear to be no perfect immune systems in nature, nor are there any microbes that invariably win against immune systems.
I was certainly under the impression before that the GPL granted each individual the rights to reproduce the covered material. This was the big question when Corel tried to violate the GPL by insisting that beta-testers were not really covered, wasn't it?
If you're looking for someone who's more... straightforward than any of the usuals, try L. Neil Smith for Prez. His whole platform is Bill of Rights Enforcement. --
What do you disagree with in there? [the ten commandments]
Uh...the first one? "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me"? (After Him is fine, though, apparently...is this confirmation that those other gods exist?;) --
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I think that C.S. Lewis would agree that the Bible is a higher authority than he (though *I* might not), and the Bible says, "Faith is the evidence of things not seen", which is an excellent definition, IMHO. It shows that faith is supposed to be in and of itself evidence that whatever the faith is placed in exists! I think that "belief without reason" is probably a good paraphrase of that sentiment. :)
Really? It's not hard to believe for some of us.
he had apparently not bothered to find out whether the existing bioweapons gave an advantage to the offense or defense.
But this implies that someone knows, or that he could have found out easily, if only he bothered to search the literature. Is this so, or do we need fundamental research on the question (i.e., what Merkle was calling for in the first place)? I would assume that the research needs doing, but I don't see any reason that it would be easier to do with biological molecular machinery than with artificial molecular machinery, especially since biological machinery will necessarily have all sorts of non-designed side effects. I just don't think it's as simple a question as you and Hemos appear to agree it is.
(Joy later asked Merkle 'Do you think biological weaponary gives an advantage to the offensive or defensive,' to which Merkle embarrassingly replied 'I'm not sure').
What? Why was this embarrassing? It does seem unclear whether biological machinery is inherently better at defense or offense, since there appear to be no perfect immune systems in nature, nor are there any microbes that invariably win against immune systems.
I was certainly under the impression before that the GPL granted each individual the rights to reproduce the covered material. This was the big question when Corel tried to violate the GPL by insisting that beta-testers were not really covered, wasn't it?
If you're looking for someone who's more ... straightforward than any of the usuals, try L. Neil Smith for Prez. His whole platform is Bill of Rights Enforcement.
--
What do you disagree with in there?
;)
[the ten commandments]
Uh...the first one? "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me"? (After Him is fine, though, apparently...is this confirmation that those other gods exist?
--