I can answer that question. My belief, even though it is not even theoretically possible to prove a negative, that there is no such thing as magic. By this, I mean that effect flows from cause by natural laws in every case. Sure, maybe some effects result from magic, but I believe that they do not.
Another way of saying the same thing, already said by another person who has responded, is that we naturalists start out epistemologically believing in nothing, then build up beliefs in things that can be demonstrated.
And that's the answer! I don't believe in the God described by most people, because most people describe a magical God, and I believe that there is no such thing as magic. On the other hand, I enjoy very much discussing the ways that there could be a 'god' which is non-magical -- and there are many such ways.
I agree with you, I just don't see it as the problem that you do. Do you think that all applications should be recompiled and rigorously re-tested when Apple updates OS X from 10.6.01 to 10.6.02? I don't think very many people do that. The platform generally comes with an implicit promise of general stability. If you don't trust the promise, that's fine, but I don't think it's reasonable for people to pretend that tomorrow's nightly build is going to be completely different and break everything versus today's nightly build.
I'm not an FF dev, but I bet they are hoping to strike a contract with the webpage makers of the world. The name of the contract would be "HTML Specification 4.01", and maybe eventually 5.0.
Because, you know, I also didn't rigorously test my C code when the most recent point release of the gcc came out. Some people do, but most of us don't. Heck, did you know that some people don't even bother to recompile their applications when they do an apt-get upgrade? Golly, how does any software ever work.
You think that browsers are all magically going to be standards-compliant just because version numbers are removed?
No, he said all (many, whatever) web pages will magically be standards-compliant, instead of browser-compliant. Don't accuse him of exactly the opposite of what he said.
First, "God" is undefinable. Nobody agrees on what it is, so we don't need to argue about whether it exists, because we can't even agree on what it would mean for it to exist.
Second, the existence of some kind of "God" is a very, very minor superstition. Although it sort of seems like the greatest superstition of all, it's really not, for the reason above: if we can't say anything about God, then it's hardly much of a superstition.
Third, almost everybody who goes on and on about "you can't disprove God" is actually also defending a whole set of other beliefs, but uses the "God" thing as a feint, a cover, because it's not actually tenable to defend those other beliefs. It is those beliefs which are the "level of superstition" to which I object. Any act of a God which affects the natural world is within the realm of science: if it affects matter or uses a force or results in any physical detectable change to the universe, then science can measure it. Do you believe in a God which affects anything in the universe? If so, I say that is an untenable claim, both from a scientific perspective as well as a philosophical perspective.
So, blah blah blah, I don't know what "your religion" is, so I can't say whether science has invalidated it. But I can assert that science has invalided every religion I have ever heard of, and every religion which has any dogmatic claims whatsoever. If your religion is one of those, then it is invalidated by science. If it's not, then your religious beliefs are so miniscule that they wouldn't rise above the "level of superstition" to which I object.
Agreed. Nobody ever prayed their way to the surface of the moon. I'm baffled that the world is still dealing with this level of superstition. HELLO, PEOPLE? WE'VE BEEN SHOWING YOU SCIENCE FOR LIKE THREE HUNDRED YEARS NOW! GET WITH THE PROGRAM! Sheesh.
I blame the science reporters. If I hear the word "God particle" one more time I'm going to march into the New York Times building and (figuratively) firebomb their science department.
Yeah, science is done in the open... in science journals. Sorry, I'm not going to read science journals to learn about science any more than I'm going to read the proceedings of the CFR to learn about foreign policy. Luckily, the world now has science blogs, which do a good job of reporting science. There are a lot of them, though, so it's hard to keep up.
I also recommend podcasts. I used to listen to TWIS, but honestly I didn't like the personalities. I enjoy the following, in enjoyment-order:
The Skeptics Guide to the Universe RadioLab Skeptoid Astronomy Cast 60 Second Science 60 Second Mind NOVA Science Now QuackCast Science Friday Podcast Nature Podcast Planetary Radio The Naked Scientist
I listen to a shit-ton of podcasts, because it fits my lifestyle. I listen on the way to work, on the way home, during work, while taking walks, while riding my bike, while building stuff (hobbies), while doing yardword. I just love radio programs, without the radio commercials. I hope podcasts start offering a freemium model, where I can pay a nominal amount to get rid of the ads. How much is each podcast ad impression worth? A few cents? I'll double that!
Yes, jests are fun. But seriously, it would depend on how many decimal places before you agree to round up to "swept out". I think most people would be willing to round up in this case, but not in Pluto's.
Right. It's not clear to me how much home schooling is done by crazypants woo-woo parents, and how much is done by super-intellectual parents. Does anyone have a statistic?
I disagree. I think public schools are mostly fine. I'll start believing that public schools are 'dreadful' when I see big systemic failures in school districts with stable affluent families. The problems are brought into schools by students, from outside, from society, and those problems wouldn't be solved by privatizing schools. The only difference private schools would make, would be to loosen the standards for student education, just as the GP said. Some people very much want those looser standards (for instance in order to teach creationism), which is a valid political position, but they should be up front about it.
Hmmm. Perhaps one of the most important "needs" is "low cost". This is government, after all, and Americans have spoken clearly that they want SMALL GOVERNMENT. Well, this is the kind of crime enforcement computer system you get with small government. This is the very end result of voting for fiscal conservatives, who are just trying to maximize tax dollars. So not everyone can afford a system that will pay off in the long run, some of them have to do what the voters told them to do.
Does Android compete with Apple. (No, if you want an iPhone you're not going to buy an Android phone and vice versa.)
Whoa. That is an amazingly narrow definition of "compete". So, if Android doesn't compete with Apple's iOS, could you give an example of what Android does compete with?
Of course piracy and looting are "free market". You should enter into a private contract with pirates if you don't want them to loot your stuff. Alternately, as a private citizen you can hire a private police force to enforce your property claims. Having a state-run police force is socialism -- yes, literally: as government employees that is socialized police work.
If you want to claim that taxes can be ultra-low without lawlessness, then provide examples. I can't think of a place which has both small government and prevailing peace and prosperity. Because I am a man of evidence, I have come through experience to reject the claims of libertarians/free marketers/tea partiers. I just don't think the claims reflect reality, but I'm ready for the slew of examples you're going to bury me in.
Or, we could do it backwards. Name all the best places in the world, and then let's talk about the taxes in those places. Bonus points if you have actually put your money where your mouth is, and moved to one of those places. Extra bonus points if you can prove how awesome low taxes are by showing mass human migration to those places.
Fair enough. Although that definition doesn't seem to jibe with my understanding of the AT&T or Windows monopoly cases, because neither had "the exclusive power to carry on a particular business or trade". Maybe the courts rely more on this part of the definition: "In a monopoly, one or more persons or companies totally dominates an economic market".
Facebook might not have "the exclusive power to carry on the particular business of social networking", but it does "totally dominate the economic market of social networking".
I still think a lawyer would have to comment, to clear up the confusion.
It occurs to me that Somalia would be a utopian paradise for "free market" types of people. Do you think taxes should be ultra-low? Do you want "small government" because you think government always screws things up? Want unfettered access to all varieties of weapons? Believe that two private individuals should be able to enter into *any* contract whatsoever?
Spinning-disk hard drives are still with us. Random-access memory is still with us. Keyboards are still with us. UNIX is still with us. Hierarchical filesystems are still with us.
When I called to cancel my basic cable, they offered to drop my price to $5 per month for basic cable, on top of what I pay for cable internet. I declined: basic cable isn't worth $5 per month.
Netflix is worth much, much more than basic cable. Let's say basic cable is worth, oh, one cent per day -- 30c per month. Let's say Netflix is worth, uh, like 40x that much -- $12 per month. That's probably about right for me; that's about my market price. So, Netflix used to be a bargain ($10 per month for $12 of value) whereas now it's not "worth it" ($16 per month for $12 value).
I'm not indignant. I'm not angry. I'm a little disappointed because I like Netflix, and it's always been a good deal. But now it's not a good deal anymore, so I just won't buy it anymore. I think for most people, Netflix is worth more than $16 per month, so they'll stick with it. That's fine.
Slashdot Mirror
I can answer that question. My belief, even though it is not even theoretically possible to prove a negative, that there is no such thing as magic. By this, I mean that effect flows from cause by natural laws in every case. Sure, maybe some effects result from magic, but I believe that they do not.
Another way of saying the same thing, already said by another person who has responded, is that we naturalists start out epistemologically believing in nothing, then build up beliefs in things that can be demonstrated.
And that's the answer! I don't believe in the God described by most people, because most people describe a magical God, and I believe that there is no such thing as magic. On the other hand, I enjoy very much discussing the ways that there could be a 'god' which is non-magical -- and there are many such ways.
I agree with you, I just don't see it as the problem that you do. Do you think that all applications should be recompiled and rigorously re-tested when Apple updates OS X from 10.6.01 to 10.6.02? I don't think very many people do that. The platform generally comes with an implicit promise of general stability. If you don't trust the promise, that's fine, but I don't think it's reasonable for people to pretend that tomorrow's nightly build is going to be completely different and break everything versus today's nightly build.
I'm not an FF dev, but I bet they are hoping to strike a contract with the webpage makers of the world. The name of the contract would be "HTML Specification 4.01", and maybe eventually 5.0.
Because, you know, I also didn't rigorously test my C code when the most recent point release of the gcc came out. Some people do, but most of us don't. Heck, did you know that some people don't even bother to recompile their applications when they do an apt-get upgrade? Golly, how does any software ever work.
The FF team disagrees. They think the bigger problem is with enterprises stagnating on antique browsers.
You think that browsers are all magically going to be standards-compliant just because version numbers are removed?
No, he said all (many, whatever) web pages will magically be standards-compliant, instead of browser-compliant. Don't accuse him of exactly the opposite of what he said.
A couple thoughts:
First, "God" is undefinable. Nobody agrees on what it is, so we don't need to argue about whether it exists, because we can't even agree on what it would mean for it to exist.
Second, the existence of some kind of "God" is a very, very minor superstition. Although it sort of seems like the greatest superstition of all, it's really not, for the reason above: if we can't say anything about God, then it's hardly much of a superstition.
Third, almost everybody who goes on and on about "you can't disprove God" is actually also defending a whole set of other beliefs, but uses the "God" thing as a feint, a cover, because it's not actually tenable to defend those other beliefs. It is those beliefs which are the "level of superstition" to which I object. Any act of a God which affects the natural world is within the realm of science: if it affects matter or uses a force or results in any physical detectable change to the universe, then science can measure it. Do you believe in a God which affects anything in the universe? If so, I say that is an untenable claim, both from a scientific perspective as well as a philosophical perspective.
So, blah blah blah, I don't know what "your religion" is, so I can't say whether science has invalidated it. But I can assert that science has invalided every religion I have ever heard of, and every religion which has any dogmatic claims whatsoever. If your religion is one of those, then it is invalidated by science. If it's not, then your religious beliefs are so miniscule that they wouldn't rise above the "level of superstition" to which I object.
You can use science to find out stuff.
Agreed. Nobody ever prayed their way to the surface of the moon. I'm baffled that the world is still dealing with this level of superstition. HELLO, PEOPLE? WE'VE BEEN SHOWING YOU SCIENCE FOR LIKE THREE HUNDRED YEARS NOW! GET WITH THE PROGRAM! Sheesh.
I blame the science reporters. If I hear the word "God particle" one more time I'm going to march into the New York Times building and (figuratively) firebomb their science department.
Yeah, science is done in the open... in science journals. Sorry, I'm not going to read science journals to learn about science any more than I'm going to read the proceedings of the CFR to learn about foreign policy. Luckily, the world now has science blogs, which do a good job of reporting science. There are a lot of them, though, so it's hard to keep up.
I also recommend podcasts. I used to listen to TWIS, but honestly I didn't like the personalities. I enjoy the following, in enjoyment-order:
The Skeptics Guide to the Universe
RadioLab
Skeptoid
Astronomy Cast
60 Second Science
60 Second Mind
NOVA Science Now
QuackCast
Science Friday Podcast
Nature Podcast
Planetary Radio
The Naked Scientist
I listen to a shit-ton of podcasts, because it fits my lifestyle. I listen on the way to work, on the way home, during work, while taking walks, while riding my bike, while building stuff (hobbies), while doing yardword. I just love radio programs, without the radio commercials. I hope podcasts start offering a freemium model, where I can pay a nominal amount to get rid of the ads. How much is each podcast ad impression worth? A few cents? I'll double that!
Yes, jests are fun. But seriously, it would depend on how many decimal places before you agree to round up to "swept out". I think most people would be willing to round up in this case, but not in Pluto's.
Of course creationism is falsifiable. God would simply have to come down and say "No, I didn't create you, you all evolved." See? Falsifiable.
Right. It's not clear to me how much home schooling is done by crazypants woo-woo parents, and how much is done by super-intellectual parents. Does anyone have a statistic?
I disagree. I think public schools are mostly fine. I'll start believing that public schools are 'dreadful' when I see big systemic failures in school districts with stable affluent families. The problems are brought into schools by students, from outside, from society, and those problems wouldn't be solved by privatizing schools. The only difference private schools would make, would be to loosen the standards for student education, just as the GP said. Some people very much want those looser standards (for instance in order to teach creationism), which is a valid political position, but they should be up front about it.
"System Settings" is a better name. This is obvious. The complaint is void.
Probably because it doesn't fit their needs as described in the question.
Hmmm. Perhaps one of the most important "needs" is "low cost". This is government, after all, and Americans have spoken clearly that they want SMALL GOVERNMENT. Well, this is the kind of crime enforcement computer system you get with small government. This is the very end result of voting for fiscal conservatives, who are just trying to maximize tax dollars. So not everyone can afford a system that will pay off in the long run, some of them have to do what the voters told them to do.
Does Android compete with Apple. (No, if you want an iPhone you're not going to buy an Android phone and vice versa.)
Whoa. That is an amazingly narrow definition of "compete". So, if Android doesn't compete with Apple's iOS, could you give an example of what Android does compete with?
Of course piracy and looting are "free market". You should enter into a private contract with pirates if you don't want them to loot your stuff. Alternately, as a private citizen you can hire a private police force to enforce your property claims. Having a state-run police force is socialism -- yes, literally: as government employees that is socialized police work.
If you want to claim that taxes can be ultra-low without lawlessness, then provide examples. I can't think of a place which has both small government and prevailing peace and prosperity. Because I am a man of evidence, I have come through experience to reject the claims of libertarians/free marketers/tea partiers. I just don't think the claims reflect reality, but I'm ready for the slew of examples you're going to bury me in.
Or, we could do it backwards. Name all the best places in the world, and then let's talk about the taxes in those places. Bonus points if you have actually put your money where your mouth is, and moved to one of those places. Extra bonus points if you can prove how awesome low taxes are by showing mass human migration to those places.
Fair enough. Although that definition doesn't seem to jibe with my understanding of the AT&T or Windows monopoly cases, because neither had "the exclusive power to carry on a particular business or trade". Maybe the courts rely more on this part of the definition: "In a monopoly, one or more persons or companies totally dominates an economic market".
Facebook might not have "the exclusive power to carry on the particular business of social networking", but it does "totally dominate the economic market of social networking".
I still think a lawyer would have to comment, to clear up the confusion.
I don't think that's the legal definition of 'monopoly'. But I'm not a lawyer, are you?
Pfft. Yeah, but saying Facebook acts unethical isn't a news story. That hasn't been news since Zuck was in college.
I see adverts for satellite TV on cable TV.
It occurs to me that Somalia would be a utopian paradise for "free market" types of people. Do you think taxes should be ultra-low? Do you want "small government" because you think government always screws things up? Want unfettered access to all varieties of weapons? Believe that two private individuals should be able to enter into *any* contract whatsoever?
Somalia is the place for you! (Link actually jokes about Darfur and Minnesota.)
Only people who want big government supported by high taxes should stay in HELLHOLES like the completely backward United States of America.
The answer is even easier than that.
Spinning-disk hard drives are still with us.
Random-access memory is still with us.
Keyboards are still with us.
UNIX is still with us.
Hierarchical filesystems are still with us.
Indeed.
I don't have cable, either, because of the price.
When I called to cancel my basic cable, they offered to drop my price to $5 per month for basic cable, on top of what I pay for cable internet. I declined: basic cable isn't worth $5 per month.
Netflix is worth much, much more than basic cable. Let's say basic cable is worth, oh, one cent per day -- 30c per month. Let's say Netflix is worth, uh, like 40x that much -- $12 per month. That's probably about right for me; that's about my market price. So, Netflix used to be a bargain ($10 per month for $12 of value) whereas now it's not "worth it" ($16 per month for $12 value).
I'm not indignant. I'm not angry. I'm a little disappointed because I like Netflix, and it's always been a good deal. But now it's not a good deal anymore, so I just won't buy it anymore. I think for most people, Netflix is worth more than $16 per month, so they'll stick with it. That's fine.