I explained to them why they were forcing people to pay money to see things on their web site by using proprietary formats and that I used Linux, a free and open source operating system which didn't work with Microsoft expensive proprietary formats.
1) read slashdot story on "Method and Apparatus for Spherical Planning"
2) patent "Method and Apparatus for Cubic Planning"
3) wait 16 years
4) profit!!!
It's so hard to have a discusison on religion and give your view clearly. You did a better job than many other people I've spoken to and a better job than I have to date.
I'm just saying that evidence points me towards believing that God is a fallacy. I'm also saying that with time we'll have more and more evidence that this is such. Of course religions will evolve as any memetic complex or real virus would(pardon my depreciatory use of the word virus but it's easier for me to explain myself with it).
I was Catholic for years. I served mass, was a member of my parish council for two years. I believed fervently but when one is faced with ideas of memetic complexes, evolution, historical accounts of the inquisition and the God of the Gaps fallacy I found it hard to keep holding on to my faith.
We used to have numerous polytheist religions with Gods for everything from thunder, the sun, oceans, forests, fertility, etc... With time people realized that small moments in life showed that there were incompatibilities and the story just didn't have enough convincing arguments for it anymore. Or perhaps they were just superseded by more believable religions (monotheist religions) which didn't provide as many God of the gaps fallacies.
It's evolution at it's best. Now the religions that work best in the world are the ones which don't wet themselves as much. They still look like evolutions from older religions. We still have people praying for things to happen just like we used to do sacrifices for the God of rain to pour down on the crops.
Sure the Catholic religion is evolving but when it comes down to it God isn't required anymore to explain things around us. We have the system of science to help us learn about our universe. Sure science cannot answer questions about life after death but why should we pick and choose from whichever religion is most convenient for us? Why not ask God for some help? Why didn't you choose Islam to answer your questions about life? Let me guess you were born in a Catholic family or Catholic community. You got infected by the memetic complex too.
I can't tell you what to believe but I read my Bible through and through, twice. I've also read Dawkins, Sagan and Hawkin amongst other books. Why don't you read a few of their books and ask God for help in your prayers. I know I prayed and it didn't help my faith.
Now I'm not here to convince you. This is merely to explain that a person can make a decision based on the evidence he collected even though he has no proof. To date by looking around at the universe we cannot get anything that proves the existence of God but by looking at the universe we can get evidence that religions infecting us with the God memetic complex are wrong in many aspects.
that book rocks. I'm in the middle of extended phenotype right now and I have to go to the glossary at the end all the time (biology classes are far away). I'd have to say that Selfish Gene was certainly more interesting though. It blew me away. Especially the last two or three chapters. Every chapter got better and better.
If you like that I think you'd enjoy something somewhat unrelated by Carl Sagan, Dragons of Eden. It's speculation on the evolution of human intelligence and you read it with a different eye once you read Selfish Gene!:)
how convenient this all is. The priest is willing to accept any lame excuse. How else would he value his work of preaching if he doesn't find ways to excuse the apparent fallacies of the Bible?
I find it annoying how so many agnostics feel superior because atheist and religious people believe something which they cannot prove. This in no way takes away from someone who is agnostic for the good reasons (it is reasonable with what he knows to not take any idea fully).
I for one am atheist. I am convinced that God is a fallacy. Sure I cannot disprove God's existence but then again I cannot prove to a 4 year old kid that there are no invisible spirits haunting his bedroom at night. However I have strong reasons to believe that God is a virus-like memetic complex. We've used God to explain the sun (it was his eye, in ancient egyptian mythology and in more recent Christian beliefs). We used Him to put ourselves at the center of the universe (error committed by christians, muslims and Jews). We've used Him to make ourselves more important than all other species (error commited especially by Jews and Christians, don't know about Moslems). Every single time God comes in to explain our great design and how wonderful we are and how loved and important we are. The evidence points to a universe that couldn't care less about us. When go from a believer to knowing more about the universe, evolution and science we realize that the universe couldn't care less about us and that good or bad are human constructs.
If I take into account all of that I have strong reasons to believe that God is a fallacy we cling on to because of our limits. When we cannot explain something we use God, when we don't want to face hard questions we use God. It is time we stop using Him.
Climbing Mount Improbable. He explains the eye, differences in eyes in different species (not only mammals) and shows that the evidence "out there" points us rather towards a no design or random design rather than a creationist view.
It's what made me go from agnostic to atheist. We just use the concept of God whenever we reach personal limits. Time and time again we use God to explain things and we're proven wrong. Me becoming an atheist came after seeing one too many arguments in favor of the God is a coping mecanism rather than truth.
if I used my computer for computing and my game console for gaming. My computer is used for writing emails, reading slashdot, programming and file sharing. I use Linux and with the money I don't spend on an OS I can actually buy a PS2 that doesn't require I stay up to date as often with my hardware.
The logic is that in Windows you can open an email, without even double clicking the attachement and your computer becomes a spam relay. At least in Linux you don't have such stupid mess. And my brother is certainly capable of installing a firewall in both Windows and Linux.
Anyways if you think that an anti-virus and a firewall is all you need in Windows think again. There are ample proofs that even when "well protected" the Windows system design flaws will make your computer complete hell.
I know that! What I'm asking though is how we could automate the process, keeping usernames and password for existing users. Automation is what a computer can do for us and the initial effort here is but a few easy scripts. Wouldn't you like it if you had 8 users on one machine not to have to *re*create the users and migrate manually their data? Sure you can have partitions but the new system doesn't have any idea who uid=102 is anymore.
There is a tutorial for moving your home on that matter. I used it before but I find that tedious. Imagine if you have 14 users on a workstation and you want to migrate all of them. A little automation could migrate all users in a few seconds. I think Ubuntu would be the distro to introduce such a feature.
I switch from distro to distro whenever I find one that is better than the current one. I just moved from Slackware (with dropline gnome) to Ubuntu because of the latest gnome and kernel. My brother is so impressed with Ubuntu that he's switching from Windows. Well he's also partly unimpressed with Windows security. He's currently backing everything up and the transfer of files and all is rather tedious. We thought of an idea to make the process faster and would like your opinion on it.
Would it be possible to have an Ubuntu install CD which checks a Windows or Linux installation, migrates its users/files and "converts" their system to Ubuntu? I realize there are some hurdles to overcome this in the Windows world but it seems feasible from one distro to the next. What do you think of the idea?
because they offer drivers for Linux. I'll have to admit though that if there were a truly "open" card out there that would allow me to play the games I play I'd go for whatever worked. I'm not religiously behind Nvidia.
Slashdot Mirror
I explained to them why they were forcing people to pay money to see things on their web site by using proprietary formats and that I used Linux, a free and open source operating system which didn't work with Microsoft expensive proprietary formats.
1) read slashdot story on "Method and Apparatus for Spherical Planning" 2) patent "Method and Apparatus for Cubic Planning" 3) wait 16 years 4) profit!!!
agreed. Bad habits linger on don't they? ;)
It's so hard to have a discusison on religion and give your view clearly. You did a better job than many other people I've spoken to and a better job than I have to date.
I'm just saying that evidence points me towards believing that God is a fallacy. I'm also saying that with time we'll have more and more evidence that this is such. Of course religions will evolve as any memetic complex or real virus would(pardon my depreciatory use of the word virus but it's easier for me to explain myself with it).
I was Catholic for years. I served mass, was a member of my parish council for two years. I believed fervently but when one is faced with ideas of memetic complexes, evolution, historical accounts of the inquisition and the God of the Gaps fallacy I found it hard to keep holding on to my faith.
We used to have numerous polytheist religions with Gods for everything from thunder, the sun, oceans, forests, fertility, etc... With time people realized that small moments in life showed that there were incompatibilities and the story just didn't have enough convincing arguments for it anymore. Or perhaps they were just superseded by more believable religions (monotheist religions) which didn't provide as many God of the gaps fallacies.
It's evolution at it's best. Now the religions that work best in the world are the ones which don't wet themselves as much. They still look like evolutions from older religions. We still have people praying for things to happen just like we used to do sacrifices for the God of rain to pour down on the crops.
Sure the Catholic religion is evolving but when it comes down to it God isn't required anymore to explain things around us. We have the system of science to help us learn about our universe. Sure science cannot answer questions about life after death but why should we pick and choose from whichever religion is most convenient for us? Why not ask God for some help? Why didn't you choose Islam to answer your questions about life? Let me guess you were born in a Catholic family or Catholic community. You got infected by the memetic complex too.
I can't tell you what to believe but I read my Bible through and through, twice. I've also read Dawkins, Sagan and Hawkin amongst other books. Why don't you read a few of their books and ask God for help in your prayers. I know I prayed and it didn't help my faith.
Now I'm not here to convince you. This is merely to explain that a person can make a decision based on the evidence he collected even though he has no proof. To date by looking around at the universe we cannot get anything that proves the existence of God but by looking at the universe we can get evidence that religions infecting us with the God memetic complex are wrong in many aspects.
I can't vote (not a US citizen) but basing your idea solely on the purported "fact" that Bin Laden supports Kerry you may shoot yourself in the foot.
If you like that I think you'd enjoy something somewhat unrelated by Carl Sagan, Dragons of Eden. It's speculation on the evolution of human intelligence and you read it with a different eye once you read Selfish Gene! :)
how convenient this all is. The priest is willing to accept any lame excuse. How else would he value his work of preaching if he doesn't find ways to excuse the apparent fallacies of the Bible?
I for one am atheist. I am convinced that God is a fallacy. Sure I cannot disprove God's existence but then again I cannot prove to a 4 year old kid that there are no invisible spirits haunting his bedroom at night. However I have strong reasons to believe that God is a virus-like memetic complex. We've used God to explain the sun (it was his eye, in ancient egyptian mythology and in more recent Christian beliefs). We used Him to put ourselves at the center of the universe (error committed by christians, muslims and Jews). We've used Him to make ourselves more important than all other species (error commited especially by Jews and Christians, don't know about Moslems). Every single time God comes in to explain our great design and how wonderful we are and how loved and important we are. The evidence points to a universe that couldn't care less about us. When go from a believer to knowing more about the universe, evolution and science we realize that the universe couldn't care less about us and that good or bad are human constructs.
If I take into account all of that I have strong reasons to believe that God is a fallacy we cling on to because of our limits. When we cannot explain something we use God, when we don't want to face hard questions we use God. It is time we stop using Him.
It's what made me go from agnostic to atheist. We just use the concept of God whenever we reach personal limits. Time and time again we use God to explain things and we're proven wrong. Me becoming an atheist came after seeing one too many arguments in favor of the God is a coping mecanism rather than truth.
if I used my computer for computing and my game console for gaming. My computer is used for writing emails, reading slashdot, programming and file sharing. I use Linux and with the money I don't spend on an OS I can actually buy a PS2 that doesn't require I stay up to date as often with my hardware.
in the latest version. It comes right before "nucular".
if it is linux wouldn't be too hard for anyone to modify the source code would it?
that's because 10% + 90% = 100%!!! Why settle for just 90% if you can take 100%!!!
Anyways if you think that an anti-virus and a firewall is all you need in Windows think again. There are ample proofs that even when "well protected" the Windows system design flaws will make your computer complete hell.
I know that! What I'm asking though is how we could automate the process, keeping usernames and password for existing users. Automation is what a computer can do for us and the initial effort here is but a few easy scripts. Wouldn't you like it if you had 8 users on one machine not to have to *re*create the users and migrate manually their data? Sure you can have partitions but the new system doesn't have any idea who uid=102 is anymore.
There is a tutorial for moving your home on that matter. I used it before but I find that tedious. Imagine if you have 14 users on a workstation and you want to migrate all of them. A little automation could migrate all users in a few seconds. I think Ubuntu would be the distro to introduce such a feature.
Would it be possible to have an Ubuntu install CD which checks a Windows or Linux installation, migrates its users/files and "converts" their system to Ubuntu? I realize there are some hurdles to overcome this in the Windows world but it seems feasible from one distro to the next. What do you think of the idea?
Thanks in advance.
there is a typo, that's gtacgtacttga not gtatcgagttag
voters who choose Bush are wackos. Voters who choose Kerry and less so.
Imagine having to pay such a fee for your house! :)
because they offer drivers for Linux. I'll have to admit though that if there were a truly "open" card out there that would allow me to play the games I play I'd go for whatever worked. I'm not religiously behind Nvidia.
ok so I guess you are right. It's two clicks away though.
Two IBM's BlueGene/L.
Ubuntu fits on a single CD. Fedora needs 4 (well maybe only 3).
Ubuntu plays MP3s out of the box. Fedora doesn't.
Ubuntu is closely timed to match Gnome releases. Fedora isn't.
I guess there are a few differences. Of course none of these take away from Fedora.