No, Ogg Vorbis not technically superior. ...
MP3 uses only integers, and so is ideal for portable, battery-saving systems.
Ogg Vorbis is not a power-saving technology, weight-saving measure, or air freshener, so it shouldn't be a surprise if it doesn't help out in those areas. It's an audio compression scheme, and it compresses audio better than MP3, which is exactly what it was designed to do.
So go ahead and keep your "it's OSS/Underdog/Nerdy so I have to have a completely impractical product requirement" attidue, the rest of us will get a life, and a decent digital audio player.
Care to explain what's 'impractical' about the Ogg Vorbis requirement? Plenty of players can handle Vorbis; it's only crappy ones that can't. Apparently, it's not only practical, but it makes economic sense to include it.
Meanwhile, I've spent a comparatively small amount of money on a player with more features and capacity than I'd ever need.
Why do you believe all scientists should approach everything scientifically (all the time)? Please state from a priori beliefs how you came to achieve this belief.
Because physics doesn't care that people divide their lives into personal and professional time. If it's not logical to believe in a god while at work, then it's still not logical when you get home at night. Physics hasn't changed.
The foundation of science is consistency, so very inconsistent people shouldn't be trying to do science.
You're quite right. I can't hear the difference, and I really don't care. I'm not a sound engineer, but I am an engineer. I care about quality and good design, which Vorbis represents.
Or, as a sane alternative, you could keep carrying a cell phone and just forget about the possibility that someone might spy on you because chances are very, very good that you're not important enough for this to happen. Even if it did, it's still possible to track a person's movements and listen to their conversations when they don't own a cell phone.
Ogg Vorbis is technically superior to MP3, so if I have a choice (and I often do), I'll take a Vorbis. I therefore am not interested in any player that doesn't play it.
I think most religious scientists probably believe in a creator who does not interfere in the everyday running of the universe. I can't speak for others though.
I think this is the crux of the problem. There is exactly as much evidence for a creator that doesn't interfere as there is for a creator who gleefully and mischievously interferes. (Interestingly, the amount of evidence for either case is zero.)
When scientists choose to pick the (much more convenient) non-interfering creator to believe in, they're again being unscientific. Actually, why would they even have hypothesized a non-interfering creator in the first place? Sounds to me like they're just carefully sculpting their fantasies such that they don't inadvertently undermine their own life's work.
Not only does science not say whether god(s) exist or not, but science can never say whether god(s) exist. That piece of information has been defined as being unknowable.
Science does not say whether god(s) exist or not. That is ok, just like biology does not say whether heavy objects fall faster or not.
Interesting analogy, but it doesn't quite apply here. Biology has been carefully designed to be the framework through which biology-related information can be discovered. Science, however, has been carefully designed to be the framework through which anything knowable can be discovered.
A completely undetectable supreme being is fundamentally equivalent to no supreme being at all. So why aren't "scientists" all atheists? After all, when the existence of an omnipotent being is thought possible, then there's no point in doing science. How do you know that the outcome of scientific experiments isn't being manipulated by something outside the realm of physics?
In summary: If you are willing to hold a belief that allows physics to behave inconsistently (or at least appear that way to humans), stop doing science immediately. You have already acknowledged that your universe is not deterministic, and thus things are not knowable.
You idiot. Lots of respected physicists and scientists of other disciplines believe in God.
Actually, you're the idiot. I don't care whether people declare themselves to be scientists -- if they're not willing to be scientific, they're not scientists. You can't just be a scientist most of the time, or just when you feel like it. Science means consistency.
Believing in god(s) is not scientific. If it was, there would be a way to scientifically confirm or disconfirm the existence of god(s). As it is, there is no way to do so because god(s) have been defined to be undetectable.
Now if you ask an ID person to give him a hypothetical situation to falsify his claim, are you prepared to give an example to falsify the believe - determinism - on which you build your scientific hypothesis? If yes, can you too, please give this example?
I wouldn't have to. Without determinism, nothing can be known, so the whole issue is moot. All human experience so far indicates that things can be known.
With an omnipotent supreme being in the mix, nothing can be absolutely proven or falsified. This is why a belief in a supreme being (or any actions of this supposed being) is fundamentally worthless.
I'm a physicist and I believe in God. I believe that God created the world with the evolution, etc so that there would be a man in this world. I require no proof for that and neither do I expect science to provide me with any. In fact, I'd look very suspiciously at anyone pretending to have such "proof". It's my religion, not my science.
Good thing you didn't describe yourself as a "scientist", because your philosophy of belief is not scientific. I dare say that describing yourself as a physicist is already pretty shameful.
You're all right. This won't only be used on/against terrorists. Innocent people will be negatively affected by legislation such as this.
But holy shit -- what did you expect? People do have too much freedom. Every day, countless innocent people die because somebody else didn't have enough judgement to know where their own liberties stop and the rights of others begin.
Driving irresponsibly, driving under the influence of alcohol/drugs, gang violence in neighborhoods, terrorism, etc. -- right now, society basically tolerates these things.
Of course, you could argue that the PATRIOT act is poorly written and won't actually do anything to help. (That's probably true, but that's an implementation issue and not a theoretical issue.) No one should really be surprised that it exists.
The correct quesions are: Why are we being forced to spend our money on a TV or a set-top box?
You're not being forced to do anything. If you want to view broadcast TV (which is completely free), you need to have the hardware appropriate to the infrastructure. We're changing the infrastructure because:
(a) long-distance analog signal transmission is a terrible, terrible idea, and
(b) we have a finite amount of useful space in the RF spectrum.
The problems that you point out sound like a teacher failing to use the massive potential of computers correctly, and not any shortcoming of computers themselves as a learning tool.
You're just plain wrong. Just because mainstream society and most people don't know how to use their minds instead of being used by them, doesn't mean that the brain isn't capable of these things. In fact, we know it is, people do it all the time.
No, I'm definitely right. No matter how clever your method for doing mental math, computers are many orders of magnitude faster and always will be. The quickest-thinking human brain is embarassingly slow at math even compared to a handheld calculator powered by a Z80 or 68000.
"Get computers out of schools completely"? Is this a joke? Before too long, it'll be uncommon to find a person who isn't wearing several computers interwoven with the fibers in his clothes, and you want to remove them from schools?
Human brains are very, very poor at doing arithmetic and remembering lots of stuff. Fortunately, computers are excellent at these things, so computers are what will be doing that sort of stuff from now on, like it or not.
If your complaint is that computers aren't being used as effectively as they could be, that's a different point. Teachers need to be aware of the capabilities of various software packages (and of the Internet), and intelligently incorporate that into their lesson plan.
Not only have supreme beings not been detected yet, they are defined as being undetectable.* This is a very important difference. The very definition totally precludes the possibility of verification. Saying "show evidence to support the existence of the undetectable" is logically equivalent to saying "prove that false is true". This is why I say that the situation we have here is (or is equivalent to) no god existing.
* I'm sure you can find some gods in some religions that aren't omnipotent (and therefore might not be able to change the outcome of any test you perform to detect their presence), but these are generally smaller, less popular religions that don't have to stand up to much logical scrutiny and therefore don't have the same "god-works-in-mysterious-ways" defense mechanism. Religions work much like organisms: they either need to build up a resistance to logic or they will go extinct. Logic is the antibiotic to the bacterial disease of religion.
I would say that a religious discussion goes along with quantifying atheism's value to the world, but have it your way.
The thing is that atheism has done nothing to reform humanity, bring civility or peace, or elevate morality or solve anything.
Maybe you're right. Maybe atheism has done nothing to quiet political ills or reduce violence. I guess being atheist is only something to be passionate about if you value absolute truth and knowledge above insignificant human matters.
Also, no you are wrong; there are plenty of options in science, and everything isn't a fact. If it were, we wouldn't have to research and apply the scientific method looking for truth, as we'd just know everything. Science is our understanding of the world around us, not the power to define reality.
Science has hypotheses, but hypotheses are much more than just opinions. There's usually some evidence involved that prompts a person to form a hypothesis in the first place.
As much as I can't stand religious nuts, I have to say that atheists are nearly as fucking annoying in their fundamentalist, narrow, ignorant and arrogant view of the world.
Fundamentalist? I guess you could say that, even though it's a loaded word.
Narrow? Definitely. Simple is good.
Arrogant? Usually, and with good reason.
Ignorant? No. The views of atheists would only be ignorant if the available evidence pointed to a more likely explanation, which is doesn't. At best, a completely undetectable god exists, which is exactly equivalent to no god at all.
This discussion is going nowhere and I don't think I'll be replying again.
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No, Ogg Vorbis not technically superior.
...
MP3 uses only integers, and so is ideal for portable, battery-saving systems.
Ogg Vorbis is not a power-saving technology, weight-saving measure, or air freshener, so it shouldn't be a surprise if it doesn't help out in those areas. It's an audio compression scheme, and it compresses audio better than MP3, which is exactly what it was designed to do.
So go ahead and keep your "it's OSS/Underdog/Nerdy so I have to have a completely impractical product requirement" attidue, the rest of us will get a life, and a decent digital audio player.
Care to explain what's 'impractical' about the Ogg Vorbis requirement? Plenty of players can handle Vorbis; it's only crappy ones that can't. Apparently, it's not only practical, but it makes economic sense to include it.
Meanwhile, I've spent a comparatively small amount of money on a player with more features and capacity than I'd ever need.
Why do you believe all scientists should approach everything scientifically (all the time)? Please state from a priori beliefs how you came to achieve this belief.
Because physics doesn't care that people divide their lives into personal and professional time. If it's not logical to believe in a god while at work, then it's still not logical when you get home at night. Physics hasn't changed.
The foundation of science is consistency, so very inconsistent people shouldn't be trying to do science.
You're quite right. I can't hear the difference, and I really don't care. I'm not a sound engineer, but I am an engineer. I care about quality and good design, which Vorbis represents.
Or, as a sane alternative, you could keep carrying a cell phone and just forget about the possibility that someone might spy on you because chances are very, very good that you're not important enough for this to happen. Even if it did, it's still possible to track a person's movements and listen to their conversations when they don't own a cell phone.
If you posted on /. that spammers should die, I guess you can now consider yourself a suspect.
Yes, in the same sort of way that everyone who owns a car is a suspect in a hit-and-run.
Ogg Vorbis is technically superior to MP3, so if I have a choice (and I often do), I'll take a Vorbis. I therefore am not interested in any player that doesn't play it.
It's terrible that something like that would happen. ... it isn't moral.
Disagree.
I think most religious scientists probably believe in a creator who does not interfere in the everyday running of the universe. I can't speak for others though.
I think this is the crux of the problem. There is exactly as much evidence for a creator that doesn't interfere as there is for a creator who gleefully and mischievously interferes. (Interestingly, the amount of evidence for either case is zero.)
When scientists choose to pick the (much more convenient) non-interfering creator to believe in, they're again being unscientific. Actually, why would they even have hypothesized a non-interfering creator in the first place? Sounds to me like they're just carefully sculpting their fantasies such that they don't inadvertently undermine their own life's work.
Science does not say whether god(s) exist or not.
Not only does science not say whether god(s) exist or not, but science can never say whether god(s) exist. That piece of information has been defined as being unknowable.
Science does not say whether god(s) exist or not. That is ok, just like biology does not say whether heavy objects fall faster or not.
Interesting analogy, but it doesn't quite apply here. Biology has been carefully designed to be the framework through which biology-related information can be discovered. Science, however, has been carefully designed to be the framework through which anything knowable can be discovered.
A completely undetectable supreme being is fundamentally equivalent to no supreme being at all. So why aren't "scientists" all atheists? After all, when the existence of an omnipotent being is thought possible, then there's no point in doing science. How do you know that the outcome of scientific experiments isn't being manipulated by something outside the realm of physics?
In summary: If you are willing to hold a belief that allows physics to behave inconsistently (or at least appear that way to humans), stop doing science immediately. You have already acknowledged that your universe is not deterministic, and thus things are not knowable.
You idiot. Lots of respected physicists and scientists of other disciplines believe in God.
Actually, you're the idiot. I don't care whether people declare themselves to be scientists -- if they're not willing to be scientific, they're not scientists. You can't just be a scientist most of the time, or just when you feel like it. Science means consistency.
Believing in god(s) is not scientific. If it was, there would be a way to scientifically confirm or disconfirm the existence of god(s). As it is, there is no way to do so because god(s) have been defined to be undetectable.
Now if you ask an ID person to give him a hypothetical situation to falsify his claim, are you prepared to give an example to falsify the believe - determinism - on which you build your scientific hypothesis? If yes, can you too, please give this example?
I wouldn't have to. Without determinism, nothing can be known, so the whole issue is moot. All human experience so far indicates that things can be known.
With an omnipotent supreme being in the mix, nothing can be absolutely proven or falsified. This is why a belief in a supreme being (or any actions of this supposed being) is fundamentally worthless.
I'm a physicist and I believe in God. I believe that God created the world with the evolution, etc so that there would be a man in this world. I require no proof for that and neither do I expect science to provide me with any. In fact, I'd look very suspiciously at anyone pretending to have such "proof". It's my religion, not my science.
Good thing you didn't describe yourself as a "scientist", because your philosophy of belief is not scientific. I dare say that describing yourself as a physicist is already pretty shameful.
GTA is, with or without sexual content, utterly inapproriate for a 12 year old.
No, GTA is only inappropriate for kids that lack responsible parents.
You're all right. This won't only be used on/against terrorists. Innocent people will be negatively affected by legislation such as this.
But holy shit -- what did you expect? People do have too much freedom. Every day, countless innocent people die because somebody else didn't have enough judgement to know where their own liberties stop and the rights of others begin.
Driving irresponsibly, driving under the influence of alcohol/drugs, gang violence in neighborhoods, terrorism, etc. -- right now, society basically tolerates these things.
Of course, you could argue that the PATRIOT act is poorly written and won't actually do anything to help. (That's probably true, but that's an implementation issue and not a theoretical issue.) No one should really be surprised that it exists.
Maybe by "morons", the GP poster meant "people who happily pay big money for an OS, the core of which is free."
pla: Thank you! Someone else understands.
Mod parent through the roof!
I wasn't being too serious. I don't much care for politics.
The correct quesions are: Why are we being forced to spend our money on a TV or a set-top box?
You're not being forced to do anything. If you want to view broadcast TV (which is completely free), you need to have the hardware appropriate to the infrastructure. We're changing the infrastructure because:
(a) long-distance analog signal transmission is a terrible, terrible idea, and
(b) we have a finite amount of useful space in the RF spectrum.
Um.... can you mention one thing that nobody pays for, yet everyone gets?
The pipe dreams of whiny liberals?
The problems that you point out sound like a teacher failing to use the massive potential of computers correctly, and not any shortcoming of computers themselves as a learning tool.
You're just plain wrong. Just because mainstream society and most people don't know how to use their minds instead of being used by them, doesn't mean that the brain isn't capable of these things. In fact, we know it is, people do it all the time.
No, I'm definitely right. No matter how clever your method for doing mental math, computers are many orders of magnitude faster and always will be. The quickest-thinking human brain is embarassingly slow at math even compared to a handheld calculator powered by a Z80 or 68000.
"Get computers out of schools completely"? Is this a joke? Before too long, it'll be uncommon to find a person who isn't wearing several computers interwoven with the fibers in his clothes, and you want to remove them from schools?
Human brains are very, very poor at doing arithmetic and remembering lots of stuff. Fortunately, computers are excellent at these things, so computers are what will be doing that sort of stuff from now on, like it or not.
If your complaint is that computers aren't being used as effectively as they could be, that's a different point. Teachers need to be aware of the capabilities of various software packages (and of the Internet), and intelligently incorporate that into their lesson plan.
(Ok, I lied. Here's a reply.)
Not only have supreme beings not been detected yet, they are defined as being undetectable.* This is a very important difference. The very definition totally precludes the possibility of verification. Saying "show evidence to support the existence of the undetectable" is logically equivalent to saying "prove that false is true". This is why I say that the situation we have here is (or is equivalent to) no god existing.
* I'm sure you can find some gods in some religions that aren't omnipotent (and therefore might not be able to change the outcome of any test you perform to detect their presence), but these are generally smaller, less popular religions that don't have to stand up to much logical scrutiny and therefore don't have the same "god-works-in-mysterious-ways" defense mechanism. Religions work much like organisms: they either need to build up a resistance to logic or they will go extinct. Logic is the antibiotic to the bacterial disease of religion.
Narrow? Definitely. Simple is good.
Arrogant? Usually, and with good reason.
Ignorant? No. The views of atheists would only be ignorant if the available evidence pointed to a more likely explanation, which is doesn't. At best, a completely undetectable god exists, which is exactly equivalent to no god at all.
This discussion is going nowhere and I don't think I'll be replying again.