Heliocentrism (comparable to ID not in a religious sense, but in the sense that it was outside the mainstream in the time of Copernicus, Galileo, et al, and therefore languished in "kookdom") vs. geocentrism.
Of course there have been things outside of the mainstream which later became mainstream (e.g., quantum mechanics was rejected by some scientists at first). The question is was this thing unscientific - i.e., disputed by vast amounts of evidence?
1) I haven't heard any of those ideas prior to your post here.
There are plenty of people who believe that diseases are caused by demons or witchcraft, or believe in fairies or magic. So let's ask again - should all these be taught in science lessons?
2) How is it bad to teach people what a significant number of people believe?
It's not. I know, I have a wonderful idea - let's dedicate an entire lesson to "what irrational things people around the world believe in". We could call it, I dunno, Religious Studies lessons?
No one is saying that "what people believe" should not be taught at all.
The argument here, that you appear to have strayed from, is whether it should be taught in science lessons. I have this radical notion that science lessons should be for teaching science.
by hiding the fact that other theories exist
There are no other theories. There is one scientific theory, and a load of stories that people have made up.
While certain churches believe evolution is compatible with Christianity, they nonetheless believe that evolutionary changes occured through the will of God. This idea, that evolution is ultimately directed by a higher power, not just some meaningless progression of chemical states, is supressed in academic discourse.
I suspect you mean scientific academic discourse. Because it's not science. I'm sure people are free to write about such things in theology. Would you complain that scientific institutions supress the "theory" that the Universe was created six minutes ago, with God creating everything as it appears - or the "theory" that there are pixies at the bottom of your garden?
But who knows, lots of theories have languished in kookdom for hundreds of years and then a mutated version of them has turned out to be quite relevant. E.g. non Euclidean geometry was for ages considered a mathematical curiosity, but it turned to be useful in phyics.
This is not comparable in the slightest. Non-Euclidean geometry never claimed to be science. It is mathematics (and by that, I mean actual mathematics, and it was never considered "kookdom") that later turned out to have an application in science.
Intelligent design makes claims about the physical universe - but it is not a scientific theory.
So I shall ask for another example - what "kookdom" comparable to Intelligent Design later turned out to be a valid scientific theory?
Right, so why is it Wikipedia that is attacked all the time?
Unlike a newspaper, however, you often have complete crazies and idiots edit wikipedia and I've seen that information stay on there for a long time or until I had to correct it--things that should have been caught long ago.
Citation needed? Which is more unreliable is the sort of thing that needs studies to ascertain. And unreliable and biased material in the media can sometimes never be fixed.
On top of this, the Independent and the Guardian are just as guilty as Wikipedia here! Even if Wikipedia didn't exist, they could have got their information from any other source that might contain incorrect information! No encyclopedia should be used as a primary source.
The problem of circular references is something that plagues all sources of information. And it was on Wikipedia that this issue was spotted and fixed - not the Guardian, not the Independent. Yet it's because of this that now Wikipedia can be criticised - other sources don't get criticised, because they never spot their mistakes in the first place!
I do not know quite why the submitter of the article decided post this to Slashdot, rather than raising this on Wikipedia.
It'll never be perfect precisely because, to be direct, IDIOTS edit the wikipedia frequently throwing in nonsense and bullshit, often those with an ideological bent and don't know how to be objective.
There are plans to make "releases" on Wikipedia - uneditable versions which will consist of the good articles that have been checked. Even if the naysayers think that Wikipedia is useless, having these releases of a free (and uneditable) encyclopedia will be a great thing to have. You can then ignore the main Wikipedia pages as an "unreliable" work in progress, and still have the reliable finished releases.
Additionally, I would edit the page but was not allowed to revert over three times per day, as per the rules at that time. His information was obviously bogus, talking about people with no brains in their heads still acting normally (no joke!), angels, conspiracies, etc, some really weird websites he was citing. And when I edited over three times anyway, because hey, it was PURE NONSENSE, I got reprimanded for breaking the rules. The page got locked after awhile--on HIS reversion, the one with his bias and nonsense, and in IRC they just joked about the page always being locked on the wrong edit.
Can you link to me where this is? I tried searching through the history of scientific skepticism, but must have missed it.
because you don't post untried and untested software to the general public, and you don't generally want to post unreviewed information to the public.
Eh? With open source software, alpha/unreliable versions or even the direct CVS source is often publically available. I guess this makes open source software flawed, in your eyes?
And certain companies often make "beta" software available to the public.
There is actually a lot of uncertainty in what is a "particular expression" of the rules. Verbatim copying is certainly out but what about a "character" called a "cleric" who casts "third-level spells" against a monster with 10 "hit dice?" Those terms are all expressions of the rules...
Well, he said you can't use "names", and yes, it would be risky to use names like "hit dice", or names of spells.
But then words like "character" and "cleric" are words that already existed to describe the terms they are used for - they can't claim copyright over that! Just about every fantasy game and story has "characters" and "clerics" - and on that note, most mainstream commercial roleplaying systems seem to rip of the game mechanics off each other anyway, and they seem to be doing okay.
A story can be copyrighted. A particular collection of facts can be copyrighted (but not the facts themselves - e.g., someone is free to make a collection independently). Rules can't be copyrighted.
And a Kleenex is a type of facial tissue, but many people use it to refer to all types of facial tissue. Similarly, OSS is a type of free software, just as free ware is a type of free software. 2 categories of the same group.
Kleenex is a type of tissue. However, this does not mean it is the same thing as the tissue in my body.
OSS is a type of Free Software. That doesn't mean it is the same thing as "freeware".
Words can have more than one meaning - free as in speech/freedom, or free as in beer/no money.
Actually you can have open source software without being GPL.
He never mentioned the GPL?
The point being made is that "free" as in Free Software or Open Source (free as in speech) is not the same concept as "free" as in freeware (free as in beer).
If the police are using it to arrest criminals I have no issue with it.
Can we be sure it's infallible?
I remember when the McCann's were arrested on the basis of blood evidence in their car - there was no end of "experts" appearing in the media to tell us how unreliable DNA evidence is (curiously the completely opposite of what usually happens when a suspicious looking man is suspected of such a crime, and we're told he must be guilty because that's what the DNA says).
Yes, and your comment is posted on a Sourceforge website. You have granted them permission to do anything they like with your comment, including allowing it to be read and quoted by other site members royalty free.
Well yes that's exactly my point - just like if I buy software from a shop, they have allowed me to legally use the software. The claim being put forward by those who think all EULAs are valid is that these situations can be trumped by forcing the users (of this site, or of the software) into a contract.
I'm only asking those people who think EULAs are inherently valid to pay up. If you agree it's a stupid situation, that's fine.
Similarly, the viewers of this site are bound by the terms and conditions of sourceforge, not you.
They are bound by the T&C of sourceforge, but - according to those who claim that EULAs are inherently valid - they can enter into a "contract" that other users set, if they perform some arbitrary action to indicate "agreement", and thus be bound by that contract as well as the T&C of sourceforge.
But personally I don't make the claim that something is a contract just because one party says it is.
I had the opposite experience - when I tried to get a new account with Virgin Media (then NTL), they refused to acknowledge the existence of the NTL line in my flat. In the end, I called BT who sent someone round. He took one look at the socket and says "That's an NTL line".
Does it matter? Slashdot links to random blogs and websites all the time (and boingboing is fairly well known) without there being repeated discussions on who exactly the author is. It's the content that matters.
To illustrate what I mean, imagine our will exists entirely in the subconscious, and that by the time we're aware of our choices, we cannot alter them. In such a case, we'd still have a will (after all, we still make choices and act upon them), but that will is not free, because we are not free to consciously control it.
This doesn't follow - just because the decision is only written to my memory later does not mean I had no ability to control it. If I get blind drunk, and have no memory of what happened the next day, does this mean I didn't have free will? As much as I might like to claim that, it isn't true. Although we think of "us" as being equivalent to our memory, this isn't really accurate.
All this study shows is that the mind is not a single entity where all parts interact infinitely fast. But for people like me who don't believe in souls, this isn't anything surprising. Obviously different parts of the brain are going to take time to communicate, but this doesn't mean free will doesn't exist.
Have you missed the whole Phorm issue, where BT have essentially admitted to illegally intercepting thousands of customers' data and giving it to an ex-spyware company?
But I believe Virgin Media were planning on using Phorm too, so it doesn't affect his decision (other than to leave for someone other than BT or VM).
so it was kind of nice to see somebody sticking it to them.
True, but it's not clear what else they did with the money saved, rather VM decided to reap the benefits and the customer lost out.
It's also worth noting that whilst the 3p a day for the Sky channels was considered too expensive, Virgin On Demand which they touted as being a replacement to satisfy customers for the loss of the Sky channels turns out to cost an extra £5 a month. I think I'd rather have Sky for 90p a month.
But who says the unconscious decision process isn't an exercise of free will?
I agree - in particular, studies of these types seem to assume that free will if it exists must be part of our memory. But if you think about it, making a decision should be a higher priority than recording that we made a decision in our memory, so it stands to reason that the brain would only write the information to our memory later. This hardly rules out free will though.
Imagine if we could build a robot that had a CPU that had free will. This study would be like taking note of when information about the CPU's actions were written to RAM, and concluding that it doesn't have free will.
"fostering a climate of blind trust among people seeking information"
Funny, when it comes to Wikipedia, there's no end of people telling us how we can't trust what we read, and we need to be careful what we use it for, and check the sources. Even Wikipedia itself is honest about telling you that an article lacks sources, is biased or may not be reliable.
It's with every other source that people give their blind trust to - whether it's other encyclopedias, books, the media, or, evidently, University Professors.
If Wikipedia has made people be careful of what we read, that's a good thing. I only wish people would engage their brain more often, and use that sceptism with every other thing they read or hear.
I agree, I thought that article was rather biased - not just the headline, but the implication that perhaps these sites should be illegal like they are in other countries, and suggesting that the search terms were "simple suicide-related terms" when in fact they were specifically biased towards asking how to kill yourself. The opinions they give are solely from those in favour of censorship or manipulating search engine results.
And they've been using that same bloody picture of a guy with his hand on his head for years.
aaand just because a study is in a journal means it can never possibly be biased.
The problem isn't strictly with the study itself, but with the interpretation. Yes, they are quite correct to say "Searching for websites on how to kill yourself is more likely to find websites with information on how to kill yourself", just as a study that finds water is wet would be quite correct. What's wrong is the reporting in the media that this means that pro-suicide websites are widespread, or more common than support groups, or the idea that search engines are not behaving correctly. The first two are simply unsupported, and as for the latter, on the contrary - the only valid conclusion from this study is that search engines are working correctly.
Agreed. Also, whilst the study does distinguish between "Pro-suicide; encouraging, promoting, or facilitating suicide" and merely "Describing methods but not encouraging suicide", it is still unclear on what basis they decided a site was "pro-suicide".
The top three sites were alt.suicide.holiday suicide methods file (which has been the subject of previous "OMG the Internet made someone commit suicide!" media outrages), satan service and suicide methods.net.
The ASH file certainly gives details on suicide methods, but it's not immediately clear to me how they encourage it. It's also worth noting that most of these are either silly suggestions, or obvious. The only information that could really make a difference is the information on poisons. I'm not sure what they mean by links to other sites - all I see is listings of suicide support groups.
I presume by Satan Service they mean the page which redirects to the methods list at alt.suicide.methods. Again, it seems more information, and even states "If you believe that you have a psychological imbalance that is causing your suicidal ideations, then I recommend that you seek medical help for this imbalance rather than merely reacting to it by taking an action you may regret."
Suicidemethods.net in fact refers to a book (are we going to ban books too?), and seems an entirely academic study on the issue of suicide.
So aside from the bias in the search questions, I'm completely lost as to how they decided these were "pro-suicide". I guess it's because they're not actively dissuading people from doing it. But by this logic, the BMJ study is a "pro-suicide" site - it talks about suicide, with references to other "pro-suicide" sites, without actively offering support or discouraging people from committing suicide!
Slashdot Mirror
Heliocentrism (comparable to ID not in a religious sense, but in the sense that it was outside the mainstream in the time of Copernicus, Galileo, et al, and therefore languished in "kookdom") vs. geocentrism.
Of course there have been things outside of the mainstream which later became mainstream (e.g., quantum mechanics was rejected by some scientists at first). The question is was this thing unscientific - i.e., disputed by vast amounts of evidence?
1) I haven't heard any of those ideas prior to your post here.
There are plenty of people who believe that diseases are caused by demons or witchcraft, or believe in fairies or magic. So let's ask again - should all these be taught in science lessons?
2) How is it bad to teach people what a significant number of people believe?
It's not. I know, I have a wonderful idea - let's dedicate an entire lesson to "what irrational things people around the world believe in". We could call it, I dunno, Religious Studies lessons?
No one is saying that "what people believe" should not be taught at all.
The argument here, that you appear to have strayed from, is whether it should be taught in science lessons. I have this radical notion that science lessons should be for teaching science.
by hiding the fact that other theories exist
There are no other theories. There is one scientific theory, and a load of stories that people have made up.
While certain churches believe evolution is compatible with Christianity, they nonetheless believe that evolutionary changes occured through the will of God. This idea, that evolution is ultimately directed by a higher power, not just some meaningless progression of chemical states, is supressed in academic discourse.
I suspect you mean scientific academic discourse. Because it's not science. I'm sure people are free to write about such things in theology. Would you complain that scientific institutions supress the "theory" that the Universe was created six minutes ago, with God creating everything as it appears - or the "theory" that there are pixies at the bottom of your garden?
Stein is not discussing the Science. But, the Atheistic philosophy of Darwinism that says its all an accident and random.
It's a good thing that Darwinism doesn't say that it's an accident, or random.
Nor is there any such thing as an "Atheistic philosophy".
But who knows, lots of theories have languished in kookdom for hundreds of years and then a mutated version of them has turned out to be quite relevant. E.g. non Euclidean geometry was for ages considered a mathematical curiosity, but it turned to be useful in phyics.
This is not comparable in the slightest. Non-Euclidean geometry never claimed to be science. It is mathematics (and by that, I mean actual mathematics, and it was never considered "kookdom") that later turned out to have an application in science.
Intelligent design makes claims about the physical universe - but it is not a scientific theory.
So I shall ask for another example - what "kookdom" comparable to Intelligent Design later turned out to be a valid scientific theory?
That's true of all media
Right, so why is it Wikipedia that is attacked all the time?
Unlike a newspaper, however, you often have complete crazies and idiots edit wikipedia and I've seen that information stay on there for a long time or until I had to correct it--things that should have been caught long ago.
Citation needed? Which is more unreliable is the sort of thing that needs studies to ascertain. And unreliable and biased material in the media can sometimes never be fixed.
TFS of this article is just wrong, anyway - the Wikipedia article does not now state this ( http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sacha_Baron_Cohen&oldid=206891439 ).
On top of this, the Independent and the Guardian are just as guilty as Wikipedia here! Even if Wikipedia didn't exist, they could have got their information from any other source that might contain incorrect information! No encyclopedia should be used as a primary source.
The problem of circular references is something that plagues all sources of information. And it was on Wikipedia that this issue was spotted and fixed - not the Guardian, not the Independent. Yet it's because of this that now Wikipedia can be criticised - other sources don't get criticised, because they never spot their mistakes in the first place!
I do not know quite why the submitter of the article decided post this to Slashdot, rather than raising this on Wikipedia.
It'll never be perfect precisely because, to be direct, IDIOTS edit the wikipedia frequently throwing in nonsense and bullshit, often those with an ideological bent and don't know how to be objective.
There are plans to make "releases" on Wikipedia - uneditable versions which will consist of the good articles that have been checked. Even if the naysayers think that Wikipedia is useless, having these releases of a free (and uneditable) encyclopedia will be a great thing to have. You can then ignore the main Wikipedia pages as an "unreliable" work in progress, and still have the reliable finished releases.
Additionally, I would edit the page but was not allowed to revert over three times per day, as per the rules at that time. His information was obviously bogus, talking about people with no brains in their heads still acting normally (no joke!), angels, conspiracies, etc, some really weird websites he was citing. And when I edited over three times anyway, because hey, it was PURE NONSENSE, I got reprimanded for breaking the rules. The page got locked after awhile--on HIS reversion, the one with his bias and nonsense, and in IRC they just joked about the page always being locked on the wrong edit.
Can you link to me where this is? I tried searching through the history of scientific skepticism, but must have missed it.
because you don't post untried and untested software to the general public, and you don't generally want to post unreviewed information to the public.
Eh? With open source software, alpha/unreliable versions or even the direct CVS source is often publically available. I guess this makes open source software flawed, in your eyes?
And certain companies often make "beta" software available to the public.
There is actually a lot of uncertainty in what is a "particular expression" of the rules. Verbatim copying is certainly out but what about a "character" called a "cleric" who casts "third-level spells" against a monster with 10 "hit dice?" Those terms are all expressions of the rules...
Well, he said you can't use "names", and yes, it would be risky to use names like "hit dice", or names of spells.
But then words like "character" and "cleric" are words that already existed to describe the terms they are used for - they can't claim copyright over that! Just about every fantasy game and story has "characters" and "clerics" - and on that note, most mainstream commercial roleplaying systems seem to rip of the game mechanics off each other anyway, and they seem to be doing okay.
Neither can a story. Or a collection of facts.
A story can be copyrighted. A particular collection of facts can be copyrighted (but not the facts themselves - e.g., someone is free to make a collection independently). Rules can't be copyrighted.
And a Kleenex is a type of facial tissue, but many people use it to refer to all types of facial tissue. Similarly, OSS is a type of free software, just as free ware is a type of free software. 2 categories of the same group.
Kleenex is a type of tissue. However, this does not mean it is the same thing as the tissue in my body.
OSS is a type of Free Software. That doesn't mean it is the same thing as "freeware".
Words can have more than one meaning - free as in speech/freedom, or free as in beer/no money.
Actually you can have open source software without being GPL.
He never mentioned the GPL?
The point being made is that "free" as in Free Software or Open Source (free as in speech) is not the same concept as "free" as in freeware (free as in beer).
If the police are using it to arrest criminals I have no issue with it.
Can we be sure it's infallible?
I remember when the McCann's were arrested on the basis of blood evidence in their car - there was no end of "experts" appearing in the media to tell us how unreliable DNA evidence is (curiously the completely opposite of what usually happens when a suspicious looking man is suspected of such a crime, and we're told he must be guilty because that's what the DNA says).
Yes, and your comment is posted on a Sourceforge website. You have granted them permission to do anything they like with your comment, including allowing it to be read and quoted by other site members royalty free.
Well yes that's exactly my point - just like if I buy software from a shop, they have allowed me to legally use the software. The claim being put forward by those who think all EULAs are valid is that these situations can be trumped by forcing the users (of this site, or of the software) into a contract.
I'm only asking those people who think EULAs are inherently valid to pay up. If you agree it's a stupid situation, that's fine.
Similarly, the viewers of this site are bound by the terms and conditions of sourceforge, not you.
They are bound by the T&C of sourceforge, but - according to those who claim that EULAs are inherently valid - they can enter into a "contract" that other users set, if they perform some arbitrary action to indicate "agreement", and thus be bound by that contract as well as the T&C of sourceforge.
But personally I don't make the claim that something is a contract just because one party says it is.
I had the opposite experience - when I tried to get a new account with Virgin Media (then NTL), they refused to acknowledge the existence of the NTL line in my flat. In the end, I called BT who sent someone round. He took one look at the socket and says "That's an NTL line".
Does it matter? Slashdot links to random blogs and websites all the time (and boingboing is fairly well known) without there being repeated discussions on who exactly the author is. It's the content that matters.
That's granted to SourceForge, not to you.
If you think EULAs are inherently valid, it's time to pay up.
To illustrate what I mean, imagine our will exists entirely in the subconscious, and that by the time we're aware of our choices, we cannot alter them. In such a case, we'd still have a will (after all, we still make choices and act upon them), but that will is not free, because we are not free to consciously control it.
This doesn't follow - just because the decision is only written to my memory later does not mean I had no ability to control it. If I get blind drunk, and have no memory of what happened the next day, does this mean I didn't have free will? As much as I might like to claim that, it isn't true. Although we think of "us" as being equivalent to our memory, this isn't really accurate.
All this study shows is that the mind is not a single entity where all parts interact infinitely fast. But for people like me who don't believe in souls, this isn't anything surprising. Obviously different parts of the brain are going to take time to communicate, but this doesn't mean free will doesn't exist.
Have you missed the whole Phorm issue, where BT have essentially admitted to illegally intercepting thousands of customers' data and giving it to an ex-spyware company?
But I believe Virgin Media were planning on using Phorm too, so it doesn't affect his decision (other than to leave for someone other than BT or VM).
so it was kind of nice to see somebody sticking it to them.
True, but it's not clear what else they did with the money saved, rather VM decided to reap the benefits and the customer lost out.
It's also worth noting that whilst the 3p a day for the Sky channels was considered too expensive, Virgin On Demand which they touted as being a replacement to satisfy customers for the loss of the Sky channels turns out to cost an extra £5 a month. I think I'd rather have Sky for 90p a month.
But who says the unconscious decision process isn't an exercise of free will?
I agree - in particular, studies of these types seem to assume that free will if it exists must be part of our memory. But if you think about it, making a decision should be a higher priority than recording that we made a decision in our memory, so it stands to reason that the brain would only write the information to our memory later. This hardly rules out free will though.
Imagine if we could build a robot that had a CPU that had free will. This study would be like taking note of when information about the CPU's actions were written to RAM, and concluding that it doesn't have free will.
"fostering a climate of blind trust among people seeking information"
Funny, when it comes to Wikipedia, there's no end of people telling us how we can't trust what we read, and we need to be careful what we use it for, and check the sources. Even Wikipedia itself is honest about telling you that an article lacks sources, is biased or may not be reliable.
It's with every other source that people give their blind trust to - whether it's other encyclopedias, books, the media, or, evidently, University Professors.
If Wikipedia has made people be careful of what we read, that's a good thing. I only wish people would engage their brain more often, and use that sceptism with every other thing they read or hear.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7341024.stm
I agree, I thought that article was rather biased - not just the headline, but the implication that perhaps these sites should be illegal like they are in other countries, and suggesting that the search terms were "simple suicide-related terms" when in fact they were specifically biased towards asking how to kill yourself. The opinions they give are solely from those in favour of censorship or manipulating search engine results.
And they've been using that same bloody picture of a guy with his hand on his head for years.
aaand just because a study is in a journal means it can never possibly be biased.
The problem isn't strictly with the study itself, but with the interpretation. Yes, they are quite correct to say "Searching for websites on how to kill yourself is more likely to find websites with information on how to kill yourself", just as a study that finds water is wet would be quite correct. What's wrong is the reporting in the media that this means that pro-suicide websites are widespread, or more common than support groups, or the idea that search engines are not behaving correctly. The first two are simply unsupported, and as for the latter, on the contrary - the only valid conclusion from this study is that search engines are working correctly.
Agreed. Also, whilst the study does distinguish between "Pro-suicide; encouraging, promoting, or facilitating suicide" and merely "Describing methods but not encouraging suicide", it is still unclear on what basis they decided a site was "pro-suicide".
The top three sites were alt.suicide.holiday suicide methods file (which has been the subject of previous "OMG the Internet made someone commit suicide!" media outrages), satan service and suicide methods.net.
The ASH file certainly gives details on suicide methods, but it's not immediately clear to me how they encourage it. It's also worth noting that most of these are either silly suggestions, or obvious. The only information that could really make a difference is the information on poisons. I'm not sure what they mean by links to other sites - all I see is listings of suicide support groups.
I presume by Satan Service they mean the page which redirects to the methods list at alt.suicide.methods. Again, it seems more information, and even states "If you believe that you have a psychological imbalance that is causing your suicidal ideations, then I recommend that you seek medical help for this imbalance rather than merely reacting to it by taking an action you may regret."
Suicidemethods.net in fact refers to a book (are we going to ban books too?), and seems an entirely academic study on the issue of suicide.
So aside from the bias in the search questions, I'm completely lost as to how they decided these were "pro-suicide". I guess it's because they're not actively dissuading people from doing it. But by this logic, the BMJ study is a "pro-suicide" site - it talks about suicide, with references to other "pro-suicide" sites, without actively offering support or discouraging people from committing suicide!