Dating methods are, in essance, foolproof. They are foolproof becuase they all corespond to one another. If the methods were flawed, they would all come up with different mesurements. But They don't. See here for more information.
In short, don't beleive what your sunday school teacher tells you. There is no debate on the age of the earth. As is always true in science the number could change, but they will never become 6,000 , 600,000 , 6,000,000 , or even 600,000,000. The earth, as has been determined by a legion of independent dating methods, is billions of years old.
The T-rex could of died out last week and it would have absoulutly nothing to do with how old the earth is. T-rex was around 65 million years or so ago. The earth is 4.6 BILLION. The dating of dinosaurs has nothing to do with the how science determined the age of the earth. Dipshit.
I'm not Christian, let alone a fundamentalist, but I recognize that there are definitely some problems with evolution. If there weren't it would be fact, and not a theory.
Errrr...If you recognized anything, you would recognize that the word "theory" means a very different thing in science then it does in Common parlance. For instance, Gravity is a theory. That Germs cause disease is a theory. The Earth Revolving around the sun is a theory. Basicly, anything that cannot be directly observed is a theory. Evoultion is Just as well supported as any of the above theories I mentioned(sometimes more so). If you would like to to tell us about the problems you "know" evoultion has I would be glad to address them.
I feel that the truth lies somewhere in the middle between evolution and creation.
I thought you said you weren't a christian. Why do you half belive in Creation?
When the predicted success rate is anything - anything - besides eight percent, then an eight percent success rate is a valid scientific result, given enough attempts. You are, plain and simply, overgeneralizing, and drawing a conclusion based upon your overgeneralization.
What exactly am I overgeneralizing? The Scientfic method? If your hypothosis fails to perform, even once, then you need to change it to fit the data. It dosen't matter if it's 8% or 98% accurate. Until you coralate your hypothosies failures to the data, you have nothing more then an asserition, the same as saying that invisable pink elephants live in your backyard.
These questions were answered while you were drunk. Several times. Go back and read.
Okay I did. What I found was you stating the same thing you are now, that the probiblity of the researchers making the picks they did was 8%. You Showed me a page which showed the time Frames under which they made theese picks. Those time frames varied anywhere from a minute to a month. No mention of why time frame changed from event to event. No mention of why the resolution changed from event to event. No mention of why the events were picked at all. For the last time, I will ask. What in god's name is the calculation he used to figure out the chance of the picks being 8%?
Look. On a gut level, I have a very hard time believing these people. In fact, I'm very inclined to believe that they're wrong.
Then what the fuck are we arguing about? Do you really think this stuff is solid science? if so, why?
Don't just say "It can't be true!". I don't believe it's true either. But that doesn't make it not true.
Did I say "it can't be true?" No. Did I make an argument from argument from increduily? No. Please do not mply that I did.
What will show that they're wrong is one of these things:
No. What will prove them wrong if their hypothois fails in one of it's preditcions. and it has. 176 times.
But what if I do it another twelve? And another twelve? And many, many, many more twelves of times? And we're up to some incredibly huge number of attempts, and my success rate is still eight percent, when math says it should, on average, in the long run, be less than that?
I thought you said they've oonly done it 192 times? That's "some incredibly huge number of attempts"?
Please. Dispite my last post being rather inncohrant(4 white russians will do that to you), I made a perfectly resonable argument throughout the thread. An argument which you would not address. Namley that theese people have A 8% SUCCSESS RATE! I don't care that it should of been 5% or what ever number their magical algorythm says it should be. A 8% success rate is not a vaild scientific result.
Let me explain, yet again. When one makes a hypothesis, one must test said hypothesis to see if the result favors the prediction made by the hypothesis. If the prediction is wrong, then one changes it to produce a favorable result. These peole were, by your own admition, wrong 92% of the time. That is not science. Not unless they explain why their hypothises failed 92% of the time, which of course, they don't.
Furthermore, the methology used is absolute insanity. A wiccan spell on bin laden? Nothing more important happened on that day? How far do they look back? A minute? an hour? A week? Until they see the magical 5% threshold? How do they define the timeframe under which the event is taking place? It is plain old psedo-scienece, and I find it hard to beleive that anyone would give it credence.
Admittedly, their hypotheses is about this "major event" stuff, but that is not strictly what they are measuring. They are measuring their ability to predict when statistically significant spikes occur. And, so far, they have done so at a higher rate than mathematically normal.
Wait....I thought we argeed that they where corasponding current events to past spikes way back 10 or so comments ago. Bah.
Listen. I think you, like me, like to argue.But the thread is getting too long and I am too drunk to continue. Let us perservere through Email and we'll argue about all sorts of shit. cool?
After further review, I would like to point out that these aren't time frames under which they look for SWE's(significant world events). They're the time blocks they pulled where they saw a spike before a SWE. You(and they) stll have not awnsred where the cut-off line is for a spike being part of a SWE.
Who the fuck was Bob Morris? Why was I not told about this significant world event?
All that and they can only manage a 8% success rate?
Lets get back to orginal question. How do they define "significant world event?" Bob Morris dying? A wiccan spell on Bin Laden? Do you conisder these Significant world events? Does anybody? What is their criteria? What about when my Grandma Died? I was pretty broken up abouth that. Did it register?
No, it wasn't your simple inane "success" divided by "attempts".
Ad hominem attacks are the first sign of failed argument.
So plug those numbers into that formula, and you'll get the probability of seeing exactly 16 successes in 192 attempts. If you don't believe me, look it the fuck up before launching into another diatribe.
Diatribe? I think everyone will agree I have kept my questions and awnsers short and to the point..
Specifically, the chance of 16 or more successes out of 192, when the chance of one success in one attempt is one out of twenty, and the result of each attempt is independent of each other attempt, is approximately eight percent, at least according to this other slashdotter.
Via what Time frame? I have asked you this three times. I have recived no response. If this slashdoter provided you with the calculation, he surely provided you with the time frame under which they operated. What is it? Why do you refuse to awnser this very simple question?
Where does it end? If he had such a low opinion of the article, why didn't he tell me to read the papers in the first place?(not that the papers were any more scientific)
You have no idea what you're talking about....That 16/192 is around eight percent is merely coincidence. Your calculation has nothing to do with anything at all.>
Nothing to do with anything at all? You consider an 8% success rate irrelavant? Do you know of any scientific proposal with a 8% success rate that is considered vaild? Are you really arguing that it is?
The chance of seeing sixteen (or more) can be calculated, and it turns out (at least according to another slashdot poster) to be about eight percent.
Quite the conicidence isn't it? The chances of both succeding in total and the total faliure rate being the same figure. Did this slashdot poster provide you with the calculation? Did he provide you with the time frame for success? Did he provide the statistics on why the "most likely number of times for them to have seen spikes that large was about ten but they saw sixteen"? Did he give you anything at all?
The theory of probability can be used to predict that, if "success" or "failure" is random, your chance of "succeeding" that many times or more in that many attempts is eight percent
No, you are wrong. Instead of the chance of succeeding 16 times out of 192 being 8%, the OVERALL success rate is 8%(16/192 * 100 = 8.3%). That is an incredible Failure rate, almost one that could not be attribited to chance. To calculate the chance of sucess vs. failure, you would have to know the time frame in which they designate success, one figure which they do not seem willing to divulge.
You seemed to be saying that they were looking for significant events that they knew would take place, and then looked for a spike. September 11th or the tsunami would not fall under this condition. I obvioulsy misunderstood you.
there was a coincident spike in significantly more cases than would have been predicted by random chance.
Errr....Random chance doesn't predict anything. That's why it's random. Now, if you would like to say that random chance dosen't produce order, I might agree with you. Just define order.
They look for events that they think might cause a spike (if the proposed effect is real), and then see if a spike occurred coincidentally.
So they where looking for September 11th then? Or the tsunami? The article indicated that these events were the boxes major triumphs. If thats the case, why do they need the box at all?
The glaring error in their methodology is that they are Quantifying the un-quantifable. A significant world event is an opinion. What constitues a significant world event is in the eye of the beholder. Combine that with random strings of numbers, and one could see pretty much anything one wants. How does one tell when something is non-random string of numbers? Do they have an algorythm? If so, perhaps they should conatct the NSA. I'm sure the cryptology department would be interested.
Perhaps the article should be read before people spend a whole 5 minutes trying to prove it to be a fraud.
Perhaps you should consider that the way this machine supposedly predicts the future is entierly subjective. What is the cutoff point for when randomness becomes non-randomness? What is the cutoff point for what is a significant world event? What happens when the detecor goes off and nothing takes place? What predictions do the scientists make about what the machne will do before and during a significant world event, however they may define that? Most importanly however, why did the article fail to mention any of this? Perhaps you should consider the article for 5 minutes before accusing others of unfounded skepticism.
Please give me an example of this. I have never seen anything on Buymusic(not that I use it) that had restrictions differing from tranfers to 3 different computers and 10 burns, which is the same as Napster. If there are further restrictions on Buymusic WMA's or Differing Restrictions on different files, I am not aware of it. It is true however, that Microsft Sets the DRM restricions on all the music stores that use WMA. You can see this to be so by looking at Microsoft's WMA DRM site.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow. You sir, are an idiot.
Dating methods are, in essance, foolproof. They are foolproof becuase they all corespond to one another. If the methods were flawed, they would all come up with different mesurements. But They don't.
See here for more information.
In short, don't beleive what your sunday school teacher tells you. There is no debate on the age of the earth. As is always true in science the number could change, but they will never become 6,000 , 600,000 , 6,000,000 , or even 600,000,000. The earth, as has been determined by a legion of independent dating methods, is billions of years old.
Your logic is devestaing. Clearly, the earth IS 6000 years old. I guess my post was a troll.....
The T-rex could of died out last week and it would have absoulutly nothing to do with how old the earth is. T-rex was around 65 million years or so ago. The earth is 4.6 BILLION. The dating of dinosaurs has nothing to do with the how science determined the age of the earth. Dipshit.
Errrr...If you recognized anything, you would recognize that the word "theory" means a very different thing in science then it does in Common parlance. For instance, Gravity is a theory. That Germs cause disease is a theory. The Earth Revolving around the sun is a theory. Basicly, anything that cannot be directly observed is a theory. Evoultion is Just as well supported as any of the above theories I mentioned(sometimes more so). If you would like to to tell us about the problems you "know" evoultion has I would be glad to address them.
I feel that the truth lies somewhere in the middle between evolution and creation.
I thought you said you weren't a christian. Why do you half belive in Creation?
What exactly am I overgeneralizing? The Scientfic method? If your hypothosis fails to perform, even once, then you need to change it to fit the data. It dosen't matter if it's 8% or 98% accurate. Until you coralate your hypothosies failures to the data, you have nothing more then an asserition, the same as saying that invisable pink elephants live in your backyard.
These questions were answered while you were drunk. Several times. Go back and read.
Okay I did. What I found was you stating the same thing you are now, that the probiblity of the researchers making the picks they did was 8%. You Showed me a page which showed the time Frames under which they made theese picks. Those time frames varied anywhere from a minute to a month. No mention of why time frame changed from event to event. No mention of why the resolution changed from event to event. No mention of why the events were picked at all. For the last time, I will ask. What in god's name is the calculation he used to figure out the chance of the picks being 8%?
Look. On a gut level, I have a very hard time believing these people. In fact, I'm very inclined to believe that they're wrong.
Then what the fuck are we arguing about? Do you really think this stuff is solid science? if so, why?
Don't just say "It can't be true!". I don't believe it's true either. But that doesn't make it not true.
Did I say "it can't be true?" No. Did I make an argument from argument from increduily? No. Please do not mply that I did.
What will show that they're wrong is one of these things:
No. What will prove them wrong if their hypothois fails in one of it's preditcions. and it has. 176 times.
But what if I do it another twelve? And another twelve? And many, many, many more twelves of times? And we're up to some incredibly huge number of attempts, and my success rate is still eight percent, when math says it should, on average, in the long run, be less than that?
I thought you said they've oonly done it 192 times? That's "some incredibly huge number of attempts"?
Please. Dispite my last post being rather inncohrant(4 white russians will do that to you), I made a perfectly resonable argument throughout the thread. An argument which you would not address. Namley that theese people have A 8% SUCCSESS RATE! I don't care that it should of been 5% or what ever number their magical algorythm says it should be. A 8% success rate is not a vaild scientific result.
Let me explain, yet again. When one makes a hypothesis, one must test said hypothesis to see if the result favors the prediction made by the hypothesis. If the prediction is wrong, then one changes it to produce a favorable result. These peole were, by your own admition, wrong 92% of the time. That is not science. Not unless they explain why their hypothises failed 92% of the time, which of course, they don't.
Furthermore, the methology used is absolute insanity. A wiccan spell on bin laden? Nothing more important happened on that day? How far do they look back? A minute? an hour? A week? Until they see the magical 5% threshold? How do they define the timeframe under which the event is taking place? It is plain old psedo-scienece, and I find it hard to beleive that anyone would give it credence.
Wait....I thought we argeed that they where corasponding current events to past spikes way back 10 or so comments ago. Bah.
Listen. I think you, like me, like to argue.But the thread is getting too long and I am too drunk to continue. Let us perservere through Email and we'll argue about all sorts of shit. cool?
After further review, I would like to point out that these aren't time frames under which they look for SWE's(significant world events). They're the time blocks they pulled where they saw a spike before a SWE. You(and they) stll have not awnsred where the cut-off line is for a spike being part of a SWE.
Unforutnatly, Let's take a look at how they define a signficant world event shall we?
My favorite: Binding Spell on Bin Laden
How about another:Bob Morris, 1942 - 2004Yeah, a wickan spell chain letter. That was sure a significant world event. This is what they count as a success??
Who the fuck was Bob Morris? Why was I not told about this significant world event?
All that and they can only manage a 8% success rate?
Lets get back to orginal question. How do they define "significant world event?" Bob Morris dying? A wiccan spell on Bin Laden? Do you conisder these Significant world events? Does anybody? What is their criteria? What about when my Grandma Died? I was pretty broken up abouth that. Did it register?
Ad hominem attacks are the first sign of failed argument.
So plug those numbers into that formula, and you'll get the probability of seeing exactly 16 successes in 192 attempts. If you don't believe me, look it the fuck up before launching into another diatribe.
Diatribe? I think everyone will agree I have kept my questions and awnsers short and to the point. .
Specifically, the chance of 16 or more successes out of 192, when the chance of one success in one attempt is one out of twenty, and the result of each attempt is independent of each other attempt, is approximately eight percent, at least according to this other slashdotter.
Via what Time frame? I have asked you this three times. I have recived no response. If this slashdoter provided you with the calculation, he surely provided you with the time frame under which they operated. What is it? Why do you refuse to awnser this very simple question?
Where does it end? If he had such a low opinion of the article, why didn't he tell me to read the papers in the first place?(not that the papers were any more scientific)
Nothing to do with anything at all? You consider an 8% success rate irrelavant? Do you know of any scientific proposal with a 8% success rate that is considered vaild? Are you really arguing that it is?
The chance of seeing sixteen (or more) can be calculated, and it turns out (at least according to another slashdot poster) to be about eight percent.
Quite the conicidence isn't it? The chances of both succeding in total and the total faliure rate being the same figure. Did this slashdot poster provide you with the calculation? Did he provide you with the time frame for success? Did he provide the statistics on why the "most likely number of times for them to have seen spikes that large was about ten but they saw sixteen"? Did he give you anything at all?
No, you are wrong. Instead of the chance of succeeding 16 times out of 192 being 8%, the OVERALL success rate is 8%(16/192 * 100 = 8.3%). That is an incredible Failure rate, almost one that could not be attribited to chance. To calculate the chance of sucess vs. failure, you would have to know the time frame in which they designate success, one figure which they do not seem willing to divulge.
You seemed to be saying that they were looking for significant events that they knew would take place, and then looked for a spike. September 11th or the tsunami would not fall under this condition. I obvioulsy misunderstood you.
there was a coincident spike in significantly more cases than would have been predicted by random chance.
Errr....Random chance doesn't predict anything. That's why it's random. Now, if you would like to say that random chance dosen't produce order, I might agree with you. Just define order.
They look for events that they think might cause a spike (if the proposed effect is real), and then see if a spike occurred coincidentally. So they where looking for September 11th then? Or the tsunami? The article indicated that these events were the boxes major triumphs. If thats the case, why do they need the box at all?
The glaring error in their methodology is that they are Quantifying the un-quantifable. A significant world event is an opinion. What constitues a significant world event is in the eye of the beholder. Combine that with random strings of numbers, and one could see pretty much anything one wants. How does one tell when something is non-random string of numbers? Do they have an algorythm? If so, perhaps they should conatct the NSA. I'm sure the cryptology department would be interested.
DAldredge:You are passing judgement on their work only on the basis of a PopSCI level article written for a 9th grade audiance
heh.
Perhaps you should consider that the way this machine supposedly predicts the future is entierly subjective. What is the cutoff point for when randomness becomes non-randomness? What is the cutoff point for what is a significant world event? What happens when the detecor goes off and nothing takes place? What predictions do the scientists make about what the machne will do before and during a significant world event, however they may define that? Most importanly however, why did the article fail to mention any of this? Perhaps you should consider the article for 5 minutes before accusing others of unfounded skepticism.
NASA is a government agency.
ReplayTV supports transfers over the network via DVarchive. The old 5000 ReplayTV series can share over the network nativly.
Would it have the strength of 6 gorillas?
Put the name of the text file, ncevysbby, into this here Rot13 translator, and you will see that it spells aprilfool.
Not even that long. A judge has dissolved the restraing order effective today.
Can you provide verification(a web site or some other source) of such a device? I am unable to find any evidence that such a thing exists.
Please give me an example of this. I have never seen anything on Buymusic(not that I use it) that had restrictions differing from tranfers to 3 different computers and 10 burns, which is the same as Napster. If there are further restrictions on Buymusic WMA's or Differing Restrictions on different files, I am not aware of it. It is true however, that Microsft Sets the DRM restricions on all the music stores that use WMA. You can see this to be so by looking at Microsoft's WMA DRM site.