I didn't know ET was built on Quake3 engine. From what I remember, you just wandered around for a while until you fell in a hole, then spent ten minutes craning your neck to float out, only to do the SAME THING AGAIN ten minutes later. The player models weren't very good, nor was the texturing. I would have expected more, considering the technology they were working with.
Also, how'd they fit that whole engine on an Atari cart?
Actually, that's a poor comparison. If you steal a car, it does result in a lost sale, because a potential buyer no longer has the option to buy that car - the stock is gone. However, when copying music, the original merch is never taken from the owner - hence the difference between theft and copyright violation.
I read through your linked page. Some of your points show valid problems, but others are based on (from my POV) faulty logic, or have already been widely defused. Specifically, points 2, 3, 5, and possibly 9 are ones I'd be interested in responding to, but doing that on Slashdot tends to start flame wars. However, if you're interested, I'll post my thoughs and we can dialogue.
Re:The Future of Religion
on
SimChurch
·
· Score: 1
William Gibson actually has some similar ideas in his book Idoru (i believe it's that one anyway). One can buy designer components for the visual appearance of one's avatar. Perhaps someone who's read it more recently can give better examples.
I just created a profile (which consists of checking boxes that match your interests) and tried some searches.
There's a slider that tells Google how much to skew the search - all the way to the left and I believe it matches a standard Google search. All the way to the right and the results are highly skewed to match your preferences.
It seems to work pretty well. As a test case, I checked only Music (general) and searched for 'coughing.' When I moved the slider to 'personalized,' 9/10 results were for 'soul coughing,' a now defunct band that was known enough to have a significant presence on the web. With the slider to the left, 4/10 results were for Soul Coughing. Personalizing the search filtered out sites about the act of coughing and left sites that had 'coughing' and a music theme (not sure how it was done - have only looked at descriptions of sites).
This is by no means a real display of the accuracy or usefulness of the personalized search; it was just a little test.
I'll clarify: I wasn't saying God is not arbitrary therefore he exists, I was saying that the attributes associated with God are all at one end of the range - 0 or infinity. If a necessary being exists, it seems intuitive that it would not have arbitrary properties, as arbitrary properties beg explanations. God fits that description, so it is plausible that God is a necessary being and therefore exists. Sort of a 'best explanation' hypothesis.
I'm afraid that doesn't clear things up at all, but I'm not relying on circular arguments. You may say that the attributes of which I speak come from the Bible (which is NOT inerrant), and they are contained within but can also be reasoned through another exercise in logic: if a god created everything, that god must be more powerful than everything it created (this point is arguable, feel free to argue it). So from our frame of reference, that god is all-powerful (infinite power, far end of the spectrum, not arbitrary).
You're correct in saying that relying on the Bible for arguments results in circular reasoning. I was guilty of that when I was young, but I began searching for logical explanations and am satisfied that my beliefs are plausible. Like I said in another post - I'm not out to convert you, I'm defending my own beliefs.
I think you've summed up the situation well towards the end of your post. I will definitely be checking out those papers, though I haven't the time tonight. I would like to make a clarification regarding our blind example.
You say that you have not met any blind people in the world today who consider sight to be supernatural. I was working from the assumption that until this new, sighted person came along, everyone was blind and therefore no previous experience with sight existed. This is why I liked that example - Lance Armstrong on a bike is a higher degree of something you're accustomed to, whereas a new sense is completely foreign. Imagine someone came to you and said "I have telepathy; I can read your mind like a book." That's the angle I was taking.
As for the lottery example, you're absolutely right - an astronomical improbability is not an impossibility, which is why we're debating in the first place. I have other arguments, and you have other refutations. However, anything I say at this point is simply a restatement of what others have said before and can be researched by those interested. I was prompted to respond to your original arguments - I couldn't let them go unchallenged! - and I hope I've put at least a rudimentary case out there.
First, thank you for an intelligent response. I find it interesting to dialogue with others about beliefs, but it tends to degenerate into flame wars (which is why it's often avoided).
Your 'sight test' example provides me with an analogy. I am aware of the fallacy of overextending analogies, and will do my best to avoid that.
I want to turn your argument against you. You say that if this experiment of colored objects is carried out, and the sighted person correctly identifies all objects, this will constitute proof that Sight exists, and that this individual has the power to use it. There are a few problems here that carry over to the argument over the existence of God. First, the blind in this instance have no prior experience with sight. Even if everything about seeing were to be described to them in great detail, it would be so far beyond their experience as to be incomprehensible. Those who witnessed this act would construe it as supernatural, literally meaning above or more than what is natural, because for them blindness is natural.
Second, put yourself in their mindset. There is one person who can do these wild things that nobody understands. He can try to explain how he does it using analogies, but it's still basically beyond your abilities to comprehend. When you hear about this by word of mouth, or even on the radio, will you believe it without witnessing it yourself? You may argue that the experiment was performed by a reputable institution, but I would argue that a reputable institution wouldn't even dream of allowing such an insane person through their doors, much less let him do his little tricks.
What I'm getting at is that being given incontrovertible proof is useless unless that proof can be understood by those who are listening. Even those willing to listen will invariably try to reason out how the feat was accomplished, and compared to the simple truth, these reasons will be incredibly convoluted and not only incomplete but incompletable.
Now for the dangerous part - I want to apply this principle to the argument for a theistic universe, the "fine-tuning" argument.
For the sake of space, I'm going to assume you know the fine-tuning argument, and point you to this paper if you don't.
In summary, fine-tuning theory states that the basic parameters of physics must be set to such specific values that it can only be accounted for by intelligent design. This is, in essence, the results of the seeing person's experiment - the probability that we (life) would be capable of existing at all (not to mention human consciousness) is so small as to be impossible - a much more distant prospect than the 1/24 chance that the colored objects are named correctly. For further discussion, I'll have to simply say "look at the paper," as Dr. Collins has done much more research and is a philosopher by profession rather than hobby.
Your breakdown of arguments by Christians and your following responses is absolutely valid. I will not even touch args. 1 and 4-6 because your accusations of circular reasoning and mistrust of feelings/senses are valid, and indeed shared by me. As for the other two, there are some things I'd like to respond with. I'll quote the args. I'm responding to, for context.
2. Yes, the NFL wide receiver argument. "I want to thank God for giving me the ability to make that touchdown..." Yet we never hear, "We were kicking the other team's ass when Jesus suddenly decided to make me fumble three times." Good people win the lottery. Bad people win the lottery. Good people survive car accidents. Bad people survive car accidents. What makes you, the God-fearing Christian, more special than the other God-fearing Christian who is now hamburger in their smashed up Toyota Celica?
I have heard the opposite - bad things happen to everyone just as good things do, and there are examples in the Bible (Job, notably) of people being angry at God for being cruel. Also, th
It's obvious that the irony is understood, otherwise the inclusion of the parenthetical statement "Yes, such can and do exist" would have been omitted. It seems to me that you're the unthinking one in this exchange, as you've labelled the original poster as one of the many blindly believing masses when he clearly stated (and you quoted) that he wasn't. Or are you really so stupid as to believe that no Christians have reasoned through their faith and still have it?
Saying "there is a difference" and then not clarifying this difference is incomplete. I'd like to know what the difference is.
As for agnosticism, it's stating that we cannot know whether or not God exists - in a way, it's admitting that one doesn't know everything and while it's a cautious stance, I would not call it cowardly. (I am not an agnostic.)
I understand you now, and you're correct in saying that you are not talking about the uncanny valley. However, the symptoms of which you speak show a relationship to those of the valley: playing on humans' fear of abnormal portrayals of other humans. The uncanny valley results in the same thing, though unintentionally: robots will freak people out because they look like zombies, even though they are trying to portray normal humans. So, in essence, zombies are a good way to cause us to fear in games because it's a natural emotion to be repulsed by something so similar and yet so alien to ourselves.
I think I had better things to say, but they've stepped out, and won't be relevant by the time they return. I'm sorry.
I just read through one of the papers, and...I'll be honest - I'm not getting it. I haven't had time to digest anything, but I've been looking for an excuse to post this for a while, and it's sort of relevant here: our ability to affect the past due to wave/particle duality. It may fit in with parent's "continuum from past thru present onto the future." It's an interesting read, though I haven't actually followed up on its authenticity. Anyway, there's that - please comment if you read it; I'm interested to hear what others have to say.
There was a company, nantero, that was/is working on nanoscale RAM. Their site says that it will replace all other types of RAM. Problem is, all dates have been taken down, or else I'm not looking in the right place. I remember a year or so ago they wanted to have this rolled out by some small amount of time, like 2006 or 008, but I can't remember which. Does anybody know more?
Your competing theory is, in fact, the same thing. The "uncanny valley" is basically where zombies live - they LOOK incredibly human, but their motion just isn't quite right (the same thing applies to realistic robots).
I agree with you that this thing doesn't apply to video games - everything's either scripted or such basic movement that nobody really cares enough to get freaked out by their closeness to humans (though they can freak us out for other reasons such as jumping out from hiding, etc., but that's all by design).
Webster's for 'profane': 1. Marked by contempt or irreverence for what is sacred. 2. Nonreligious in subject matter, form, or use; secular: sacred and profane music. 3. Not admitted into a body of secret knowledge or ritual; uninitiated. 4. Vulgar; coarse.
By that definition, your statement is logically inconsistent. Even if you find the phrases extremely offensive, they are not profane.
As for taking abilities away, this only matters to television / radio, so unless you have a show...? I thought not. Still, I'm sure that the limited use of curse words on the air is balanced out by the limited discussion of religion allowed in schools, if you're looking for some twisted sense of fairness, which I think would be rather absurd.
The article says that the coin lands matching the top face 51% of the time. There is a 2% greater possibility of same-face landing. I'm willing to live with that when deciding who has to get the beer.
If that's not good enough for you, throw the coin at a wall or a cluttered tabletop - that should give you enough interference to truly randomize the decision. Sounds more fun to me, actually...
Popular Science has a longer (and IMO better) article on the entire project. It was written September 2003. It's got interesting information on the "Uncanny Valley" -- robots are okay, unless they look very much but not quite human - they call it "walking corpse." Hanson hopes to get past that valley and build (at least) a head that is a perfect human imitation.
It should be obvious that Andy is one of the people employed by the virus scanning cartels to write new viruses, which said companies use to fuel product sales.
"I think you would have a very hard time convincing a group of average (insert any race here) that this word is useful at all in today's modern vocabulary."
source: google cache of www.msu.edu/user/dynicrai/physics/dark.htm
THE DARK SUCKER THEORY
For years, it has been believed that electric bulbs emit light, but recent information has proved otherwise. Electric bulbs don't emit light; they suck dark. Thus, we call these bulbs Dark Suckers.
The Dark Sucker Theory and the existence of dark suckers prove that dark has mass and is heavier than light.
First, the basis of the Dark Sucker Theory is that electric bulbs suck dark. For example, take the Dark Sucker in the room you are in. There is much less dark right next to it than there is elsewhere. The larger the Dark Sucker, the greater its capacity to suck dark. Dark Suckers in the parking lot have a much greater capacity to suck dark than the ones in this room.
So with all things, Dark Suckers don't last forever. Once they are full of dark, they can no longer suck. This is proven by the dark spot on a full Dark Sucker. The dark which has been absorbed is then transmitted by pylons along to power plants where the machinery uses fossil fuel to destroy it.
A candle is a primitive Dark Sucker. A new candle has a white wick. You can see that after the first use, the wick turns black, representing all the dark that has been sucked into it. If you put a pencil next to the wick of an operating candle, it will turn black. This is because it got in the way of the dark flowing into the candle. One of the disadvantages of these primitive Dark Suckers is their limited range.
There are also portable Dark Suckers. In these, the bulbs can't handle all the dark by themselves and must be aided by a Dark Storage Unit. When the Dark Storage Unit is full, it must be either emptied or replaced before the portable Dark Sucker can operate again.
Dark has mass. When dark goes into a Dark Sucker, friction from the mass generates heat. Thus, it is not wise to touch an operating Dark Sucker. Candles present a special problem as the mass must travel into a solid wick instead of through clear glass. This generates a great amount of heat and therefore it's not wise to touch an operating candle. This is easily proven for lightbulbs too. When you compress a gas, it gets hot, right? So the light bulb gets hot because of all the dark being squished into the wires.
Also, dark is heavier than light. If you were to swim just below the surface of the lake, you would see a lot of light. If you were to slowly swim deeper and deeper, you would notice it getting darker and darker. When you get really deep, you would be in total darkness. This is because the heavier dark sinks to the bottom of the lake and the lighter light floats at the top. The is why it is called light.
Finally, we must prove that dark is faster than light. If you were to stand in a lit room in front of a closed, dark closet, and slowly opened the closet door, you would see the light slowly enter the closet. But since dark is so fast, you would not be able to see the dark leave the closet. So next time you see an electric bulb, remember that it is not a light emitter but a Dark Sucker.
Slashdot Mirror
I didn't know ET was built on Quake3 engine. From what I remember, you just wandered around for a while until you fell in a hole, then spent ten minutes craning your neck to float out, only to do the SAME THING AGAIN ten minutes later. The player models weren't very good, nor was the texturing. I would have expected more, considering the technology they were working with.
Also, how'd they fit that whole engine on an Atari cart?
Seriously. Lord knows we're screwed on spelling.
I don't know about the sulphur, but the acid should make things interesting...from Dino's POV anyway.
Actually, that's a poor comparison. If you steal a car, it does result in a lost sale, because a potential buyer no longer has the option to buy that car - the stock is gone. However, when copying music, the original merch is never taken from the owner - hence the difference between theft and copyright violation.
I read through your linked page. Some of your points show valid problems, but others are based on (from my POV) faulty logic, or have already been widely defused. Specifically, points 2, 3, 5, and possibly 9 are ones I'd be interested in responding to, but doing that on Slashdot tends to start flame wars. However, if you're interested, I'll post my thoughs and we can dialogue.
William Gibson actually has some similar ideas in his book Idoru (i believe it's that one anyway). One can buy designer components for the visual appearance of one's avatar. Perhaps someone who's read it more recently can give better examples.
I just created a profile (which consists of checking boxes that match your interests) and tried some searches.
There's a slider that tells Google how much to skew the search - all the way to the left and I believe it matches a standard Google search. All the way to the right and the results are highly skewed to match your preferences.
It seems to work pretty well. As a test case, I checked only Music (general) and searched for 'coughing.' When I moved the slider to 'personalized,' 9/10 results were for 'soul coughing,' a now defunct band that was known enough to have a significant presence on the web. With the slider to the left, 4/10 results were for Soul Coughing. Personalizing the search filtered out sites about the act of coughing and left sites that had 'coughing' and a music theme (not sure how it was done - have only looked at descriptions of sites).
This is by no means a real display of the accuracy or usefulness of the personalized search; it was just a little test.
I'll clarify: I wasn't saying God is not arbitrary therefore he exists, I was saying that the attributes associated with God are all at one end of the range - 0 or infinity. If a necessary being exists, it seems intuitive that it would not have arbitrary properties, as arbitrary properties beg explanations. God fits that description, so it is plausible that God is a necessary being and therefore exists. Sort of a 'best explanation' hypothesis.
I'm afraid that doesn't clear things up at all, but I'm not relying on circular arguments. You may say that the attributes of which I speak come from the Bible (which is NOT inerrant), and they are contained within but can also be reasoned through another exercise in logic: if a god created everything, that god must be more powerful than everything it created (this point is arguable, feel free to argue it). So from our frame of reference, that god is all-powerful (infinite power, far end of the spectrum, not arbitrary).
You're correct in saying that relying on the Bible for arguments results in circular reasoning. I was guilty of that when I was young, but I began searching for logical explanations and am satisfied that my beliefs are plausible. Like I said in another post - I'm not out to convert you, I'm defending my own beliefs.
I think you've summed up the situation well towards the end of your post. I will definitely be checking out those papers, though I haven't the time tonight. I would like to make a clarification regarding our blind example.
You say that you have not met any blind people in the world today who consider sight to be supernatural. I was working from the assumption that until this new, sighted person came along, everyone was blind and therefore no previous experience with sight existed. This is why I liked that example - Lance Armstrong on a bike is a higher degree of something you're accustomed to, whereas a new sense is completely foreign. Imagine someone came to you and said "I have telepathy; I can read your mind like a book." That's the angle I was taking.
As for the lottery example, you're absolutely right - an astronomical improbability is not an impossibility, which is why we're debating in the first place. I have other arguments, and you have other refutations. However, anything I say at this point is simply a restatement of what others have said before and can be researched by those interested. I was prompted to respond to your original arguments - I couldn't let them go unchallenged! - and I hope I've put at least a rudimentary case out there.
Feel free to have the last word if you wish =)
First, thank you for an intelligent response. I find it interesting to dialogue with others about beliefs, but it tends to degenerate into flame wars (which is why it's often avoided).
Your 'sight test' example provides me with an analogy. I am aware of the fallacy of overextending analogies, and will do my best to avoid that.
I want to turn your argument against you. You say that if this experiment of colored objects is carried out, and the sighted person correctly identifies all objects, this will constitute proof that Sight exists, and that this individual has the power to use it. There are a few problems here that carry over to the argument over the existence of God. First, the blind in this instance have no prior experience with sight. Even if everything about seeing were to be described to them in great detail, it would be so far beyond their experience as to be incomprehensible. Those who witnessed this act would construe it as supernatural, literally meaning above or more than what is natural, because for them blindness is natural.
Second, put yourself in their mindset. There is one person who can do these wild things that nobody understands. He can try to explain how he does it using analogies, but it's still basically beyond your abilities to comprehend. When you hear about this by word of mouth, or even on the radio, will you believe it without witnessing it yourself? You may argue that the experiment was performed by a reputable institution, but I would argue that a reputable institution wouldn't even dream of allowing such an insane person through their doors, much less let him do his little tricks.
What I'm getting at is that being given incontrovertible proof is useless unless that proof can be understood by those who are listening. Even those willing to listen will invariably try to reason out how the feat was accomplished, and compared to the simple truth, these reasons will be incredibly convoluted and not only incomplete but incompletable.
Now for the dangerous part - I want to apply this principle to the argument for a theistic universe, the "fine-tuning" argument.
For the sake of space, I'm going to assume you know the fine-tuning argument, and point you to this paper if you don't.
In summary, fine-tuning theory states that the basic parameters of physics must be set to such specific values that it can only be accounted for by intelligent design. This is, in essence, the results of the seeing person's experiment - the probability that we (life) would be capable of existing at all (not to mention human consciousness) is so small as to be impossible - a much more distant prospect than the 1/24 chance that the colored objects are named correctly. For further discussion, I'll have to simply say "look at the paper," as Dr. Collins has done much more research and is a philosopher by profession rather than hobby.
Your breakdown of arguments by Christians and your following responses is absolutely valid. I will not even touch args. 1 and 4-6 because your accusations of circular reasoning and mistrust of feelings/senses are valid, and indeed shared by me. As for the other two, there are some things I'd like to respond with. I'll quote the args. I'm responding to, for context.
2. Yes, the NFL wide receiver argument. "I want to thank God for giving me the ability to make that touchdown..." Yet we never hear, "We were kicking the other team's ass when Jesus suddenly decided to make me fumble three times." Good people win the lottery. Bad people win the lottery. Good people survive car accidents. Bad people survive car accidents. What makes you, the God-fearing Christian, more special than the other God-fearing Christian who is now hamburger in their smashed up Toyota Celica?
I have heard the opposite - bad things happen to everyone just as good things do, and there are examples in the Bible (Job, notably) of people being angry at God for being cruel. Also, th
It's obvious that the irony is understood, otherwise the inclusion of the parenthetical statement "Yes, such can and do exist" would have been omitted. It seems to me that you're the unthinking one in this exchange, as you've labelled the original poster as one of the many blindly believing masses when he clearly stated (and you quoted) that he wasn't. Or are you really so stupid as to believe that no Christians have reasoned through their faith and still have it?
Saying "there is a difference" and then not clarifying this difference is incomplete. I'd like to know what the difference is.
As for agnosticism, it's stating that we cannot know whether or not God exists - in a way, it's admitting that one doesn't know everything and while it's a cautious stance, I would not call it cowardly. (I am not an agnostic.)
I understand you now, and you're correct in saying that you are not talking about the uncanny valley.
However, the symptoms of which you speak show a relationship to those of the valley: playing on humans' fear of abnormal portrayals of other humans. The uncanny valley results in the same thing, though unintentionally: robots will freak people out because they look like zombies, even though they are trying to portray normal humans. So, in essence, zombies are a good way to cause us to fear in games because it's a natural emotion to be repulsed by something so similar and yet so alien to ourselves.
I think I had better things to say, but they've stepped out, and won't be relevant by the time they return. I'm sorry.
I just read through one of the papers, and...I'll be honest - I'm not getting it. I haven't had time to digest anything, but I've been looking for an excuse to post this for a while, and it's sort of relevant here: our ability to affect the past due to wave/particle duality. It may fit in with parent's "continuum from past thru present onto the future." It's an interesting read, though I haven't actually followed up on its authenticity. Anyway, there's that - please comment if you read it; I'm interested to hear what others have to say.
There was a company, nantero, that was/is working on nanoscale RAM. Their site says that it will replace all other types of RAM. Problem is, all dates have been taken down, or else I'm not looking in the right place. I remember a year or so ago they wanted to have this rolled out by some small amount of time, like 2006 or 008, but I can't remember which. Does anybody know more?
Your competing theory is, in fact, the same thing. The "uncanny valley" is basically where zombies live - they LOOK incredibly human, but their motion just isn't quite right (the same thing applies to realistic robots).
I agree with you that this thing doesn't apply to video games - everything's either scripted or such basic movement that nobody really cares enough to get freaked out by their closeness to humans (though they can freak us out for other reasons such as jumping out from hiding, etc., but that's all by design).
Er...
Webster's for 'profane':
1. Marked by contempt or irreverence for what is sacred.
2. Nonreligious in subject matter, form, or use; secular: sacred and profane music.
3. Not admitted into a body of secret knowledge or ritual; uninitiated.
4. Vulgar; coarse.
By that definition, your statement is logically inconsistent. Even if you find the phrases extremely offensive, they are not profane.
As for taking abilities away, this only matters to television / radio, so unless you have a show...? I thought not. Still, I'm sure that the limited use of curse words on the air is balanced out by the limited discussion of religion allowed in schools, if you're looking for some twisted sense of fairness, which I think would be rather absurd.
Pick a number,
any number.
The article says that the coin lands matching the top face 51% of the time. There is a 2% greater possibility of same-face landing. I'm willing to live with that when deciding who has to get the beer.
If that's not good enough for you, throw the coin at a wall or a cluttered tabletop - that should give you enough interference to truly randomize the decision. Sounds more fun to me, actually...
Does anyone else find grandparent and parent's procession of .sigs amusing?
Popular Science has a longer (and IMO better) article on the entire project. It was written September 2003. It's got interesting information on the "Uncanny Valley" -- robots are okay, unless they look very much but not quite human - they call it "walking corpse." Hanson hopes to get past that valley and build (at least) a head that is a perfect human imitation.
It should be obvious that Andy is one of the people employed by the virus scanning cartels to write new viruses, which said companies use to fuel product sales.
(thick & chunky tin foil included)
> The net result is increase (sic) sales.
Don't Be A Penis.
"I think you would have a very hard time convincing a group of average (insert any race here) that this word is useful at all in today's modern vocabulary."
humans?
source: google cache of
www.msu.edu/user/dynicrai/physics/dark.htm
THE DARK SUCKER THEORY
For years, it has been believed that electric bulbs emit light, but recent information has proved otherwise. Electric bulbs don't emit light; they suck dark. Thus, we call these bulbs Dark Suckers.
The Dark Sucker Theory and the existence of dark suckers prove that dark has mass and is heavier than light.
First, the basis of the Dark Sucker Theory is that electric bulbs suck dark. For example, take the Dark Sucker in the room you are in. There is much less dark right next to it than there is elsewhere. The larger the Dark Sucker, the greater its capacity to suck dark. Dark Suckers in the parking lot have a much greater capacity to suck dark than the ones in this room.
So with all things, Dark Suckers don't last forever. Once they are full of dark, they can no longer suck. This is proven by the dark spot on a full Dark Sucker. The dark which has been absorbed is then transmitted by pylons along to power plants where the machinery uses fossil fuel to destroy it.
A candle is a primitive Dark Sucker. A new candle has a white wick. You can see that after the first use, the wick turns black, representing all the dark that has been sucked into it. If you put a pencil next to the wick of an operating candle, it will turn black. This is because it got in the way of the dark flowing into the candle. One of the disadvantages of these primitive Dark Suckers is their limited range.
There are also portable Dark Suckers. In these, the bulbs can't handle all the dark by themselves and must be aided by a Dark Storage Unit. When the Dark Storage Unit is full, it must be either emptied or replaced before the portable Dark Sucker can operate again.
Dark has mass. When dark goes into a Dark Sucker, friction from the mass generates heat. Thus, it is not wise to touch an operating Dark Sucker. Candles present a special problem as the mass must travel into a solid wick instead of through clear glass. This generates a great amount of heat and therefore it's not wise to touch an operating candle. This is easily proven for lightbulbs too. When you compress a gas, it gets hot, right? So the light bulb gets hot because of all the dark being squished into the wires.
Also, dark is heavier than light. If you were to swim just below the surface of the lake, you would see a lot of light. If you were to slowly swim deeper and deeper, you would notice it getting darker and darker. When you get really deep, you would be in total darkness. This is because the heavier dark sinks to the bottom of the lake and the lighter light floats at the top. The is why it is called light.
Finally, we must prove that dark is faster than light. If you were to stand in a lit room in front of a closed, dark closet, and slowly opened the closet door, you would see the light slowly enter the closet. But since dark is so fast, you would not be able to see the dark leave the closet. So next time you see an electric bulb, remember that it is not a light emitter but a Dark Sucker.