You happily state your opinion, one that hasn't a shread of proof. But that's different of course... Scientific proof is stuff that strenghtens a theory. There's plenty of that around, look at the nice land-water fossils on whales. It's not proof like scriptures, meaning there is room for doubt, you don't have to switch off your brain, but it's pretty damned good stuff.
It seems to say to me and a lot of people "Ook".
That it doesn't speak to your imagination but makes you go all, well, sceptical and scientifically indignified, is not surprising. Let me just say "Eek eek eek eek".
(sorry, I just thought, let's have some faith here, but you can google for yourself if you need to read up on those stupid doubting whales)
At least they're not making cartoons... But read post above yours and you get why intelligent design gets a mention. And will deservedly get one for years to come as long as it's around. And um, how funny that God doesn't need any proof of existence, but evolution theory could still be us caught in a time loop.
That proves there is room for both science and religion. After all, even scientists need to switch off their brains once in a while...
Since the judge has said at the very beginning of the trail that he was the proud owner of an iPod, I'm not so sure this is as clear cut as you see it. In the end I think Apple Corp are going to win, but damages will be less than they want. IANAL...
I follow you. Still don't think I am there though. What makes more sense to me is PSP, XBox mini (whatever) or Nintendo getting *good* iPod like capacities. Three quarters of the hardware GUI are already there, big screen, and it's pretty clear you're walking around with an entertainment unit. And you're playing with a target group that is flexible enough to cope with the added features.
call me old fashioned but I like a phone that is good at keeping my phone numbers handy and making calls. I always go for the cheapest Nokia. Because it's easy. And I don't see that changing soon. Maybe I'm not typical. Or maybe I am, most people with iPods lack the interest or capacity to handle all those superior iPod killers out there. So maybe they won't buy a phone that adds ten more features to replace their stupid simple iPod?
Define better UI, please. FYI I don't have an iPod, so I'm not saying you can't possibly be right, but my very limited experience with these gizmo's happens to be "what is this", "WTF" and "Oh please" for everything non iPod, and "mmm, this I get" with the iPod.
I judge consumer stuff by consumer standards, not technological or brand (not saying I'm not sensitive to that, everybody is). And I would love to hear someone explain how a UI could be better than the iPod UI. Serious.
Nice to know. But are differences between states relevant for outsiders in science related articles? Slightly unrelated: I've heard it said that Belgium is the capital of Holland, Holland is somewhere around Amsterdam (which is of course essentially correct) and that Brussels is too small a country to be the capital of Europe. Mostly by people who lament the fact that we can't speak English like everybody else (conveniently forgetting they have this conversation over and over with the natives who in fact do speak English). Ahem, not to polarize this, just to make an OT post a bit more fun. The most telling experience was a conversation with an Atlanta Lawyer (quick, for ten points, what state?) who told us she pittied everyone living outside the US, that we had it so bad. That we essentially were waiting to be Americanized, that that was the best thing we could aspire to. This was in a French bar in Manhattan. Two elderly New Yorkers told the slightly drunk girl that she definitely had to travel a bit more. To which the lawyer confessed she'd never been outside the States. To which the french owner and me and my wife opened another bottle, expressing opinions on the futility of fighting against stupidity.
Sorry for the late reply, I was away. I appreciate your answer, and am compelled to share with you the viewpoint of an atheist (me), because your description is just as two-dimensional and lacking as I'm sure was mine:-)
Please assume the following: I am not trying to convert or to insult you. I don't feel you are trying to do either. Some of this post might insult you though. Politics and religion, you always run the risk...
So, on your post: I don't put science against religion. They are separate things. Maybe opposite in some things but one cannot replace the other. And indeed, science is not there to answer certain questions, although some scientific findings help clarify and debunk a lot. Why-questions are imo better left to philosophers (and can be fun, distressing, enlightning, sure). And well, I guess, religion too, although I am a bit sceptical towards authors who don't sign their work;-)
Where science (or at least scientific method) and religion clash heavily is on the matter of scripture. Whenever "we" (atheists) try to get to grips with the foundations of religion, we always find that "we don't get it" or "we take it too literally". Which I understand somewhat. Faith and conviction are not solely the domain of religion. But I am still a bit worried by it.
My assessment on Christianity as a church is the following (compact version. It's the result of numerous books on the subject, but since we're talking about faith just take it on faith that you can find these "opinions" if you will in political and religious history): it was founded by a roman emperor who wielded it as a sword in order to gain an empire. The miracles of those days were quite a bit more spectacular than those we get these days. His mother - being clever enough not to be too close to her son - found religion in a spectacular fashion by travelling to Jerusalem, finding Jesus' name in the records (contrary to earlier attempts by others) and finding his grave. imo pretty shaky foundations, and what follows is even less compelling. But the same can be said about most religions. Every Book is the result of serious censorship and culling of the original cult in order to get it in line with ruling society. FYI I didn't get any of this from Dan Brown's work;-)
What irks me personally is that from 300 after christ (enter roman emperor) until now the church has always been a power instrument at the beck of strong leaders (when the pope wasn't busy building his own empire) and still has a reputation of being about love, compassion and I don't know what. Even morals are what believers have and atheists lack.
So while I am a fan of science, it's not science versus religion for me. It's more in line with, well, given history and fact finding, there's about 0% credibility in scripture. Looking at the church, its history and even its current behavior, I can't find any inspiration there either. Not one religious person can explain adequately why his/her religion is in fact fact (however far removed from "official" orthodoxy) and the rest is superstition. But then I take it too literally, sigh.
On the "why" question, to be honest, I'm more kind of "now that I'm here, what's the situation, what can this monkey do". For me life seems more wonderful if I don't look for a higher power but just look around. And maybe I'm just wired that way, maybe I am the one who's weird, but building castles on quicksand gives me the opposite of fullfilment, purpose, strength. It's not very um, inspiring, but the thought that "we're just monkeys, we're all we have and we all have at least that in common, and look at us, we already walk upright, we might just outgrow ourselves" makes me glow and fill me with wonder and awe. It may make you laugh, but I am quite quite serious.
Let's see, you still believe in God, I still don't and if we don't have a reason to know and respect each other we'll be faintly embarrassed by each other. Almost like family
Everybody knows about the RDF. Strangely enough, while there are so many better looking and nicer human beings around, nobody seems to get it to work without a SJ. (that's a Steve Jobs module for the laymen).
It seems however there is a small group of people that is almost immune (100% immunity doesn't exist, just visit arstechnica...) IHL subjects (irrational hardware lovers) have a built in blindness for everything geared at normal customers.
While the IHL will typically save money on SJR products, they'll happily toss it away on J&P (Junk and Parts). And they sadly do suffer stress caused by the rest of the population who really don't RTFM, surprisingly enough don't care about Ogg and will toss everything they can't get to work in two days time. And never buy tossed gizmo AGAIN. Even if it's cheaper, better and sexier if only they'd RTFM - which they don't, see above.
The IHL can't understand this. Me neither, but that may be because I've been suffering an ear infection the last couple of years, seemingly caused by pushing too many white earbuds in my ears at the same time. One iPod at a time, one at a time...
No quarrel about intrinsic value (at least not about religion having any), and futile is not the best word for everybody, for me it is. But I readily admit that I'm not that logical or rigid on all areas (at least, I hope I'm not).
He'd/She/it would have to open all registers to make me believe. And would have to promise to make an appearance every time I'd be making a convert. Or else agree to the fact that all his other believers wouldn't actually believe in HIM/HER/IT but in my poor attempts at demagogy or enlightened self-interest or be sheep or indoctrinated at extreme young age.
Those prophets sure had a raw deal (or ate too many mushrooms).
It's nice that you're trying to put gospel in perspective, but in the same vein you can defend every religion. Now, going along with that, what makes your reference a belief deserving respect and the other ones superstition (but of course equally deserving respect, we're after all rational human beings, um, ah)?
IMO the idea of one god versus as many as there are mountains is equally valid (meaning to me: not valid at all). And the difference between explaining that god actually counts days different than we do or that yes the earth is flat, but spherically so is non existent. It's an exercise in futility. I can understand that you do the exercise. If not, what is valid, right? Mind you, it's possible to have this type of intellectual crisis about lots of human concepts eg truth and justice.
If you find all this bewildering, you'll have some understanding why atheists have such a hard time with adults believing in santa claus or God.
With all respect for your person, and even more for your attempt at rationalizing something that when all is said and done is NOT meant to be scrutinized but taken by, yes, faith.
Apple is a solution company, blending hardware and software into something appealing. MS is a software company. I don't think they'll go the Apple road...
First off, this is a dedicated effort, akin to getting linux on your toaster. But second, there indeed is a niche group of mac users who like computers in general so will most likely try this. Third, there is also a niche group that actually needs windows from time to time and is savvy enough to maintain a windows machine on generic hardware for that, so why not a dual install on their mac. So hurray!
Look, I'm not out to bash the Gimp, but do you have any real evidence that the majority is actually using the Gimp? It's the best free app out there to do things you would otherwise do in Photoshop, but I am reasonably sure most people just install a friend's version of photoshop, even if they're aware of the existence of the Gimp. If you can show me evidence to the contrary I am extremely interested. Really.
I have both PS and the Gimp, because I'm the type to have both, but there's loads of stuff that' either hard to do or plain impossible in the Gimp. Tough luck, but I'm practical. And I'm not blind to the fact that I am used to Photoshop, but even a hardcore Gimp user will have to perform quite a few minor miracles the moment he has to work for pre-press or needs to share his work in collaborative design. Which includes a lot of not so professional work.
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You happily state your opinion, one that hasn't a shread of proof. But that's different of course...
Scientific proof is stuff that strenghtens a theory. There's plenty of that around, look at the nice land-water fossils on whales. It's not proof like scriptures, meaning there is room for doubt, you don't have to switch off your brain, but it's pretty damned good stuff.
It seems to say to me and a lot of people "Ook".
That it doesn't speak to your imagination but makes you go all, well, sceptical and scientifically indignified, is not surprising. Let me just say "Eek eek eek eek".
(sorry, I just thought, let's have some faith here, but you can google for yourself if you need to read up on those stupid doubting whales)
At least they're not making cartoons...
But read post above yours and you get why intelligent design gets a mention. And will deservedly get one for years to come as long as it's around.
And um, how funny that God doesn't need any proof of existence, but evolution theory could still be us caught in a time loop.
That proves there is room for both science and religion. After all, even scientists need to switch off their brains once in a while...
Who callest thou Luddite?!?
Since the judge has said at the very beginning of the trail that he was the proud owner of an iPod, I'm not so sure this is as clear cut as you see it. In the end I think Apple Corp are going to win, but damages will be less than they want. IANAL...
I follow you. Still don't think I am there though. What makes more sense to me is PSP, XBox mini (whatever) or Nintendo getting *good* iPod like capacities. Three quarters of the hardware GUI are already there, big screen, and it's pretty clear you're walking around with an entertainment unit. And you're playing with a target group that is flexible enough to cope with the added features.
call me old fashioned but I like a phone that is good at keeping my phone numbers handy and making calls. I always go for the cheapest Nokia. Because it's easy.
And I don't see that changing soon. Maybe I'm not typical. Or maybe I am, most people with iPods lack the interest or capacity to handle all those superior iPod killers out there. So maybe they won't buy a phone that adds ten more features to replace their stupid simple iPod?
"other players have better UIs"
Define better UI, please. FYI I don't have an iPod, so I'm not saying you can't possibly be right, but my very limited experience with these gizmo's happens to be "what is this", "WTF" and "Oh please" for everything non iPod, and "mmm, this I get" with the iPod.
I judge consumer stuff by consumer standards, not technological or brand (not saying I'm not sensitive to that, everybody is). And I would love to hear someone explain how a UI could be better than the iPod UI. Serious.
Nice to know. But are differences between states relevant for outsiders in science related articles?
Slightly unrelated: I've heard it said that Belgium is the capital of Holland, Holland is somewhere around Amsterdam (which is of course essentially correct) and that Brussels is too small a country to be the capital of Europe. Mostly by people who lament the fact that we can't speak English like everybody else (conveniently forgetting they have this conversation over and over with the natives who in fact do speak English). Ahem, not to polarize this, just to make an OT post a bit more fun. The most telling experience was a conversation with an Atlanta Lawyer (quick, for ten points, what state?) who told us she pittied everyone living outside the US, that we had it so bad. That we essentially were waiting to be Americanized, that that was the best thing we could aspire to. This was in a French bar in Manhattan. Two elderly New Yorkers told the slightly drunk girl that she definitely had to travel a bit more. To which the lawyer confessed she'd never been outside the States.
To which the french owner and me and my wife opened another bottle, expressing opinions on the futility of fighting against stupidity.
"But what inquiring minds want to know is what does it taste like?"
IANAP but I thought that depended on the flavor?
Well, maybe it's time computers moved into consumer space, that is, if one wants consumers to continue to buy them.
Sorry for the late reply, I was away. I appreciate your answer, and am compelled to share with you the viewpoint of an atheist (me), because your description is just as two-dimensional and lacking as I'm sure was mine :-)
;-)
;-)
Please assume the following: I am not trying to convert or to insult you. I don't feel you are trying to do either. Some of this post might insult you though. Politics and religion, you always run the risk...
So, on your post: I don't put science against religion. They are separate things. Maybe opposite in some things but one cannot replace the other. And indeed, science is not there to answer certain questions, although some scientific findings help clarify and debunk a lot. Why-questions are imo better left to philosophers (and can be fun, distressing, enlightning, sure). And well, I guess, religion too, although I am a bit sceptical towards authors who don't sign their work
Where science (or at least scientific method) and religion clash heavily is on the matter of scripture. Whenever "we" (atheists) try to get to grips with the foundations of religion, we always find that "we don't get it" or "we take it too literally". Which I understand somewhat. Faith and conviction are not solely the domain of religion. But I am still a bit worried by it.
My assessment on Christianity as a church is the following (compact version. It's the result of numerous books on the subject, but since we're talking about faith just take it on faith that you can find these "opinions" if you will in political and religious history): it was founded by a roman emperor who wielded it as a sword in order to gain an empire. The miracles of those days were quite a bit more spectacular than those we get these days. His mother - being clever enough not to be too close to her son - found religion in a spectacular fashion by travelling to Jerusalem, finding Jesus' name in the records (contrary to earlier attempts by others) and finding his grave. imo pretty shaky foundations, and what follows is even less compelling. But the same can be said about most religions. Every Book is the result of serious censorship and culling of the original cult in order to get it in line with ruling society. FYI I didn't get any of this from Dan Brown's work
What irks me personally is that from 300 after christ (enter roman emperor) until now the church has always been a power instrument at the beck of strong leaders (when the pope wasn't busy building his own empire) and still has a reputation of being about love, compassion and I don't know what. Even morals are what believers have and atheists lack.
So while I am a fan of science, it's not science versus religion for me. It's more in line with, well, given history and fact finding, there's about 0% credibility in scripture. Looking at the church, its history and even its current behavior, I can't find any inspiration there either. Not one religious person can explain adequately why his/her religion is in fact fact (however far removed from "official" orthodoxy) and the rest is superstition. But then I take it too literally, sigh.
On the "why" question, to be honest, I'm more kind of "now that I'm here, what's the situation, what can this monkey do". For me life seems more wonderful if I don't look for a higher power but just look around. And maybe I'm just wired that way, maybe I am the one who's weird, but building castles on quicksand gives me the opposite of fullfilment, purpose, strength. It's not very um, inspiring, but the thought that "we're just monkeys, we're all we have and we all have at least that in common, and look at us, we already walk upright, we might just outgrow ourselves" makes me glow and fill me with wonder and awe. It may make you laugh, but I am quite quite serious.
Let's see, you still believe in God, I still don't and if we don't have a reason to know and respect each other we'll be faintly embarrassed by each other. Almost like family
"The Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field (RDF)."
Everybody knows about the RDF. Strangely enough, while there are so many better looking and nicer human beings around, nobody seems to get it to work without a SJ. (that's a Steve Jobs module for the laymen).
It seems however there is a small group of people that is almost immune (100% immunity doesn't exist, just visit arstechnica...)
IHL subjects (irrational hardware lovers) have a built in blindness for everything geared at normal customers.
While the IHL will typically save money on SJR products, they'll happily toss it away on J&P (Junk and Parts). And they sadly do suffer stress caused by the rest of the population who really don't RTFM, surprisingly enough don't care about Ogg and will toss everything they can't get to work in two days time. And never buy tossed gizmo AGAIN. Even if it's cheaper, better and sexier if only they'd RTFM - which they don't, see above.
The IHL can't understand this. Me neither, but that may be because I've been suffering an ear infection the last couple of years, seemingly caused by pushing too many white earbuds in my ears at the same time. One iPod at a time, one at a time...
Cheers
No quarrel about intrinsic value (at least not about religion having any), and futile is not the best word for everybody, for me it is. But I readily admit that I'm not that logical or rigid on all areas (at least, I hope I'm not).
He'd/She/it would have to open all registers to make me believe. And would have to promise to make an appearance every time I'd be making a convert. Or else agree to the fact that all his other believers wouldn't actually believe in HIM/HER/IT but in my poor attempts at demagogy or enlightened self-interest or be sheep or indoctrinated at extreme young age.
Those prophets sure had a raw deal (or ate too many mushrooms).
"Only by making up your own mind using your own sources you can become a whole and balanced person.
Lifelong study is the duty of a religious person."
So how does that work. You sit down, think about it and say "YES, there is a God, and by golly, He's Almighty!"
I can't help it, I've got to bite.
So, in fact religion now is a free for all where you can discard what you think silly and believe what is holy?
This to me is even stranger than people who believe the whole thing.
"am I the only one who giggles like a school girl when they read "homo erectus"?"
/. I'm guessing, NO.
Since this is
It's nice that you're trying to put gospel in perspective, but in the same vein you can defend every religion. Now, going along with that, what makes your reference a belief deserving respect and the other ones superstition (but of course equally deserving respect, we're after all rational human beings, um, ah)?
IMO the idea of one god versus as many as there are mountains is equally valid (meaning to me: not valid at all). And the difference between explaining that god actually counts days different than we do or that yes the earth is flat, but spherically so is non existent. It's an exercise in futility. I can understand that you do the exercise. If not, what is valid, right? Mind you, it's possible to have this type of intellectual crisis about lots of human concepts eg truth and justice.
If you find all this bewildering, you'll have some understanding why atheists have such a hard time with adults believing in santa claus or God.
With all respect for your person, and even more for your attempt at rationalizing something that when all is said and done is NOT meant to be scrutinized but taken by, yes, faith.
All religions are true for a given value of true...
Which shouldn't distract adults from actually using their brains instead of memorizing gospel.
Apple is a solution company, blending hardware and software into something appealing. MS is a software company. I don't think they'll go the Apple road...
"Jobs is an idiot for insisting that his software can only run on his hardware."
And my painter is an idiot for not being a plumber.
This is a very limited set of hardware they're aiming at. Things will probably get more confused when Apple adds to their product line.
First off, this is a dedicated effort, akin to getting linux on your toaster. But second, there indeed is a niche group of mac users who like computers in general so will most likely try this. Third, there is also a niche group that actually needs windows from time to time and is savvy enough to maintain a windows machine on generic hardware for that, so why not a dual install on their mac. So hurray!
Well, let's hope those patents go the way of the dodo...
Look, I'm not out to bash the Gimp, but do you have any real evidence that the majority is actually using the Gimp? It's the best free app out there to do things you would otherwise do in Photoshop, but I am reasonably sure most people just install a friend's version of photoshop, even if they're aware of the existence of the Gimp. If you can show me evidence to the contrary I am extremely interested. Really.
I have both PS and the Gimp, because I'm the type to have both, but there's loads of stuff that' either hard to do or plain impossible in the Gimp. Tough luck, but I'm practical. And I'm not blind to the fact that I am used to Photoshop, but even a hardcore Gimp user will have to perform quite a few minor miracles the moment he has to work for pre-press or needs to share his work in collaborative design. Which includes a lot of not so professional work.