I do like the idea of a variably sized beowulf cluster running a floating number of package (LAMP) servers. Get more clients? Add more VLAMPs. Things slowing down? Add more hardware.
You still take performance hits, but if you can scale your system by just adding cheap commodity systems, that works. Plug it in, boot it off a CD, and let the Cluster take control.
Seriously. I don't know who gave anyone the impression that virtualization was a performance booster. Management improver? Sure. Stability insurance? Why not? But if you don't get that virtualizing your servers imposes a bit of overhead, then you're probably not paying attention.
I especially love the idea that running different types of server virtualized on the same machine is a good idea; the idea of virtualization of multiple servers is to distribute the load. If you have, say, ftpd, httpd and mysqld running as their own virtualized systems, they will all get hit *simultaneously*.
"The evolutionists can (and will) continue to change, reshape, and rethink their theory..."
Hence the term 'Theory'. Of course, there's two distinct parts of evolution. The history (theory) and the process (speciationa nd adaptation via the law of natural selection). Of course the history gets continuously revised; we don't have all the data yet. We know what the beginning must have looked like, and we know what the end looks like, and we have a lot of data on the middle, but there's hazy bits. That's what's being rethought. The history, not the process.
"...until the return of Jesus."
Irrelevant, and wishful thinking.
"They'll be forced to do so, as it becomes apparent to them that some scientific fact arises for which the current iteration of said theory cannot account."
Ah, the words of someone who didn't bother reading the article. Thanks for playing.
Summary: Evolution, the historical record of species evolution on earth is being rethought, as there is new evidence to refine our understanding of it, and is as yet theoretical.
Evolution, the process of speciation (the forking off of species) and adaptation through natural selection, is quite firmly proven.
Unfortunately, Conservapedia was started by a group of fundie literalists in New Jersey to correct what they felt were 'glaring errors' and a 'liberal agenda' in Wikipedia.
In other words, yes, there really are people that stupid.
"Nobody has EVER made a fossil. NO fossils are being made anywhere today, especially by any slow, gradual process, sometimes imagined by evolutionists."
Two words: Snow Mummies.
"To prevent this, a dead body needs to be put in an environment that prevents all microorganisms from feeding on the remains and oxygen must be excluded."
Hm. Like drowning in tar?
"A sudden disastrous upheaval such as the Biblical flood could certainly account for fossils."
Yes. Because there are no waterborne microorganisms.
Read as "Naturally occuring semi-modern fossils"
"The unwarranted assumption (faith) is that such radioactive decay rates have never varied over the vast periods of time evolutionists need in order to make their assertions seem plausible."
In order for radioactive decay rates to change, there would need to be some fundamental changes in a number of unary (ie: they equal 1) quantum constants. These constants only exist to translate from conventional units of measurement into quantum units. I would submit that you need to show evidence to suggest that any QED constant has drifted by any small percent over the time we've known about them.
Seriously. Is it that you're trolling on purpose, or are you actually someone who is *just* educated enough to sound this stupid?
The only 'evolutionist agenda' is a subset of the scientific agenda: to promote the understanding of how the universe works, and to investigate the universe to widen our understanding.
The only thing that causes evolutionary theory to stand out as a pariah is that it interferes with the credibility of religion. So it becomes an 'agenda', rather than a subset of biological science to those who are offended by the offense to their imaginary friend.
Can't deal with reality? Sorry, that's not my problem. Want to espouse your unsupported view? As with any semi-academic forum, you'd better be prepared for a debate - and as with any internet-based forum, you'd better be prepared for flaming.
Oh my god, I don't believe I've ever seen such unbridled stupid!
Honestly. With the mostly well assembled gramer and proper punctuation, I have to assume that was satire; you'd have to have an IQ below 75 to say that shit.
That brings the conversation to the concept of rational anarchy - that you're free to do as you please, but that your actions may carry consequences for which you are responsible (read 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress' by Robert A. Heinlein).
For some reason, there is a greater proportion of rational anarchy among atheists than theists, but as they say in statistics, correlation is not always statistically significant. Apply such correlations to people, and you're just stereotyping.
"I think this is just pandering to the religious. There is no sensible or logical way to determine the probability of God anyway."
If you go read "The God Delusion", I believe Richard Dawkins might contest your point. Indeed, that's where most of the below argument comes from - in spirit, if not in wording. Just so you know, mentioning his name alone is a good way to piss theists off, mostly because I've never seen a one refute his logic. I don't know if it's because they can't actually read such a long book, or because his arguments are bulletproof.
"No, this is not true. It can be argued that the default position is atheism. Anyway, atheism is not a belief. It the absence of belief."
That really depends on how you come to it. The rational atheist can state, with a finite amount of certainty, how unlikely the concept of God is. The irrational atheist cannot, and can rather only state that there is no God.
The difference, of course, is that without a certain amount of study on the subject, you can't say with honesty both that there is no God and that you don't believe as far as deitys go. If you say there is no God, you're stating a belief, as it can't be proven that there is not. However, by showing that God is about as probable as the tooth faerie, you've shown that it's not a belief, but a logical conclusion.
As with most things, dealing in absolutes is asking for trouble; the argument from probability usually shuts up the "But you can't prove it!" douchebags, as you've already headed off their argument by doing a little investigation.
I apologize, you and he seem to misunderstand how natural selection works. It's not a random process; it's a directed process (towards survival) that effectively feeds off randomness as a source of energy.
Think about how a bridge rectifier works: normally, they're used for the purpose of converting AC current into DC, however, the input voltage can be completely random, and it would still produce DC current.
Similarly, if a self-replicating molecule (SRM) is modified (ie: damaged by environmental effects) in a way that causes it not to survive, or that causes its progeny to fail to survive or replicate, that SRM form doesn't continue to appear in its environment.
Similarly, it's not 'survival of the fittest', as is always quoted. It's 'continuance of the survivors' - as many 'fit' survivors coexist easily, and the 'fittest' only comes into play when there is competition for survival resources (food, shelter, etc).
In short, the only two truly random occurences in the creation of life were these two: first, the start of natural selection itself by the formation of the first self-replicating molecules. These proto-beasties are pretty common occurrences in primordial earth models, so I won't be bothering my lucky stars about them.
The other one is the particular configuration of creature mankind ended up in; with the only directive in natural selection being survival, sentient life could have evolved into any biologically based form, depending on the conditions that surrounded its growth.
Of course, this guarantees a few things, the most important of which is that, if there's a cosmologically earth-like plantet out there (ie: the same amount of stellar radiation falling on a body of similar mass that started out as a lava-ball), there is very likely to be life on it in one form or another. The other is that eventually, any sentient life will become intellignet enough to speculate on its own origins, yet pass through a phase where they're stupid enough to figure they were built by something else.
"That said - and here many xians feel offended - one can not give people who believe in the idea of a 'god' (as described in the bible) any more credibility than those who would believe in Allah, or in Shiva, or Inti (the Inca Sun god), or in tooth-fairies."
One of my favorite points to make: The degree to which a nation of individuals is religious should have no bearing on how the government is run. The second you introduce one religions' values, regardless of how ubiquitous you think they are, you've oppressed someone. Keep religion out of politics, and life will fare much more easily.
Generally, educated atheists express the concept of God in terms of a low probability, which can be shown logically.
Conversely, uneducated atheists are, in a way, religious, in that they believe something that flies in the face of common wisdom without having an argument to show whether or not their belief is likely.
For example, I don't believe there are unicorns living below Mars' crust. I can't prove they're not there, but I can state how likely they are to be. Because that probability is very low, I can behave in a way that assumes they do not exist.
Hm. I don't think I see the point, then, of supposed 'Karma Whoring'. I've had an 'Excellent' rating since my first month as a registered user. And I can be a dick. I swear I've gotten 'Troll' moddings as often as 'Insightful' or 'Interesting', or even 'Funny' (Honestly, I think 'Troll' and 'Funny' are sides of the same bit of relativity; I've seen some funny damned trolls).
Could it be that some people here are so adept at pissing others off that they can't get their rating up?
Chill. I doubt he fears you or your arguments - especially that they seem to come from a sense of frustration.
And it's true. Mostly, atheists are talking to each other when making logical arguments against religion - mostly to provide each of us with "make the proseltyzer feel stupid so he'll leave me alone" ammo.
Most of us realize that you'll drop the imaginary friend in your own time, or maybe you won't; either way, nothing we say will change it. For that segment of us, it's to create a bullet-proof anti-preacher sheild. What fun is it, for example, to be told you're going to hell if you don't have a good argument as to why hell probably doesn't exist?
That said, the majority of us aren't really looking for an argument. We know arguments happen; we're quite outnumbered in the world, and it's very hard to keep the fact that you don't actually believe in God to yourself. You know. It comes up - and nine times out of ten, when it does, you end up getting the third degree by someone who was satisfied with 'Because God made it that way' for their whole lives or the 'flavor of the month' theist who is newly converted and wants to share (read: force) her new insights with you. Initially, argument prep is self-defence, though it often migrates to preemptive defense and outright flaming.
We should be more mature than that, and in fact, most of us are. It's just that, like any group, you get the teenagers and the adults who never left high school who are so damned sure of themselves that they can't be bothered to respect the choices of others.
I try to reprimand my fellow atheists occasionally when they step out of line; responses to insane proseltyzing that includes threats of damnation don't get rebuffed, but once in a while you'll get the genuinely curious question about atheism and the vitrolic atheist auto-reponse - and I'll shoot that down every time.
I can't moderate all the 'fuck God!' posts. I'd go crazy. But I just want to let you know that most of us aren't actually like that. We're good, normal people who just happen to not believe in a deity or deities.
Slashdot Mirror
I do. I feel that AMD should stop beating itself and get back to beating Intel!
No, seriously, though. I'm holding out on the hope that AMD's licensing of ZRAM will be able to keep them in the game.
Hey, wake me when they've got 512M of base RAM directly on the chip, will you?
A sister of my department here actually does this for its academic hosting. Though, it's a grid, not a cluster.
Given the source, I'm skeptical about the accuracy of this article.
Wow. A "Well, DUH" post I wrote got modded insightful. How's that for irony.
Guys, the button you're looking for is 'Redundant'.
I do like the idea of a variably sized beowulf cluster running a floating number of package (LAMP) servers. Get more clients? Add more VLAMPs. Things slowing down? Add more hardware.
You still take performance hits, but if you can scale your system by just adding cheap commodity systems, that works. Plug it in, boot it off a CD, and let the Cluster take control.
Duh.
Seriously. I don't know who gave anyone the impression that virtualization was a performance booster. Management improver? Sure. Stability insurance? Why not? But if you don't get that virtualizing your servers imposes a bit of overhead, then you're probably not paying attention.
I especially love the idea that running different types of server virtualized on the same machine is a good idea; the idea of virtualization of multiple servers is to distribute the load. If you have, say, ftpd, httpd and mysqld running as their own virtualized systems, they will all get hit *simultaneously*.
Again. Duh.
"The evolutionists can (and will) continue to change, reshape, and rethink their theory ..."
Hence the term 'Theory'. Of course, there's two distinct parts of evolution. The history (theory) and the process (speciationa nd adaptation via the law of natural selection). Of course the history gets continuously revised; we don't have all the data yet. We know what the beginning must have looked like, and we know what the end looks like, and we have a lot of data on the middle, but there's hazy bits. That's what's being rethought. The history, not the process.
"...until the return of Jesus."
Irrelevant, and wishful thinking.
"They'll be forced to do so, as it becomes apparent to them that some scientific fact arises for which the current iteration of said theory cannot account."
Ah, the words of someone who didn't bother reading the article. Thanks for playing.
Summary:
Evolution, the historical record of species evolution on earth is being rethought, as there is new evidence to refine our understanding of it, and is as yet theoretical.
Evolution, the process of speciation (the forking off of species) and adaptation through natural selection, is quite firmly proven.
Unfortunately, Conservapedia was started by a group of fundie literalists in New Jersey to correct what they felt were 'glaring errors' and a 'liberal agenda' in Wikipedia.
In other words, yes, there really are people that stupid.
"Nobody has EVER made a fossil. NO fossils are being made anywhere today, especially by any slow, gradual process, sometimes imagined by evolutionists."
Two words: Snow Mummies.
"To prevent this, a dead body needs to be put in an environment that prevents all microorganisms from feeding on the remains and oxygen must be excluded."
Hm. Like drowning in tar?
"A sudden disastrous upheaval such as the Biblical flood could certainly account for fossils."
Yes. Because there are no waterborne microorganisms.
Read as "Naturally occuring semi-modern fossils"
"The unwarranted assumption (faith) is that such radioactive decay rates have never varied over the vast periods of time evolutionists need in order to make their assertions seem plausible."
In order for radioactive decay rates to change, there would need to be some fundamental changes in a number of unary (ie: they equal 1) quantum constants. These constants only exist to translate from conventional units of measurement into quantum units. I would submit that you need to show evidence to suggest that any QED constant has drifted by any small percent over the time we've known about them.
Seriously. Is it that you're trolling on purpose, or are you actually someone who is *just* educated enough to sound this stupid?
"A man's religion is to be respected about as far as is his belief that his wife is pretty and that his children are smart."
- Richard Dawkins (?)
The only 'evolutionist agenda' is a subset of the scientific agenda: to promote the understanding of how the universe works, and to investigate the universe to widen our understanding.
The only thing that causes evolutionary theory to stand out as a pariah is that it interferes with the credibility of religion. So it becomes an 'agenda', rather than a subset of biological science to those who are offended by the offense to their imaginary friend.
Can't deal with reality? Sorry, that's not my problem. Want to espouse your unsupported view? As with any semi-academic forum, you'd better be prepared for a debate - and as with any internet-based forum, you'd better be prepared for flaming.
Gah!
Oh my god, I don't believe I've ever seen such unbridled stupid!
Honestly. With the mostly well assembled gramer and proper punctuation, I have to assume that was satire; you'd have to have an IQ below 75 to say that shit.
That dude is hilarious. I saw him on Never Mind the Buzzcocks, the ep with the guy from Torchwood.
We'll have to call it early quantum state phenomenon - Only way to fit five-thousand species of mammal on the same boat...
Well...
That brings the conversation to the concept of rational anarchy - that you're free to do as you please, but that your actions may carry consequences for which you are responsible (read 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress' by Robert A. Heinlein).
For some reason, there is a greater proportion of rational anarchy among atheists than theists, but as they say in statistics, correlation is not always statistically significant. Apply such correlations to people, and you're just stereotyping.
"I think this is just pandering to the religious. There is no sensible or logical way to determine the probability of God anyway."
If you go read "The God Delusion", I believe Richard Dawkins might contest your point. Indeed, that's where most of the below argument comes from - in spirit, if not in wording. Just so you know, mentioning his name alone is a good way to piss theists off, mostly because I've never seen a one refute his logic. I don't know if it's because they can't actually read such a long book, or because his arguments are bulletproof.
"No, this is not true. It can be argued that the default position is atheism. Anyway, atheism is not a belief. It the absence of belief."
That really depends on how you come to it. The rational atheist can state, with a finite amount of certainty, how unlikely the concept of God is. The irrational atheist cannot, and can rather only state that there is no God.
The difference, of course, is that without a certain amount of study on the subject, you can't say with honesty both that there is no God and that you don't believe as far as deitys go. If you say there is no God, you're stating a belief, as it can't be proven that there is not. However, by showing that God is about as probable as the tooth faerie, you've shown that it's not a belief, but a logical conclusion.
As with most things, dealing in absolutes is asking for trouble; the argument from probability usually shuts up the "But you can't prove it!" douchebags, as you've already headed off their argument by doing a little investigation.
I apologize, you and he seem to misunderstand how natural selection works. It's not a random process; it's a directed process (towards survival) that effectively feeds off randomness as a source of energy.
Think about how a bridge rectifier works: normally, they're used for the purpose of converting AC current into DC, however, the input voltage can be completely random, and it would still produce DC current.
Similarly, if a self-replicating molecule (SRM) is modified (ie: damaged by environmental effects) in a way that causes it not to survive, or that causes its progeny to fail to survive or replicate, that SRM form doesn't continue to appear in its environment.
Similarly, it's not 'survival of the fittest', as is always quoted. It's 'continuance of the survivors' - as many 'fit' survivors coexist easily, and the 'fittest' only comes into play when there is competition for survival resources (food, shelter, etc).
In short, the only two truly random occurences in the creation of life were these two: first, the start of natural selection itself by the formation of the first self-replicating molecules. These proto-beasties are pretty common occurrences in primordial earth models, so I won't be bothering my lucky stars about them.
The other one is the particular configuration of creature mankind ended up in; with the only directive in natural selection being survival, sentient life could have evolved into any biologically based form, depending on the conditions that surrounded its growth.
Of course, this guarantees a few things, the most important of which is that, if there's a cosmologically earth-like plantet out there (ie: the same amount of stellar radiation falling on a body of similar mass that started out as a lava-ball), there is very likely to be life on it in one form or another. The other is that eventually, any sentient life will become intellignet enough to speculate on its own origins, yet pass through a phase where they're stupid enough to figure they were built by something else.
"That said - and here many xians feel offended - one can not give people who believe in the idea of a 'god' (as described in the bible) any more credibility than those who would believe in Allah, or in Shiva, or Inti (the Inca Sun god), or in tooth-fairies."
One of my favorite points to make: The degree to which a nation of individuals is religious should have no bearing on how the government is run. The second you introduce one religions' values, regardless of how ubiquitous you think they are, you've oppressed someone. Keep religion out of politics, and life will fare much more easily.
Generally, educated atheists express the concept of God in terms of a low probability, which can be shown logically.
Conversely, uneducated atheists are, in a way, religious, in that they believe something that flies in the face of common wisdom without having an argument to show whether or not their belief is likely.
For example, I don't believe there are unicorns living below Mars' crust. I can't prove they're not there, but I can state how likely they are to be. Because that probability is very low, I can behave in a way that assumes they do not exist.
Hm. I don't think I see the point, then, of supposed 'Karma Whoring'. I've had an 'Excellent' rating since my first month as a registered user. And I can be a dick. I swear I've gotten 'Troll' moddings as often as 'Insightful' or 'Interesting', or even 'Funny' (Honestly, I think 'Troll' and 'Funny' are sides of the same bit of relativity; I've seen some funny damned trolls).
Could it be that some people here are so adept at pissing others off that they can't get their rating up?
My computer is necessary for me to acquire money, which in turn makes it necessary for survival.
Query: How is karma calculated? I'm honestly curious.
Chill. I doubt he fears you or your arguments - especially that they seem to come from a sense of frustration.
And it's true. Mostly, atheists are talking to each other when making logical arguments against religion - mostly to provide each of us with "make the proseltyzer feel stupid so he'll leave me alone" ammo.
Most of us realize that you'll drop the imaginary friend in your own time, or maybe you won't; either way, nothing we say will change it. For that segment of us, it's to create a bullet-proof anti-preacher sheild. What fun is it, for example, to be told you're going to hell if you don't have a good argument as to why hell probably doesn't exist?
That said, the majority of us aren't really looking for an argument. We know arguments happen; we're quite outnumbered in the world, and it's very hard to keep the fact that you don't actually believe in God to yourself. You know. It comes up - and nine times out of ten, when it does, you end up getting the third degree by someone who was satisfied with 'Because God made it that way' for their whole lives or the 'flavor of the month' theist who is newly converted and wants to share (read: force) her new insights with you. Initially, argument prep is self-defence, though it often migrates to preemptive defense and outright flaming.
We should be more mature than that, and in fact, most of us are. It's just that, like any group, you get the teenagers and the adults who never left high school who are so damned sure of themselves that they can't be bothered to respect the choices of others.
I try to reprimand my fellow atheists occasionally when they step out of line; responses to insane proseltyzing that includes threats of damnation don't get rebuffed, but once in a while you'll get the genuinely curious question about atheism and the vitrolic atheist auto-reponse - and I'll shoot that down every time.
I can't moderate all the 'fuck God!' posts. I'd go crazy. But I just want to let you know that most of us aren't actually like that. We're good, normal people who just happen to not believe in a deity or deities.