He doesn't believe the theory of evolution, which is to say, where we came from. That is NOT the same as saying he doens't believe in evolution.
there's a huge difference between things evolving and saying we evolved from X, i don't see how anyone could confuse them.
Your second statement is easy to interpret, while your first one is painfully opaque.
we can test theories about gravity and basic physics. So those we can feel fairly confident about. But how do we test where we came from?
The same way we test everything else. We can observe small scale evolution in a lab, the same way we observe pendulums. When things are harder to control we have to use more indirect evidence, using models from the lab and evidence that we can observe about the less cooperative phenomena. We can't put a second earth into orbit around the sun any more than we can duplicate hominid evolution, but we're pretty confident about gravity being responsible. Why should we suddenly become obstinate when it comes to biology?
But you cannot prove, with much of any certainty, that we evolved from X. You can observe what's happening now, and try to make correlations and make educated guesses, and guess what, that's called science.
And when the educated guesses are well-supported, new tests keep confirming its predictions, no strongly contradictory evidence has been found, and no other good theory has been put forward, then it's silly to refuse to accept it as the likely explanation.
I was merely reacting to the false premise that child porn isn't dangerous.
Pictures aren't dangerous, and making child porn without committing an underlying crime isn't either. If it wasn't illegal, Hollywood would produce as much kiddie porn as the creepy people could want, the same way they make horror movies, and material produced with actual crimes wouldn't have a market.
Because there is a market for child porn, kids get victimized.
If they only went after porn that was produced using a victim, I might support it. Victims deserve to have control over the products of the crime - if someone steals from me I get my stuff back, if someone invades my privacy I should be able to destroy the material created. But we show depictions of murders, kidnappings, rapes, beatings, and theft on TV - why should fictional portrayals of one subsection of crime, one far less violent than murder, be deemed off limits completely?
I guess you missed the part where I said that I think these searches are overly intrusive.
Which isn't what he was addressing.
I was merely opining on the fact that child porn is most certainly dangerous to it's victims.
Which is incorrect. Cartoons, computer animations, and video with deliberately underage-looking actors all count as child porn - but don't have actual victims. Wanting to look at any of those isn't anymore dangerous than watching TV that depicts murder, drug use, or prostitution.
Try to read what I wrote and not just jerk your knee;)
If you're going to be insulting, then I'll reply in kind: try some reading comprehension first.
Nah - the koine Greek word for faith is pistis which means either forensic proof, assurance based on a track record or faithfulness.
Which makes no difference. If the word "God" came from the Latin word for delusion, it wouldn't have any effect on whether God exists or not. The word "Slavic" shares a root with "slave", but you wouldn't use that fact to defend keeping them as slaves, would you? Besides, the meanings of words change over time.
... authors of the new testament documents constantly exhorting their audience to use their eyes and ears and go check things out for themselves.
Then they can't get upset when I use the evidence I have to conclude that religion is a product of psychology.
Or they might just laugh at you. Hint: the great myths and the Bible have precious little in common liguistically, stylistically or historically.
All that means is that Greco-Roman and Middle-Eastern myths have systematic differences. They both use supernatural events to explain natural ones, push a certain moral outlook, inspire positive emotions and soothe negative ones, etc.
There is absolutely no chance Christianity would have survived if its founders had started making claims that were trivially falsifiable by the authorities of the day.
That's absurd. 9/11 conspiracy theorists still think that jet fuel doesn't burn hot enough to bring down the towers - ignoring the fact that steel looses strength when it gets hot even if it doesn't melt. Anti-immunization people still think that MMRs cause autism, despite the clear evidence that they don't. And those exist in a modern, literate, educated culture! And look at "sleeping with a virgin will cure AIDS", "AIDS was developed by westerners", "condoms don't stop AIDS" - all from Africa on a single topic. And you think that Christianity wouldn't survive because it made potentially disprovable claims?!?!?
Mormonism survived a beginning as unlikely as Christianity (persecution, miracles that supposedly had evidence for a time, wacky beliefs, etc) and now they've got strong influence in a US state, BYU, missionaries worldwide, and a presidential candidate in a major party. Heck, if Mitt becomes president and inspires converts, they'll have almost exactly duplicated the rise of Christianity. Do you find that "incredibly powerful evidence" for Mormonism?
Why do you think raping and murder is wrong (assuming you do)? Why do I care about raising my children right, and treating others with respect?
Human beings are social animals, the drives that help us to get along in society are built into us almost as deeply as the desire to have sex. People that don't think that murder is wrong (or something equivalent to that) or don't raise their children to handle social situations are at an evolutionary disadvantage.
... other then being killed myself, which, given there is no purpose, doesn't matter?
It might not matter in a universal sense, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't matter to you. And even Christian morality is based on something that's already built into human beings - why should you care if morality matters to God?
recognizing the huge impact religion have had on the formation of modern day society is important - and I don't think discrediting everything religion, past and present, with a wave of the hand (which is what many atheists seem to do) is a very sensible thing to do.
Atheists don't dismiss the impact that religion has, even if they don't think its effects are all as rosy as you're suggesting - they just don't believe it's true. The sun doesn't circle the earth, but that doesn't mean that that belief had no effect on history.
Because if you believe we are here for no reason at all, but still care about poor people, drug abuse, the environment and war in remote countries, then you are acting extremely irrationally.
It depends on what you mean by 'irrational'. If wanting to live, watch TV, and have sex is irrational, then fine, caring is irrational. Just keep in mind that Christians are just as irrational, because they irrationally want to obey God.
I don't believe in a metaphysical god that can intervene...
Then you're not a Christian. You may have been influenced by Christianity, your moral systems might be similar, but without a belief in something supernatural you're not religious.
For one, I highly doubt westernized society would be quick to start to inflict any form of medical procedure on someone who does not wish it.
Right, because in modern, western countries (say 1970s US) we'd never castrate 'mental defectives', pointlessly cut out healthy appendixes and tonsils, or circumcise children based on cultural myths and bogus medicine. Oh, wait - that was legal in the US in 1970, and the second two were quite common.
We let plenty of idiots choose not to vaccinate their children against measles and the like.
That implies that the parents, not the kids, get to choose. Don't parent's count as part of "westernized society" and childern as "someone" in the first sentence I quoted?
I am sure plenty of nutjobs out there would like to see an anti-cocaine vaccine be made manditory, but I do not think it will happen.
You happen to think it won't, so the rest of us shouldn't worry?
So when the government gains a new tool that might help them achieve some of the goals of a large, expensive, seemingly endless program (the 'war on drugs'), there's no good reason to expect that they might use it?
And until that happens, your post... adds little value to a frank discussion of the pros and cons...
So until someone is actually being forced to do X, the idea that "X might be forced on people" can't even be discussed as a pro or con?
Fundamentals question is then, shouldn't political rights be also economical rights?
I think the problem is that you're using two different definitions of "rights". You use "political rights" to mean "people can't make others do (or not do) things", while "economic rights" means "people can make others do (or not do) things", which are opposites. The "right to speak" doesn't force anyone to listen, but a "right to a job" would force people to keep you on. The fact that you empathize with people who speak and people who are fired, rather than those who want viewpoints silenced or who do the firing, shouldn't change what "rights" mean.
I once was awarded a check large enough to be worth $500 after taxes for work "above and beyond" on a certain project. It felt nice until I added up the extra hours I'd put in and found out the cocksucking bastards had gotten me to work for about five dollars an hour.
If the project was part of your regular salaried position, then they already paid you for it. The $500 was a token of appreciation, it wasn't your only compensation. And on top of the monetary stuff, having evidence of your value can't be bad for your career, either.
You sound like you're insulted by a gift of $500 when you weren't owed anything.
Fearful? No, the "at will" system would make me fearful.... If you're not employed, there's always employers in a hurry who'll sign you on for that reason so on the whole it's not a problem for the workforce at all.
This is where I get confused. If they can't get rid of you, wouldn't they error on the side of hiring too few people, lowering your chance of getting hired? Isn't getting fired and rehired by companies that can try new things better than not being able to find a job at all?
The level of hostility at termination is just terrible in the US. I don't think I've ever heard of anyone being escorted out by the security guard
Outside of the news, I haven't either.
You might have a point if EU companies had their ass handed to them by US companies, but my impression is that the US has more economic problems now than we do...
We're doing OK, don't take the doom-and-gloom newscasts too seriously. Sure our dollar is weaker - but that's mostly because it was the undisputed international currency and now has real competition. Housing still has some sorting out to do, we're still paying twice the world rate for sugar, our military spending spree was horrid...
But even after taking size into account, US GDP is on par with the better EU economies. And don't forget that the EU has it's own economic woes: 15 years ago France had an unemployment rate the US hasn't seen since the Great Depression, and even after making that its top priority, it's still struggling with it. And it sacrificed a lot to get there - 30% lower GDP per capita, many people in their 30s who've never worked at all, massive funding for civil service pensions so people retire at 55, etc.
The laws defines the consumer of child pornography as being the beneficiary of a crime against a child.
No, child pornography doesn't have to involve an underlying crime. First, a teenager can take pictures of themselves legally, but an adult with those pictures would still be guilty of possession of child pornography. Second, cartoons, computer generated images, etc., with no actual child involved count as child porn.
You have purchased the evidence of a sex crime that in many cultures would warrant the death penalty.
Who cares. Even if I were to accept that they were evidence of a sex crime, it's still legal to look at evidence of other capital crimes, like homicide scenes and war casualties. Nobody is suggesting that possession of pictures of 9/11 should be a crime, and that's evidence of homicide on a massive scale.
The last time I looked at our county's sex offender registry, public urination had not put anyone on the list.
If you think that means it doesn't happen, then you aren't paying attention to the news, or the other posts on this thread.
They were on the list because they were repeat offenders with a profoundly disturbing history of violence.
Neither violence nor repetition in necessary for someone to be put on the list. And just to make it clear, a serial killer who preys on children, but never sexually abuses them, won't end up on the sex offender registry. It would make far more sense to have a "violent offender and likely recidivist" registry.
Its certainly not free markets, but not so sure it isn't capitalism.
It's true that the original definition of capitalism only specified private ownership, because Marx (the inventor of the word) was only interested in who was in control, while "free market" is about the relationship between government and trade/property. On the other hand, most people don't make that kind of distinction anymore.
that there are moral and ethical laws that are as involitable as E=MC^2
That's absurd. Look, I just insulted you, violating the "involitable" moral law that one should be kind to others!
The belief that moral and ethical laws aren't as concrete as the physical laws.
They aren't. Physical law is based on observation of the world, while moral opinions are based on reactions to it. You can't objectively measure morality any more than you can measure beauty.
Anyone with an attention span greater than a human life can plainly see..
...that the general themes of morality are part of human nature, but that there's no clear line between the immoral and the merely icky.
Right, so Buffet should force the IRS to take more money than they think he owes them.
What, you think the IRS will put up a fight?
How do you propose he does that, exactly?
They take checks.
Not to mention that I just love the spirit of creativity that reinterprets "rich person arguing for greater forced redistribution through the government, then voluntarily donating large sums to private charity" as "rich person says choice for me, none for thee".
Fixed that for you.
Are the rest of your opinions as well thought through as that one?
He needed to spell it out more, considering his audience.
Religion is a set of rules governing behavior of a human population.
No, that's an ethical or moral system. Some of those are based on religious beliefs, but others are not - they're completely distinct concepts.
Religions are not subject to scientific testing, because you'd need to study a population of humans over several generations, with a control, and you'd be dead before the experiment was half over.
Morals can't be objectively tested because they're opinions, not facts. Religion (at least most modern ones) can't be tested because they're based on making non-testable claims, and the ones that do make verifiable claims end up being false. And as a side note, just because it would be hard to test, doesn't mean that it's "beyond science" - it just means that you might have to rely on more indirect methods.
That's what makes them so much more interesting, debatable, and generally difficult to deal with than science. All you have to work with is deduction, observation of the aftermath of a bunch of experiments started by men long dead, and no control group. Yet, this problem domain is the most important there is, because it governs how we live
What makes morality interesting, etc. is that it's opinion, but those opinions affect others and are based on things common to all of humanity. There's no way to scientifically demonstrate that slavery is evil, for example, but that belief still has tremendous effects on human beings. On the other hand, religion is interesting, etc. because it's based on not being reasonable and making rationalizations. Nothing is more fun than an improvised defense of some made-up "fact".
Just because you like your problems neat and tidy, provable and falsifiable, that doesn't mean the world is obligated to reduce itself to your level.
And just because you take ancient myths seriously doesn't mean you're better than anyone else.
... the technicians tested the drive's new software by searching the computer's hard drive for video files to play back.
The court also noted that the technicians weren't randomly perusing the drive for contraband, but instead were testing its functioning in a "commercially accepted manner."
I feel that the first remark conflicts with "expectation of privacy". Files on the desktop would be one thing, but I doubt an average person would think that a search of their entire hard drive would be part of installing a DVD drive. Just like I wouldn't expect a plumber to go through my garage looking for a wrench if he has his own tools. In essence, both may be part of doing the job, but they aren't a necessary, or easily anticipated, part of it. And since an average person can't anticipate it, they would be expecting privacy - and for me that's the important element.
If space itself is expanding, any measuring device is itself expanding.
That's where I disagree with you. Two free objects would move apart in an expanding space, but the size of a ruler is determined by the chemical bonds between its atoms, i.e. electromagnetism - and the electrons aren't gaining charge so that they can hold the longer ruler together. The ends of the ruler would be pulled in, keeping its length constant. The dots on your balloon are only affected by the expansion, but other forces counteract it in the real world.
It's possible that the universe isn't expanding, but to duplicate our observations: every object in the universe would have to be shrinking at the same rate, something would have to uniformly drain energy from photons (for red shift), the speed of light would have to slow (so that it appears constant), gravity would have to weaken (we'd be getting closer to the center of the shrinking the Earth) and other forces would have to follow suit. Keep in mind that atoms would have to put out higher-frequency photons (they have to be smaller, too), while the forces holding them together got weaker. And all of the would have to be in sync. And I haven't started on the cosmic microwave background and other evidence for the big bang.
Run that through Occam's Razor and tell me what you think. I'm not against speculation, or criticism of current theory, but in this case I think you're letting an assumption about how objects would act in expanding space get the better of you.
This is where my issue is (from your previous post):
This is basically the same thing CC did and it isn't a big deal.
Then, when pressed, you go on to list a vast number of ways that your situations are different!
My main point is that people should have an expectation of privacy: you expect your plumber to see your kitchen (where the leak is), but not the back of your bedroom closet. If he's in charge of maintaining the whole house in many ways, that's different.
Even though the government and a well-establish industry are trying to restrict something, the (black) market finds a way for people to get what they want. Isn't that a market success, and a government failure?
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there's a huge difference between things evolving and saying we evolved from X, i don't see how anyone could confuse them.
Your second statement is easy to interpret, while your first one is painfully opaque.
we can test theories about gravity and basic physics. So those we can feel fairly confident about. But how do we test where we came from?
The same way we test everything else. We can observe small scale evolution in a lab, the same way we observe pendulums. When things are harder to control we have to use more indirect evidence, using models from the lab and evidence that we can observe about the less cooperative phenomena. We can't put a second earth into orbit around the sun any more than we can duplicate hominid evolution, but we're pretty confident about gravity being responsible. Why should we suddenly become obstinate when it comes to biology?
But you cannot prove, with much of any certainty, that we evolved from X. You can observe what's happening now, and try to make correlations and make educated guesses, and guess what, that's called science.
And when the educated guesses are well-supported, new tests keep confirming its predictions, no strongly contradictory evidence has been found, and no other good theory has been put forward, then it's silly to refuse to accept it as the likely explanation.
Pictures aren't dangerous, and making child porn without committing an underlying crime isn't either. If it wasn't illegal, Hollywood would produce as much kiddie porn as the creepy people could want, the same way they make horror movies, and material produced with actual crimes wouldn't have a market.
Because there is a market for child porn, kids get victimized.
If they only went after porn that was produced using a victim, I might support it. Victims deserve to have control over the products of the crime - if someone steals from me I get my stuff back, if someone invades my privacy I should be able to destroy the material created. But we show depictions of murders, kidnappings, rapes, beatings, and theft on TV - why should fictional portrayals of one subsection of crime, one far less violent than murder, be deemed off limits completely?
Which isn't what he was addressing.
I was merely opining on the fact that child porn is most certainly dangerous to it's victims.
Which is incorrect. Cartoons, computer animations, and video with deliberately underage-looking actors all count as child porn - but don't have actual victims. Wanting to look at any of those isn't anymore dangerous than watching TV that depicts murder, drug use, or prostitution.
Try to read what I wrote and not just jerk your knee ;)
If you're going to be insulting, then I'll reply in kind: try some reading comprehension first.
Which makes no difference. If the word "God" came from the Latin word for delusion, it wouldn't have any effect on whether God exists or not. The word "Slavic" shares a root with "slave", but you wouldn't use that fact to defend keeping them as slaves, would you? Besides, the meanings of words change over time.
Then they can't get upset when I use the evidence I have to conclude that religion is a product of psychology.
Or they might just laugh at you. Hint: the great myths and the Bible have precious little in common liguistically, stylistically or historically.
All that means is that Greco-Roman and Middle-Eastern myths have systematic differences. They both use supernatural events to explain natural ones, push a certain moral outlook, inspire positive emotions and soothe negative ones, etc.
There is absolutely no chance Christianity would have survived if its founders had started making claims that were trivially falsifiable by the authorities of the day.
That's absurd. 9/11 conspiracy theorists still think that jet fuel doesn't burn hot enough to bring down the towers - ignoring the fact that steel looses strength when it gets hot even if it doesn't melt. Anti-immunization people still think that MMRs cause autism, despite the clear evidence that they don't. And those exist in a modern, literate, educated culture! And look at "sleeping with a virgin will cure AIDS", "AIDS was developed by westerners", "condoms don't stop AIDS" - all from Africa on a single topic. And you think that Christianity wouldn't survive because it made potentially disprovable claims?!?!?
Mormonism survived a beginning as unlikely as Christianity (persecution, miracles that supposedly had evidence for a time, wacky beliefs, etc) and now they've got strong influence in a US state, BYU, missionaries worldwide, and a presidential candidate in a major party. Heck, if Mitt becomes president and inspires converts, they'll have almost exactly duplicated the rise of Christianity. Do you find that "incredibly powerful evidence" for Mormonism?
Human beings are social animals, the drives that help us to get along in society are built into us almost as deeply as the desire to have sex. People that don't think that murder is wrong (or something equivalent to that) or don't raise their children to handle social situations are at an evolutionary disadvantage.
It might not matter in a universal sense, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't matter to you. And even Christian morality is based on something that's already built into human beings - why should you care if morality matters to God?
recognizing the huge impact religion have had on the formation of modern day society is important - and I don't think discrediting everything religion, past and present, with a wave of the hand (which is what many atheists seem to do) is a very sensible thing to do.
Atheists don't dismiss the impact that religion has, even if they don't think its effects are all as rosy as you're suggesting - they just don't believe it's true. The sun doesn't circle the earth, but that doesn't mean that that belief had no effect on history.
Because if you believe we are here for no reason at all, but still care about poor people, drug abuse, the environment and war in remote countries, then you are acting extremely irrationally.
It depends on what you mean by 'irrational'. If wanting to live, watch TV, and have sex is irrational, then fine, caring is irrational. Just keep in mind that Christians are just as irrational, because they irrationally want to obey God.
I don't believe in a metaphysical god that can intervene ...
Then you're not a Christian. You may have been influenced by Christianity, your moral systems might be similar, but without a belief in something supernatural you're not religious.
Thank goodness that most of the time it's only partially effective.
Mary doesn't want to have anything to do with Brian, but since she's chained in his rape dungeon, she doesn't have a choice.
Jane may be a metaphorical slave to Carl's silver tongue, but Mary is a real slave to Brian. Please learn the difference.
Right, because in modern, western countries (say 1970s US) we'd never castrate 'mental defectives', pointlessly cut out healthy appendixes and tonsils, or circumcise children based on cultural myths and bogus medicine. Oh, wait - that was legal in the US in 1970, and the second two were quite common.
We let plenty of idiots choose not to vaccinate their children against measles and the like.
That implies that the parents, not the kids, get to choose. Don't parent's count as part of "westernized society" and childern as "someone" in the first sentence I quoted?
I am sure plenty of nutjobs out there would like to see an anti-cocaine vaccine be made manditory, but I do not think it will happen.
You happen to think it won't, so the rest of us shouldn't worry?
So when the government gains a new tool that might help them achieve some of the goals of a large, expensive, seemingly endless program (the 'war on drugs'), there's no good reason to expect that they might use it?
And until that happens, your post ... adds little value to a frank discussion of the pros and cons ...
So until someone is actually being forced to do X, the idea that "X might be forced on people" can't even be discussed as a pro or con?
For you, I'd suggest an anti-BS vaccine.
Suggesting a potential alternative isn't "fixing".
I think the problem is that you're using two different definitions of "rights". You use "political rights" to mean "people can't make others do (or not do) things", while "economic rights" means "people can make others do (or not do) things", which are opposites. The "right to speak" doesn't force anyone to listen, but a "right to a job" would force people to keep you on. The fact that you empathize with people who speak and people who are fired, rather than those who want viewpoints silenced or who do the firing, shouldn't change what "rights" mean.
If the project was part of your regular salaried position, then they already paid you for it. The $500 was a token of appreciation, it wasn't your only compensation. And on top of the monetary stuff, having evidence of your value can't be bad for your career, either.
You sound like you're insulted by a gift of $500 when you weren't owed anything.
This is where I get confused. If they can't get rid of you, wouldn't they error on the side of hiring too few people, lowering your chance of getting hired? Isn't getting fired and rehired by companies that can try new things better than not being able to find a job at all?
The level of hostility at termination is just terrible in the US. I don't think I've ever heard of anyone being escorted out by the security guard
Outside of the news, I haven't either.
You might have a point if EU companies had their ass handed to them by US companies, but my impression is that the US has more economic problems now than we do...
We're doing OK, don't take the doom-and-gloom newscasts too seriously. Sure our dollar is weaker - but that's mostly because it was the undisputed international currency and now has real competition. Housing still has some sorting out to do, we're still paying twice the world rate for sugar, our military spending spree was horrid...
But even after taking size into account, US GDP is on par with the better EU economies. And don't forget that the EU has it's own economic woes: 15 years ago France had an unemployment rate the US hasn't seen since the Great Depression, and even after making that its top priority, it's still struggling with it. And it sacrificed a lot to get there - 30% lower GDP per capita, many people in their 30s who've never worked at all, massive funding for civil service pensions so people retire at 55, etc.
Speak for yourself - I call my mom every week!
Oh, you meant a ... woman woman ... sorry.
No, child pornography doesn't have to involve an underlying crime. First, a teenager can take pictures of themselves legally, but an adult with those pictures would still be guilty of possession of child pornography. Second, cartoons, computer generated images, etc., with no actual child involved count as child porn.
You have purchased the evidence of a sex crime that in many cultures would warrant the death penalty.
Who cares. Even if I were to accept that they were evidence of a sex crime, it's still legal to look at evidence of other capital crimes, like homicide scenes and war casualties. Nobody is suggesting that possession of pictures of 9/11 should be a crime, and that's evidence of homicide on a massive scale.
The last time I looked at our county's sex offender registry, public urination had not put anyone on the list.
If you think that means it doesn't happen, then you aren't paying attention to the news, or the other posts on this thread.
They were on the list because they were repeat offenders with a profoundly disturbing history of violence.
Neither violence nor repetition in necessary for someone to be put on the list. And just to make it clear, a serial killer who preys on children, but never sexually abuses them, won't end up on the sex offender registry. It would make far more sense to have a "violent offender and likely recidivist" registry.
Make an absurd statement
Miss the point of the post I'm replying to
Insult the original poster because I misunderstood what he was saying
and several people point it out, then I should:
Make a blasphemous religious reference
Talk about Greek mythology
That will magically make my absurdity irrelevant, my missing the point will vanish, and my insult will be relabeled insightful. Right?
That seems to be a popular view among some groups, but I don't see a lot of evidence that economists believe that.
It's true that the original definition of capitalism only specified private ownership, because Marx (the inventor of the word) was only interested in who was in control, while "free market" is about the relationship between government and trade/property. On the other hand, most people don't make that kind of distinction anymore.
Capitalism tends towards monopolies.
Why would you say that?
That's absurd. Look, I just insulted you, violating the "involitable" moral law that one should be kind to others!
The belief that moral and ethical laws aren't as concrete as the physical laws.
They aren't. Physical law is based on observation of the world, while moral opinions are based on reactions to it. You can't objectively measure morality any more than you can measure beauty.
Anyone with an attention span greater than a human life can plainly see..
What, you think the IRS will put up a fight?
How do you propose he does that, exactly?
They take checks.
Not to mention that I just love the spirit of creativity that reinterprets "rich person arguing for greater forced redistribution through the government, then voluntarily donating large sums to private charity" as "rich person says choice for me, none for thee".
Fixed that for you.
Are the rest of your opinions as well thought through as that one?
He needed to spell it out more, considering his audience.
No, that's an ethical or moral system. Some of those are based on religious beliefs, but others are not - they're completely distinct concepts.
Religions are not subject to scientific testing, because you'd need to study a population of humans over several generations, with a control, and you'd be dead before the experiment was half over.
Morals can't be objectively tested because they're opinions, not facts. Religion (at least most modern ones) can't be tested because they're based on making non-testable claims, and the ones that do make verifiable claims end up being false. And as a side note, just because it would be hard to test, doesn't mean that it's "beyond science" - it just means that you might have to rely on more indirect methods.
That's what makes them so much more interesting, debatable, and generally difficult to deal with than science. All you have to work with is deduction, observation of the aftermath of a bunch of experiments started by men long dead, and no control group. Yet, this problem domain is the most important there is, because it governs how we live
What makes morality interesting, etc. is that it's opinion, but those opinions affect others and are based on things common to all of humanity. There's no way to scientifically demonstrate that slavery is evil, for example, but that belief still has tremendous effects on human beings. On the other hand, religion is interesting, etc. because it's based on not being reasonable and making rationalizations. Nothing is more fun than an improvised defense of some made-up "fact".
Just because you like your problems neat and tidy, provable and falsifiable, that doesn't mean the world is obligated to reduce itself to your level.
And just because you take ancient myths seriously doesn't mean you're better than anyone else.
The court also noted that the technicians weren't randomly perusing the drive for contraband, but instead were testing its functioning in a "commercially accepted manner."
I feel that the first remark conflicts with "expectation of privacy". Files on the desktop would be one thing, but I doubt an average person would think that a search of their entire hard drive would be part of installing a DVD drive. Just like I wouldn't expect a plumber to go through my garage looking for a wrench if he has his own tools. In essence, both may be part of doing the job, but they aren't a necessary, or easily anticipated, part of it. And since an average person can't anticipate it, they would be expecting privacy - and for me that's the important element.
That's where I disagree with you. Two free objects would move apart in an expanding space, but the size of a ruler is determined by the chemical bonds between its atoms, i.e. electromagnetism - and the electrons aren't gaining charge so that they can hold the longer ruler together. The ends of the ruler would be pulled in, keeping its length constant. The dots on your balloon are only affected by the expansion, but other forces counteract it in the real world.
It's possible that the universe isn't expanding, but to duplicate our observations: every object in the universe would have to be shrinking at the same rate, something would have to uniformly drain energy from photons (for red shift), the speed of light would have to slow (so that it appears constant), gravity would have to weaken (we'd be getting closer to the center of the shrinking the Earth) and other forces would have to follow suit. Keep in mind that atoms would have to put out higher-frequency photons (they have to be smaller, too), while the forces holding them together got weaker. And all of the would have to be in sync. And I haven't started on the cosmic microwave background and other evidence for the big bang.
Run that through Occam's Razor and tell me what you think. I'm not against speculation, or criticism of current theory, but in this case I think you're letting an assumption about how objects would act in expanding space get the better of you.
This is basically the same thing CC did and it isn't a big deal.
Then, when pressed, you go on to list a vast number of ways that your situations are different!
My main point is that people should have an expectation of privacy: you expect your plumber to see your kitchen (where the leak is), but not the back of your bedroom closet. If he's in charge of maintaining the whole house in many ways, that's different.
Even though the government and a well-establish industry are trying to restrict something, the (black) market finds a way for people to get what they want. Isn't that a market success, and a government failure?