Yeah, yeah, terrorists! Be afraid! Terrorist! Think of the children! And the terrorist, the evil terrorist, everywhere. Did we mention terrorists?
Think about it. Is this a terror weapon? Can't you think of at least half a dozen more interesting terror things to put into a shipping container? I know I can.
So that's the strawman. What's it really about? The US control of the sea and air, I think. The russians were driven out of Afghanistan in good parts by the Stinger missile.
Iran can be accessed by sea through the Strait of Hormuz. You can't maintain a 50 miles no-other-vessels zone around your aircraft carrier there. But then, Iran already has Sunburn missiles and could sink a US carrier anytime it wants. Why would it want another option? Because the Sunburns are nukes, and with the escalated conflict around Iran's nuclear program, using them would likely mean a US first strike.
Lots and lots of other countries would just love to give the US a shot across the bow. I think there'll be tons of buyers for this thing. The american ability to project its forces rests largely on the carrier groups. Anything that can take out a carrier is a great thing to have if you believe you could be next in the War On Anyone We Don't Like (aka Terrorists).
Ah, so you are saying they're not just stupid idiots, they're also incapable of learning?
No surprise we're in an economic crisis, when people like that are allowed to run companies. Obviously, they should all hand their keys to you, right away.
I know, it's the source of a large part of our troubles today, but that wasn't the point at all, we can discuss that elsewhere.
Re:I don't think ARM makes chips
on
Apple To Buy ARM?
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· Score: 2, Interesting
And obviously you think that everyone who licensed the design is a stupid idiot who never went to law or business school, and would sign a licensing deal that can be revoked for no reason at any time.
The real business world is a little more complicated than that.
Then say that, and don't bring up stuff that happened before most of the/. audience was born. Seriously, if you don't like his face, say you don't like his face. Don't dig through ancient history to find a bullshit reason like "it looks like Louis II and he was an asshole, too".
(By the way, Steve Jobs is the same guy who denied paternity while his daughter and former girlfriend lived on welfare. I don't think he has any solid footing on the moral high ground.)
He later acknowledge, and this was in the late 70s. I don't know which world you live in, but the one around here has this thing called "change", and sometimes it applies to the minds of people as much as to the physical reality.
Casting doubts on the morality of someone for something that happened 30+ years ago is just stupid. Talk to us again if you can find a case like that from this millenium.
There are perfectly reasonable people who have no problem with children seeing Venus de Milo, breastfeeding mothers, or people sunbathing nude, but want to prevent children from seeing pornography.
I agree.
I don't understand why, though. And that's serious. Can you point to any non-anecdotal evidence that seeing porn is harmful to children? My current level of knowledge is that no evidence whatsoever exists and our "think of the children" attitude towards porn is probably a mixture of leftover christian morals and projected personal disgust/fascination. But I'm ready to learn, so if you have any evidence, studies, etc. - please point me there.
You made a halfway valid point until this. Sorry, a religion is a belief system invulnerable to evidence, built on a "we know answers to all questions about life, the universe and everything" promise and usually with a solid helping of superstition, miracles, life-after-death and all that other stuff.
Look, fans are fans. Sports fans are just as if not more single-minded about their favorite team. That doesn't turn any fan club into a religion.
Most importantly, I've yet to hear reports about Apple calling their users into a crusade against any other OS, or Apple fans discussing whether windows users should be stoned or hanged, and then following through with it. And while the BSA sometimes seems like the inquisition, it works more for MS than for Apple, and its method of questioning are (at least so far) a little more civilized.
I run a free browsergame, and have for more than ten years now. It has never had any advertisement on it. Since I've been working a dot-coms and ISPs and such for most of that time, I've not paid much for hosting or domain names, etc. - but hardware isn't free, and after one upgrade I decided to open a PayPal account and ask for donations.
Ever since, I've received a steady stream that would more than cover the hosting fees for the amount of traffic it generates. And that is with me being perfectly honest that I don't really need it, and most of it won't be spent on the game since it simply doesn't cost that much.
Recent studies indicate that it's a lot worse than that. Ads apparently have a measurable, and mostly negative, impact on human behaviour and emotions. For example, a recent study showed that people who were looking at certain fast food logos were more likely to drive faster than others who had not.
Advertisement is engineering gone far out of control. They've carefully looked for, and found, ways to get into your brain for several decades now. Only now are some studies being done about what the side effects of that forceful entry actually are.
If religion is prematurely taken away from THESE people, they will truly go on a crime spree because their morality is THAT pathological, built as it is on a foundation of sand.
Possible, but debatable. They believe that their religion is the foundation of their ethics - but is it, really? Why would someone go on a killing spree after having lost his faith? It's not as if there were many reported cases of that happening, even though people are losing their faith all the time.
It is certainly more likely that they will simply realize that at least the majority of their ethics has nothing to do with religion whatsoever.
Plus, people go on killing sprees today because of religion. Unless the number doing that because it was taken away is higher, you'd still end up with a net positive effect.
Religs love a good old fashioned religious war - gives them a focus to mobilize the mobs. Backing people into a corner is the best way to solidify their positions instead of converting them.
Oh, totally. Old Nietzsche already said that the Romans did Christianity a huge favour by prosecuting it.
Which is why I think ridiculing them works a lot better. I'd like to have their sources of funding cut, especially tax money, because we don't spend millions and billions on some international clown foundation either, do we? Once they don't get any of my money anymore, and don't have a say in what's on TV anymore, and basically are out of my life, they can go fuck themselves for all I care. Would be a change over fucking young children.
As long as they do damage to society, society has to fight back.
The psychology of desperation is a powerful thing.
Indeed, it is. However, I strongly believe that education is a worse enemy of religion than wealth.
If there's no demo, I'll get hold of a pirate copy, simple as that. I just don't buy games before I've verified that they run on my system and that they're fun.
The movie analogy is flawed. First, you don't need to check for the technical specifications - if you have two eyes, you can watch the movie, that's all you need to know. Two, they do have free demos, they just call them trailers. And no, due to reason #1, a video trailer for a game just doesn't cut it.
So, you are saying that this god person can make eternal souls, but for reasons of his own chooses not to. Instead, every soul created goes through a one-lifetime "test run" before it is either switched to everlasting, or thrown into the recycling furnace?
You'd think an omnipotent being wouldn't be in need of such a shoddy QA process. But, of course, "gods ways are beyond the understanding of our mortal minds", the all-time dumbo argument against any and all criticism.
My main point still stands: There is no point in discussing this, as there are a great number of stories that can be invented on this subject. But they're all stories, and that's the point. So thank you for your comment, because by inventing yet another story, you proved me right.;-)
The problem with religion is that it is based on extremely early human thought processes. Now the human mind develops pretty slowly, we are not so much different from our ancestors than we would like to be, but it does advance. And the only way that religions even survive in our current world is to blatantly ignore most of the stuff in their own holy books.
Or when's the last time you stoned someone to death for being rude to his parents?
It's right there in the ten commandments (though the punishment is in Deuteronomy).
These "inspired by the creator himself" books are so obviously texts from human before the evolution of much of what we call civilization today, especially in the areas of justice, society and international relationships, I really can not grasp how anyone who is not mentally impaired can seriously discuss the point that this is so.
but it is wise to recognize that in the case of a lot of people, it serves the same function as a grenade pin.
But for lots of other people, it serves as a grenade. My personal opinion is that the sum total is quite negative. However, I have only evidence, not proof, that this is so.
I have had people tell me that "we" (they meant to use the pronoun in the usual vague manner but betrayed their own insecurity in doing so) have morals only because of a fear of god's wrath.
I'm thankful for the likes of Sam Harris who are busy putting the final nail in the coffin of religion by debunking this myth. My usual reply is "yes, the morals of stoning adulterers, burning alive young girls who were raped because they 'ashame' the family, and of bombing each other.". It is precisely that fear of godly wrath that makes religion so dangerous, because except for that, you'd have no reason to worry about whether or not others subscribe to your faith. It is the direct effect of this belief that you can save your own or someone elses eternal soul by destroying your/his body that has brought us such things as the inquisition, witch hunts, crusades or suicide bombers.
Our real morals - and even the most devout religious fool usually sees that once it's spellt out to them - greatly deviate from what the "holy inspired words of the creator himself, as written down in his holy book" say. We don't stone people for insulting their parents. We consider it rude, but not worthy of a death penalty. No, the reason we have morals at all is that we have chosen to not take them from pre-agriculture self-help books, but instead opted to read these books very selectively. Someone who follows, say the bible literally in every single point and commandment would be considered a very amoral person by today's standards.
I suspect for most people it's not about respect. It's more of a - "You believe... what? Honey, be nice to the man - he's... special." - sort of 'respect'.
At least from my experience, I very much doubt it. Religion is considered to be "beyond reason" even by most otherwise sane folk.
You can be reasonably sure that your opponent has joined the fray of their own free choice and you don't have to step gingerly to avoid hurting someone.
Yes, it makes it easier. But it's important to bring that into RL as well, because that is where religion does the damage.
What is left of you after your body is dead is your soul.
Actually, what's left of your body is some decomposing biomass. Whether or not there is anything in addition to the body is very much up for debate, and I happen to not accept the answer "we know because this dusty old tome from a time when the entire human knowledge about medicine and psychology could fit on a single sheet of paper tells us so".
If you created an animated "Intelligent" life form and set it free to roam the world, would you want it to come back or go live with your worst enemy?
I'd certainly enjoy the occasional visit, but if I set it free to roam the world then I'd want it to, you know, roam the world.
Now if I built in a death timer so that it has to come back to me after a while, much against its own will, I'd consider myself a fucked up egomaniac.
Religion is the reason we have universities and higher education today. You personally may choose to ignore the moral ideals of many religions, but let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater.
Well, this is/. and I'm not really writing a book, so some parts of my opinion are necessarily missing. I actually do believe that religion once served a useful role for the development of mankind. I disagree about the education part, especially given that one religion (Christianity) was a major factor in destroying what higher education the ancient world already had in place, but that's a minor point.
The major point is that this time is long past, and these days (and for hundreds of years now), religion has been more of a burden than a help. It's time to get rid of it.
He does have "use" of it, in the sense that it is a gift, and should not be wasted to damage yourself or others.
If it is a gift, then it comes with no strings attached and I can do with it as I see fit. If there are strings attached, it isn't a gift, but something else, maybe a lease. Please make up your mind if you want to discuss this point.
I studied to be a priest for 2 years, and we were required to take courses in logic. I would imagine most have not. Your attitude toward religion and logic are not logical.
*nod*
The amount of effort that the organized religions put into their foot soldiers is frightening. I know what priests learn during training. They are much better trained for speaking than many actual professions that require speaking skills.For example, teachers don't get nearly as much voice training, even though they speak all day, every day.
My attitude toward religion isn't logical, but I can create an unbroken logical chain towards it, and reason and intuition have mutually reinforced each other over several years before I came to where I am today. I'm not saying "religion is evil" because I feel like doing so anymore than a physicist says "gravity exists" because he feels its pull - he certainly has that feeling, but it is only a tiny part of what actually constitutes his knowledge about gravity. So if you say that there is no physical reason to even research gravity, then you are certainly right. But that doesn't put gravity itself beyond reason.
What you are claiming is merely a presumption, and one of many possible scenarios
Exactly my point. I was showing the GP that his story is just one of many, by making up my own. Since we're talking about the presumed motivations of hypothetical beings, it is a little difficult to ascertain the truth, or even just a probability.
but religion as a fundamental belief structure has yet to be proven one way or another,
Proven as what? As a belief structure? I think we're done with that. As "true" or "false"? That's trivial: We have about a dozen large religions, all mutually exclusive, all claiming that they and only they are in posession of the truth. By their own internal logic, at most one of them can be. If elven of them are wrong, what are the chances that the 12th is right?
Socrates when he said "all that I know is that I know nothing." Understanding that there are gaps in human knowledge
Socrates was over two millenia ago, we have made a little bit of progress since then. Most importantly, we have realized that there is a difference between not knowing everything, and knowing nothing at all. And we have dug a lot deeper into the nature of truth since Socrates and Plato and especially Aristotle. Granted, it's taken us almost 2000 years, but we finally arrived at non-Aristotelian logic, for example. We realize that whatever "truth" ultimately may be, even if we can not claim to know anything absolutely really for certain, some knowledge, such as physics or medicine, has obvious, visible, reliable and testable practical applications. And some knowledge, such as music, or ethics, has somewhat fuzzy, and not-quite-obvious, but still overal positive practical effects. And some knowledge, such as Voodoo, and Kabballa, and religion, simply doesn't.
Nevertheless, we do apparently have a built-in desire for some kind of spirituality, be it religion or some replacement. There is a lot of very interesting research still to be done on the human mind. It just happens that the nonsense some barely literate desert dwellers wrote down twenty centuries ago isn't among it. It's a historical curiosity, like ancient greek physics.
What if it's not an advert? Most of the spam I get is just a random collection of words trying to damage bayesian filters, much like a typical Slashdot post.
Then it's harrassment. You can classify spam as a subtype of that if you're into nice tree-structures. I personally care a lot more about getting rid of the crap.
If someone stops me on the street and tries to sell a product or get me to give to charity thats not truly spam, even though it is frustrating and at times unwanted.
Multiply that by 1000 or so and you see why spam is a problem.
What about businesses that buy qualified sales leads?
If that "lead" hasn't opted in to receive sales pitches, then for all I care they can die. Just because you made a business out of something doesn't mean you have an eternal subscription to stay in business. We don't have a moral problem about all the torturers and inquisitors that are out of a job because we don't do that kind of stuff anymore, do we?
What about when my Bank sends me promotional material for services they offer that they think might appropriate for me based on my current accounts? These are all advertisements that I didn't ask for, but not truly spam.
In my country, they can only do that if you said they could. It's usually a smallprint somewhere on the form you sign when you open your account, and most people don't bother, but you can X it out.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, yeah, terrorists! Be afraid! Terrorist! Think of the children! And the terrorist, the evil terrorist, everywhere. Did we mention terrorists?
Think about it. Is this a terror weapon? Can't you think of at least half a dozen more interesting terror things to put into a shipping container? I know I can.
So that's the strawman. What's it really about? The US control of the sea and air, I think. The russians were driven out of Afghanistan in good parts by the Stinger missile.
Iran can be accessed by sea through the Strait of Hormuz. You can't maintain a 50 miles no-other-vessels zone around your aircraft carrier there. But then, Iran already has Sunburn missiles and could sink a US carrier anytime it wants. Why would it want another option? Because the Sunburns are nukes, and with the escalated conflict around Iran's nuclear program, using them would likely mean a US first strike.
Lots and lots of other countries would just love to give the US a shot across the bow. I think there'll be tons of buyers for this thing. The american ability to project its forces rests largely on the carrier groups. Anything that can take out a carrier is a great thing to have if you believe you could be next in the War On Anyone We Don't Like (aka Terrorists).
Ah, so you are saying they're not just stupid idiots, they're also incapable of learning?
No surprise we're in an economic crisis, when people like that are allowed to run companies. Obviously, they should all hand their keys to you, right away.
I know, it's the source of a large part of our troubles today, but that wasn't the point at all, we can discuss that elsewhere.
And obviously you think that everyone who licensed the design is a stupid idiot who never went to law or business school, and would sign a licensing deal that can be revoked for no reason at any time.
The real business world is a little more complicated than that.
Then say that, and don't bring up stuff that happened before most of the /. audience was born. Seriously, if you don't like his face, say you don't like his face. Don't dig through ancient history to find a bullshit reason like "it looks like Louis II and he was an asshole, too".
(By the way, Steve Jobs is the same guy who denied paternity while his daughter and former girlfriend lived on welfare. I don't think he has any solid footing on the moral high ground.)
He later acknowledge, and this was in the late 70s. I don't know which world you live in, but the one around here has this thing called "change", and sometimes it applies to the minds of people as much as to the physical reality.
Casting doubts on the morality of someone for something that happened 30+ years ago is just stupid. Talk to us again if you can find a case like that from this millenium.
There are perfectly reasonable people who have no problem with children seeing Venus de Milo, breastfeeding mothers, or people sunbathing nude, but want to prevent children from seeing pornography.
I agree.
I don't understand why, though. And that's serious. Can you point to any non-anecdotal evidence that seeing porn is harmful to children? My current level of knowledge is that no evidence whatsoever exists and our "think of the children" attitude towards porn is probably a mixture of leftover christian morals and projected personal disgust/fascination. But I'm ready to learn, so if you have any evidence, studies, etc. - please point me there.
This isn't vendor lock-in, it's religion.
You made a halfway valid point until this. Sorry, a religion is a belief system invulnerable to evidence, built on a "we know answers to all questions about life, the universe and everything" promise and usually with a solid helping of superstition, miracles, life-after-death and all that other stuff.
Look, fans are fans. Sports fans are just as if not more single-minded about their favorite team. That doesn't turn any fan club into a religion.
Most importantly, I've yet to hear reports about Apple calling their users into a crusade against any other OS, or Apple fans discussing whether windows users should be stoned or hanged, and then following through with it. And while the BSA sometimes seems like the inquisition, it works more for MS than for Apple, and its method of questioning are (at least so far) a little more civilized.
Well, have you tried actually asking your users?
I run a free browsergame, and have for more than ten years now. It has never had any advertisement on it. Since I've been working a dot-coms and ISPs and such for most of that time, I've not paid much for hosting or domain names, etc. - but hardware isn't free, and after one upgrade I decided to open a PayPal account and ask for donations.
Ever since, I've received a steady stream that would more than cover the hosting fees for the amount of traffic it generates. And that is with me being perfectly honest that I don't really need it, and most of it won't be spent on the game since it simply doesn't cost that much.
Recent studies indicate that it's a lot worse than that. Ads apparently have a measurable, and mostly negative, impact on human behaviour and emotions. For example, a recent study showed that people who were looking at certain fast food logos were more likely to drive faster than others who had not.
Advertisement is engineering gone far out of control. They've carefully looked for, and found, ways to get into your brain for several decades now. Only now are some studies being done about what the side effects of that forceful entry actually are.
If religion is prematurely taken away from THESE people, they will truly go on a crime spree because their morality is THAT pathological, built as it is on a foundation of sand.
Possible, but debatable. They believe that their religion is the foundation of their ethics - but is it, really? Why would someone go on a killing spree after having lost his faith? It's not as if there were many reported cases of that happening, even though people are losing their faith all the time.
It is certainly more likely that they will simply realize that at least the majority of their ethics has nothing to do with religion whatsoever.
Plus, people go on killing sprees today because of religion. Unless the number doing that because it was taken away is higher, you'd still end up with a net positive effect.
Religs love a good old fashioned religious war - gives them a focus to mobilize the mobs. Backing people into a corner is the best way to solidify their positions instead of converting them.
Oh, totally. Old Nietzsche already said that the Romans did Christianity a huge favour by prosecuting it.
Which is why I think ridiculing them works a lot better. I'd like to have their sources of funding cut, especially tax money, because we don't spend millions and billions on some international clown foundation either, do we? Once they don't get any of my money anymore, and don't have a say in what's on TV anymore, and basically are out of my life, they can go fuck themselves for all I care. Would be a change over fucking young children.
As long as they do damage to society, society has to fight back.
The psychology of desperation is a powerful thing.
Indeed, it is. However, I strongly believe that education is a worse enemy of religion than wealth.
If there's no demo, I'll get hold of a pirate copy, simple as that. I just don't buy games before I've verified that they run on my system and that they're fun.
The movie analogy is flawed. First, you don't need to check for the technical specifications - if you have two eyes, you can watch the movie, that's all you need to know. Two, they do have free demos, they just call them trailers. And no, due to reason #1, a video trailer for a game just doesn't cut it.
So, you are saying that this god person can make eternal souls, but for reasons of his own chooses not to. Instead, every soul created goes through a one-lifetime "test run" before it is either switched to everlasting, or thrown into the recycling furnace?
You'd think an omnipotent being wouldn't be in need of such a shoddy QA process. But, of course, "gods ways are beyond the understanding of our mortal minds", the all-time dumbo argument against any and all criticism.
My main point still stands: There is no point in discussing this, as there are a great number of stories that can be invented on this subject. But they're all stories, and that's the point. So thank you for your comment, because by inventing yet another story, you proved me right. ;-)
All of them.
No, I'm (almost) serious.
The problem with religion is that it is based on extremely early human thought processes. Now the human mind develops pretty slowly, we are not so much different from our ancestors than we would like to be, but it does advance. And the only way that religions even survive in our current world is to blatantly ignore most of the stuff in their own holy books.
Or when's the last time you stoned someone to death for being rude to his parents?
It's right there in the ten commandments (though the punishment is in Deuteronomy).
These "inspired by the creator himself" books are so obviously texts from human before the evolution of much of what we call civilization today, especially in the areas of justice, society and international relationships, I really can not grasp how anyone who is not mentally impaired can seriously discuss the point that this is so.
but it is wise to recognize that in the case of a lot of people, it serves the same function as a grenade pin.
But for lots of other people, it serves as a grenade. My personal opinion is that the sum total is quite negative. However, I have only evidence, not proof, that this is so.
I have had people tell me that "we" (they meant to use the pronoun in the usual vague manner but betrayed their own insecurity in doing so) have morals only because of a fear of god's wrath.
I'm thankful for the likes of Sam Harris who are busy putting the final nail in the coffin of religion by debunking this myth. My usual reply is "yes, the morals of stoning adulterers, burning alive young girls who were raped because they 'ashame' the family, and of bombing each other.". It is precisely that fear of godly wrath that makes religion so dangerous, because except for that, you'd have no reason to worry about whether or not others subscribe to your faith. It is the direct effect of this belief that you can save your own or someone elses eternal soul by destroying your/his body that has brought us such things as the inquisition, witch hunts, crusades or suicide bombers.
Our real morals - and even the most devout religious fool usually sees that once it's spellt out to them - greatly deviate from what the "holy inspired words of the creator himself, as written down in his holy book" say. We don't stone people for insulting their parents. We consider it rude, but not worthy of a death penalty. No, the reason we have morals at all is that we have chosen to not take them from pre-agriculture self-help books, but instead opted to read these books very selectively. Someone who follows, say the bible literally in every single point and commandment would be considered a very amoral person by today's standards.
I suspect for most people it's not about respect. It's more of a - "You believe ... what? Honey, be nice to the man - he's ... special." - sort of 'respect'.
At least from my experience, I very much doubt it. Religion is considered to be "beyond reason" even by most otherwise sane folk.
You can be reasonably sure that your opponent has joined the fray of their own free choice and you don't have to step gingerly to avoid hurting someone.
Yes, it makes it easier. But it's important to bring that into RL as well, because that is where religion does the damage.
FWIW, you can never have enough shoes, shoemaker or not.
You're saying this god is a woman?
You got me, thanks for the laugh. If I could, I'd mod you up.
What is left of you after your body is dead is your soul.
Actually, what's left of your body is some decomposing biomass. Whether or not there is anything in addition to the body is very much up for debate, and I happen to not accept the answer "we know because this dusty old tome from a time when the entire human knowledge about medicine and psychology could fit on a single sheet of paper tells us so".
If you created an animated "Intelligent" life form and set it free to roam the world, would you want it to come back or go live with your worst enemy?
I'd certainly enjoy the occasional visit, but if I set it free to roam the world then I'd want it to, you know, roam the world.
Now if I built in a death timer so that it has to come back to me after a while, much against its own will, I'd consider myself a fucked up egomaniac.
Religion is the reason we have universities and higher education today. You personally may choose to ignore the moral ideals of many religions, but let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater.
Well, this is /. and I'm not really writing a book, so some parts of my opinion are necessarily missing. I actually do believe that religion once served a useful role for the development of mankind. I disagree about the education part, especially given that one religion (Christianity) was a major factor in destroying what higher education the ancient world already had in place, but that's a minor point.
The major point is that this time is long past, and these days (and for hundreds of years now), religion has been more of a burden than a help. It's time to get rid of it.
He does have "use" of it, in the sense that it is a gift, and should not be wasted to damage yourself or others.
If it is a gift, then it comes with no strings attached and I can do with it as I see fit. If there are strings attached, it isn't a gift, but something else, maybe a lease. Please make up your mind if you want to discuss this point.
I studied to be a priest for 2 years, and we were required to take courses in logic. I would imagine most have not.
Your attitude toward religion and logic are not logical.
*nod*
The amount of effort that the organized religions put into their foot soldiers is frightening. I know what priests learn during training. They are much better trained for speaking than many actual professions that require speaking skills.For example, teachers don't get nearly as much voice training, even though they speak all day, every day.
My attitude toward religion isn't logical, but I can create an unbroken logical chain towards it, and reason and intuition have mutually reinforced each other over several years before I came to where I am today. I'm not saying "religion is evil" because I feel like doing so anymore than a physicist says "gravity exists" because he feels its pull - he certainly has that feeling, but it is only a tiny part of what actually constitutes his knowledge about gravity. So if you say that there is no physical reason to even research gravity, then you are certainly right. But that doesn't put gravity itself beyond reason.
I enjoy insulting religious fools. They are being treated with way too much respect. Tolerance is not always appropriate.
What you are claiming is merely a presumption, and one of many possible scenarios
Exactly my point. I was showing the GP that his story is just one of many, by making up my own. Since we're talking about the presumed motivations of hypothetical beings, it is a little difficult to ascertain the truth, or even just a probability.
but religion as a fundamental belief structure has yet to be proven one way or another,
Proven as what? As a belief structure? I think we're done with that. As "true" or "false"? That's trivial: We have about a dozen large religions, all mutually exclusive, all claiming that they and only they are in posession of the truth. By their own internal logic, at most one of them can be. If elven of them are wrong, what are the chances that the 12th is right?
Socrates when he said "all that I know is that I know nothing." Understanding that there are gaps in human knowledge
Socrates was over two millenia ago, we have made a little bit of progress since then. Most importantly, we have realized that there is a difference between not knowing everything, and knowing nothing at all. And we have dug a lot deeper into the nature of truth since Socrates and Plato and especially Aristotle. Granted, it's taken us almost 2000 years, but we finally arrived at non-Aristotelian logic, for example. We realize that whatever "truth" ultimately may be, even if we can not claim to know anything absolutely really for certain, some knowledge, such as physics or medicine, has obvious, visible, reliable and testable practical applications. And some knowledge, such as music, or ethics, has somewhat fuzzy, and not-quite-obvious, but still overal positive practical effects. And some knowledge, such as Voodoo, and Kabballa, and religion, simply doesn't.
Nevertheless, we do apparently have a built-in desire for some kind of spirituality, be it religion or some replacement. There is a lot of very interesting research still to be done on the human mind. It just happens that the nonsense some barely literate desert dwellers wrote down twenty centuries ago isn't among it. It's a historical curiosity, like ancient greek physics.
What if it's not an advert? Most of the spam I get is just a random collection of words trying to damage bayesian filters, much like a typical Slashdot post.
Then it's harrassment. You can classify spam as a subtype of that if you're into nice tree-structures. I personally care a lot more about getting rid of the crap.
If someone stops me on the street and tries to sell a product or get me to give to charity thats not truly spam, even though it is frustrating and at times unwanted.
Multiply that by 1000 or so and you see why spam is a problem.
What about businesses that buy qualified sales leads?
If that "lead" hasn't opted in to receive sales pitches, then for all I care they can die. Just because you made a business out of something doesn't mean you have an eternal subscription to stay in business. We don't have a moral problem about all the torturers and inquisitors that are out of a job because we don't do that kind of stuff anymore, do we?
What about when my Bank sends me promotional material for services they offer that they think might appropriate for me based on my current accounts? These are all advertisements that I didn't ask for, but not truly spam.
In my country, they can only do that if you said they could. It's usually a smallprint somewhere on the form you sign when you open your account, and most people don't bother, but you can X it out.
The person sending the spam isn't necessary the same person selling the goods;
No, and I didn't say that. But the person selling the goods is hiring a spammer. Cut their profits through spamming and they'll stop doing that.