Rule utilitarianism requires a utility function. There is no way to show that the utility function is the 'best' one. For example a rule utilitarianist who believes the function we should maximize is human genetic superiority (above all other concerns) would be a very nasty piece of work.
I do think that ethics that are tested constantly (and the bad ones rejected) are superior to those that don't, but ultimately the current major problem is when ethics are based on something other than empathy (or perhaps the prevention of harm).
Science cant deal with morals. Science is about positive (descriptive) statements not normative (prescriptive) statements.
I don't have a moral system (I'm a moral nihilist) but my effective 'moral code' is basically secular humanism. A basic tenet of this is that you should constantly test morals to see which are better. What exactly is the basis for a scientific morality? How do you use a method for falsifying descriptive statements to demonstrate the truth of normative ones?
As for atheism being 'not main stream', it is far larger than most people realize. And it is a philosophical position about the existence of god. Of course it provides no moral framework. You may as well complain that New Criticism provides no explanation of atomic theory. Most atheists I know who have thought about morality subscribe to some brand of secular humanism. Is that what you are taking about?
I'm not especially interested in converting believers. I just want them to recognize me a decent human being with the same concerns as them. I'd also like them to recognize that I have exactly the same 'moral sense' as they do.
You moral relativism is fine and I agree with it, judge people by the standards of the day and the society they grew up in. Could you now get every single believer who lectures me about how I'm evil and relativist to shut up? Either we judge people by the standards of the day, moral relativism is fine and the Quran (or Bible, or anything else) is interpreted in that manner, or it isn't and pedophilia is a-okay.
You are free to get as upset as you like. The problem isn't that people in the Islamic world get upset. It is that Islalmist extremism has reach the point where death threats have caused self-censorship.
You think your prophet is sacred, we get it. Insulting your prophet is the equivalent of defacating on an American flag in your culture. Fine, we understand. There is something more important at stake here however and that is freedom of speech.
If you feel that Islam is incompatible with freedom of speech, that is fine. You can say so. Just don't be surprised when people say that your religion has no place in the civilized world. The fact of the matter is I don't believe that to be the case.
One of the things I observe about the Islamic world is that it's people aren't that different from our own. They admire our technological prowess and our democratic institutions. The problem is that the often don't understand the latter. Democracy, if it is to last, cant just be about giving people a voice in government. There are some bitter pills to swallow that come along with it. Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Religion, Freedom of Association, the Right to Life. A democracy is a dictatorship waiting to happen without all of these things.
If, like most of the Islamic world, you admire our democratic institutions I invite you to go and consider precisely why it is they function. I invite you to consider the commands in the Quran which require you to provide for the poor and the needy. Is not permanent and stable representation in government not mandated by these tenet? If so, does not the overriding message of tolerance and justice supersede the requirements prohibiting Muslims from idolatry?
Atheism is a religion the same way that Divine Command theory is a religion (as in neither are religions). Atheism is a philosophical positions. It also isn't a faith in either the caricatured conception of faith most people have (belief without evidence or justifying argument) or in the theological sense (trust in previously reliable god).
Lets assume that what you mean by faith is "belief without evidence or justifying argument". I'm going to assume you mean this because if you mean that atheists have faith because they trust in a previously reliable god then really there is no hope for you. Most rational theists don't have faith by this definition never mind most atheists. Ask someone why they believe or don't believe. If they give an argument or present evidence then by this definition they don't have faith. Their argument may be unsound or their evidence questionable but you cant criticize them because they have 'faith'.
The fact that you can bust out an argument like the one you present is very telling. It indicates that either you are misrepresenting your position or you think it is unjustified. Trained theologians don't argue this way because they actually know what 'faith' is.
As for complaints about having religion imposed, you act like atheists are the only ones who want secular principles enforced. Most Christians I know are adamant secularists because they recognize that secularism is the only way to provide for the freedom of religion that protects their religion just as it protects every other religious and non-religious belief.
If your core epistemology is scientific and you believe in virgin births, talking snakes and magic healing spit you have a problem because these are empirical claims. Science and religion can be compatible, but it requires a lot of give on the side of the traditional religions to make them so. If you are Jewish, Christian or Muslim it is highly likely you will have to reinterpret your sacred texts and embrace a brand of theology which rejects any kind of literalism. This ends up being a highly technical argument when the core message is simple. Most peoples conception of faith and religion is incompatible with a scientific epistemology.
Most 'religious' scientists I've spoken to have a conception of religion very different from the popular one, and have far more in common with their atheist colleagues than they do with the wider religious community. If you ask them why they believe in God they will present arguments like the Kalam Cosmological argument or talk about the Divine Command theory of ethics rather than try to hand wave their god into existence as many ordinary religious folk do. Most certainly don't believe in talking snakes.
The problem is actually pretty simple. The scientific method has been so successful that in the popular conception it has basically become a god. Sure we have things like vaccination scares and the like where unscientific crap gets spread about but usually the justification for that is bad science, not a rejection of the scientific method. In that sense there is very much a conflict between science and the popular conception of religion because many religions make claims that are empirical in nature. Most religious scientists would reject those claims, or at least only hold to a version of them so metaphysical in character as to make them non-empirical. But the wider religious community does not. They want the new authority that the scientific method has, but are not prepared to pay the price by dropping their bronze age mythology.
Put very simply if your conception of religion makes empirical claims then it has a high risk of coming into conflict with science. If it doesn't then that is fine, but don't operate under the delusion that you are anything other than an oddity when it comes to religious thought. In fairness to you I will say that you are right, it isn't religion vs. science. It's modern theology, philosophy and science vs.vs bronze age mysticism.
I gotta say for me the problem here isn't the languages that were removed, it's the languages that are still there!
I mean VB.Net 2008! This is a very complicated language totally unsuitable for teaching. It's like starting a course on physics with a class on algebraic topology. C, C# etc are all equally unsuitable as a first language. If you are trying to teach something lower level like C for the sake of it then do assembly, but they shouldn't be a first introduction to programming. They should just mandate Pascal and be done with it. There are plenty of free, high quality packages available for it so it's cheap for the schools and colleges. If you are even vaguely competant as an educator you can pick it up quickly and it's designed specifically to teach students to program.
Calling the hack job the social sciences division of CUP did with "The Skeptical Enviromentalist" peer review is incredibly misleading. The work was simply too big and too original and too natural sciences oriented for that review process to have any hope of having a reasonable outcome, regardless of the credentials of those selected as reviewers. Given the nature of Lomborg's claims there should have been a statistician on the review panel. It was a publication concerned with the natural sciences and it should never have been reviewed by the social science division, they simply were not qualified. His work is full of non-peer reviewed references, contains numerous statistical mistakes and was not peer reviewed in any meaningful sense of the word. Large tracts of it would certainly not have been published had it been put up for review by a high quality nat. sci. journal. He should have submitted his climatology work to climatology journals, his ecology work to ecology journals and his economics work to economics journal, not burdened the social sciences division of the CUP with reviewing a book they clearly did not have the expertise to review. What's sad is that much of Lomborg's work is actually extensions of some criticisms which do exist in the literature and had he submitted his work to apropriate journals I've little doubt some of his work is of publishable quality. He did not. If you are looking to 'win' the argument then yes, technically this book went through peer review, but comparing the process this book went through to the exacting standard most papers in the natural sciences go through is absurd.
Not peer reviewed literature. Not a comittee with oversight of the scientific process. That was a book in response to a book Lomborg published, one that wasn't subject to peer review. In said book Lomborg borders on accusing an entire academic community of committing fraud himself. When Alistair McGrath published "The Dawkin's Delusion" no one cared. Clearly this was intended as a personal refutation to the "The God Delusion" but if Dawkins had wanted the discussion conducted with the usual regards for measure and decorum found in the peer reviewed literature he would have published his theological work there. McGrath comes very close to suggesting that Dawkin's is deliberately misrepresenting the issue (although again there the conclusion of the refutation is that Dawkins is incompetent rather than fraudulent) and Dawkins didn't give a rats backside. Why? Not peer reviewed, not a real accusation of scientific fraud. The book is titled "The Lomborg Deception" because just as in the above case the person writing the refutation believes (correctly in my opinion, although Lomborg hasn't successfully submitted his more outlandish claims for peer review in any respected journals that I know of so perhaps I'm wrong and his ideas just need tidying up) that Lomborg is either committing fraud or incompetent. Again the writer errs on the side of suggesting incompetence and again this is not an accusation dealt with by an body with oversight. There is such a case if you look at the poster below you, and I point out why the DCSD investigation into Lomborg also doesn't represent an accusation of fraud either. There the committee again concluded that Lomborg is simply incompetent rather than fraudulent. The entire Lomborg case is an excellent illustration of why new and original ideas in the sciences generally have to go through peer review first.
In the case you are referring to Lomborg was suspected of fraud because of his repeated misuse of data and mis-characterisation of others research. If his work had been published in a physics or economics journal of any quality it is almost certain he would have had his paper rejected. To actually get his work published in the same form as it appeared in his books he would have to commit fraud. He did not however submit his work to the journals. This wasn't a witch hunt. He was investigated and it was found that the mistakes in his work could reasonably be put down to poor practices than to outright fraud. My point again, in the academic arena he was accused of incompetence, not fraud. This situation he could have entirely avoided if instead of publishing his work in a book he had published it in the journals first. His 'exoneration' essentially amounted to the MSTI pretending that his work wasn't science (or at least didn't have to meet the exacting standard of the natural sciences and could instead be viewed as a work in the 'social sciences'), and that since the publication was not in the literature it was unclear the DCSD had remit to review the work. Hardly a ringing endorsement. I read Lomborg's site before it was down so I'm familiar with his refutation. Again he chooses to conduct an academic discussion not in the literature but on his own website. We have peer review for a reason, it keeps the standard of debate high by ensuring only research of a certain minimum quality is submitted for consideration. Both Friel and Lomborg's work in this regard is frankly a dash sloppy at times because neither has been properly reviewed, this is what happens when you don't use the peer review process for academic work.
In the academic arena ripping each others ideas to shreds is standard fare. No one is suggesting Lomborg committed fraud or going after him personally. People are suggesting he is wrong. Given that many of his more outlandish claims appear in paperback rather than in peer reviewed literature this is better than he deserves.
There/is/ a universal truth (at least in as far as geometry is 'universal') that when you enter the command "ls -a" on a *nix box it will give you a list of all files in a directory (given certain assumptions are true). In so far as it is an empirical fact that the circumference of a radius is proportional to its radius, it is also an empirical fact that typing "ls -a" at a command prompt will give you a list of all files in a directory. Please, go do the study rigt now if you like. You can even go away and build a model for why it happens. A good place to start would be the source code for the "ls" command. Just because we designed the reality doesn't make it any less real. By your argument is work on abstract high dimensional spaces patentable? That has applications in the real world but it does not reflect some universal fact of the real world in the sense you are using it. Should PCA be patentable? Where does the line get drawn? You talk as though there is a nice fine line between 'real world' based mathematics like geometry and trigonometry and advanced subjects like codec design and differential topology, when that line is a great wibbly wobbly jiggly blurry mess. Fortunately there is a nice clean dividing line. Physical objects. These are clearly distinct from processes in that processes do things while objects merely are (or at most have potential to do things).
Physicist who programs in C++ / Python and has dabbled with everything from LISP to Haskell, not that it makes the slightest bit of difference.
If we are going to make ad hominem style responses I'm going to retort back by pointing out that while you might be a programmer you sure aren't a computer scientists or a mathematician. Other posters have directed you to where you can obtain information as to why all computer programs are by definition mathematics but I want to focus on one line in particular...
"A codec isn't a mathematical formula, it's a series of steps for transforming data into sound based on a set of arbitrary standards"
You have just described a mathematical formula. In goes some mathematical object from some space, out comes some mathematical object from some other space. That is literally the definition of a formula.
Now you could argue that the process for making a light bulb or a chair is a mathematical formula if you wanted. And you would be right. It takes some input object (wood and nails and so on) and produces some output object (a chair).
This is why I don't like process or business method patents either. You patent the darn chair, not the way you make it.
There is a reason the number is 10 years. If you do the analysis with 20 years of past data the warming trend is significant.
This meme will never go away because it is an abuse of statistics. If you have an effect in your data over time you will always need some minimum window size in time to see that effect with significance in the statistical sense.
For example random digits 1112211112211122322222122332222123333322333222333222333333444334
The above clearly trends upwards. But if you go away and do analysis you will be able to pick your window (for instance the sequence 3222221 appears in the above data) so that at any given point along this data set there appears to be no change or even the reverse change in the average magnitude of the digits.
This is what is going on here. It's a cheap trick by people who know the general public cant do stats.
Okay why is it that one form of mathematics can be patented and other kinds cant? All a computer program is is a mathematical algorithm. I'm a professional scientists, when do I get to patent the maths I derive? Not that I'd ever want one. Software patents are insane because they allow you to patent maths. I'd like to think it's obvious why you don't want a field as interconnected and related as mathematics to be patented. What happens when some clever mathematician shows some alogrithm to be isomorphic (the standard of sameness) as some other method implemented in software patents! Without the physical device to point to and say "that mechanism" patents become a nightmare.
I'm assuming serious civilian casualties are something people want to avoid more than an occupation that is almost certainly imminent anyway by a relatively benign power. Everything you have said is both true, and assumes winning the war rather than doing what is in the best interest of the invaded country as a whole is the priority.
That said I feel I should point out that blatant use of civilians and civilian infrastructure is used for propaganda purposes by both sides and goes some way to legitimising the removal of the existing civil authority in a nation or region.
Your other objections to this weapons system are also well thought out, especially the one about launching a first strike against the US being a really bad idea. This is clearly a preemptive weapon. It seems that many parts of the world who oppose the US believe a little too much of their own propaganda. The US military has been on a tight leash for a long time now. It could have 'won' any of the wars it has been involved in if tolerance for casualties (both American and enemy civilian) were high enough.
All I see using this weapon as it is intended doing is getting a larger portion of ones own population and infrastructure blown up.
A reference? No I'd have to go hunting, I can explain the situation as best I remember it however. The first Q ships were using in 1915 prior to the full use of unrestricted submarine warfare in 1917 but after the declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare in the Channel, North Sea and neighbouring waters.
The rules of engagement for submarines were not well defined in the Great War. The British blockade extended to food, which cause diplomatic rumbles in the States and outraged Germany. Germany tried to respond in kind but there was concern that if they annoyed the USA they might enter the war. Early in the war German submarine captains would often pull up to a craft and forcebly disembark the crew before sinking her, especially if she was sailing under a neutral flag. German escalation of unrestricted submarine warfare inlcuding the February 4th declaration in 1915 by Admiral von Pohl meant that the British civilian ships were already under attack (as was neutral shipping at times). Part of the British response was Q ships. As far as the British were concerned the German use of submarines was already a violation of the spirit (and for that matter at the time the letter) of the rules of naval warfare.
The Germans accused the British of using Q ships with foriegn flags (whipping out the white naval ensign at the last minute) essentially 'forcing' them to shoot at everything that sailed. There were regular complaints from the Germans about the Q-ships.
The whole thing was a mess. All sides should have agreed realistic limits on how submarines could operate and how blockades could be conducted prior to hostilities because both sides ended up doing rather nasty things.
Not really letting my country commit war crimes, I object to them and write to my MP about them but beyond that not a whole lot I can do. I think I can complain about both.
Torture is bad, my government sucks for doing it and I don't like it. I want the people complicit on trial in the Hague.
People who fight under false flags, who use child soldiers and who hide behind notions of 'asymmetrical warfare' suck, I don't like them and I want them on trial in the Hague.
The explanation from evolutionary psychology is a perfectly acceptable answer to the question "Why do we feel an obligation not to kill others". It does nothing to answer the question "Why should we not kill others". The former is a statement of scientific fact, we have moral codes because evolution has determined them for survival advantage. This in no way means that we ought to obey those preprogrammed moral directives given to us by our evolutionary background. The scientific method cant answer the question "Why shouldn't you kill others" unless you provide an apriori assumption like "given that I want to procreate" or "given that empathy is the best value". Secular Humanism for instance assumes that we should base our ethics around empathy. There is no good reason to assume this (you could say the results of this assumption are good, but they are only good if one assumes empathy is the best value which is circular reasoning).
If Liberia was the power launching the missile it goes from fighting under a false flag to using foriegn nationals as human shields. Unless of course the Chinese-Malasian-Indian mixed crew were all mercenaries and oh sod it.
Something will be very wrong with this picture barring an alliance between China, Malasia, India, Britain and Liberia against the United States. Perhaps we could throw in a US admiral with stealth technology on his boat who wants to defect to Russia but who has a small arsenal of nuclear weapons. Only Jack Ryan can save us!
Point is, don't dress up military installations to look like civilian infrastructure, it's bad.
I agree that is how a sensible state will use it. That is not how the system is portrayed in the marketing video, at least, not my interpretation of the video.
You see to be under the impression I think this is a bad idea from a marketing stand point because people wont go for it. I think it's a bad idea because it's a good way to make civilians legitimate targets. I've no doubt there are customers for this sort of thing. I just think these customers are either evil or stupid, or both.
This would be a terrorist act however, and I was thinking of this in terms of a straight fight between states. I kinda need to get with the new warfare paradigm don't I.
The Church is not wider society. It is a political party. It is a social club. It is a business. It is a charity. It is an organisation, not a state of being. You find me an organisation (not wider society, the suggestion I leave that is asinine, how exactly do you propose I do that?) I'm actually a member of that protects child rapists and I will leave it. Are you now prepared to leave the Church? Your use of statistics show how patently you missed the point. It isn't that members of the Church raped children (although that does make claims of moral superiority laughable, especially from a organisation whose leader bangs on about moral relativism). That doesn't make the Church complicit, what makes the Church complicit in these crimes is that they covered them up! The day they raped children was the day their policies gave tacit approval to it. Again I ask, show me an organisation I am a voluntary member of which is routinely complicit in the raping of children and I promise you I will leave it before the sun sets.
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Rule utilitarianism requires a utility function. There is no way to show that the utility function is the 'best' one. For example a rule utilitarianist who believes the function we should maximize is human genetic superiority (above all other concerns) would be a very nasty piece of work.
I do think that ethics that are tested constantly (and the bad ones rejected) are superior to those that don't, but ultimately the current major problem is when ethics are based on something other than empathy (or perhaps the prevention of harm).
Science cant deal with morals. Science is about positive (descriptive) statements not normative (prescriptive) statements.
I don't have a moral system (I'm a moral nihilist) but my effective 'moral code' is basically secular humanism. A basic tenet of this is that you should constantly test morals to see which are better. What exactly is the basis for a scientific morality? How do you use a method for falsifying descriptive statements to demonstrate the truth of normative ones?
As for atheism being 'not main stream', it is far larger than most people realize. And it is a philosophical position about the existence of god. Of course it provides no moral framework. You may as well complain that New Criticism provides no explanation of atomic theory. Most atheists I know who have thought about morality subscribe to some brand of secular humanism. Is that what you are taking about?
I'm not especially interested in converting believers. I just want them to recognize me a decent human being with the same concerns as them. I'd also like them to recognize that I have exactly the same 'moral sense' as they do.
You moral relativism is fine and I agree with it, judge people by the standards of the day and the society they grew up in. Could you now get every single believer who lectures me about how I'm evil and relativist to shut up? Either we judge people by the standards of the day, moral relativism is fine and the Quran (or Bible, or anything else) is interpreted in that manner, or it isn't and pedophilia is a-okay.
You are free to get as upset as you like. The problem isn't that people in the Islamic world get upset. It is that Islalmist extremism has reach the point where death threats have caused self-censorship.
You think your prophet is sacred, we get it. Insulting your prophet is the equivalent of defacating on an American flag in your culture. Fine, we understand. There is something more important at stake here however and that is freedom of speech.
If you feel that Islam is incompatible with freedom of speech, that is fine. You can say so. Just don't be surprised when people say that your religion has no place in the civilized world. The fact of the matter is I don't believe that to be the case.
One of the things I observe about the Islamic world is that it's people aren't that different from our own. They admire our technological prowess and our democratic institutions. The problem is that the often don't understand the latter. Democracy, if it is to last, cant just be about giving people a voice in government. There are some bitter pills to swallow that come along with it. Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Religion, Freedom of Association, the Right to Life. A democracy is a dictatorship waiting to happen without all of these things.
If, like most of the Islamic world, you admire our democratic institutions I invite you to go and consider precisely why it is they function. I invite you to consider the commands in the Quran which require you to provide for the poor and the needy. Is not permanent and stable representation in government not mandated by these tenet? If so, does not the overriding message of tolerance and justice supersede the requirements prohibiting Muslims from idolatry?
Atheism is a religion the same way that Divine Command theory is a religion (as in neither are religions). Atheism is a philosophical positions. It also isn't a faith in either the caricatured conception of faith most people have (belief without evidence or justifying argument) or in the theological sense (trust in previously reliable god).
Lets assume that what you mean by faith is "belief without evidence or justifying argument". I'm going to assume you mean this because if you mean that atheists have faith because they trust in a previously reliable god then really there is no hope for you. Most rational theists don't have faith by this definition never mind most atheists. Ask someone why they believe or don't believe. If they give an argument or present evidence then by this definition they don't have faith. Their argument may be unsound or their evidence questionable but you cant criticize them because they have 'faith'.
The fact that you can bust out an argument like the one you present is very telling. It indicates that either you are misrepresenting your position or you think it is unjustified. Trained theologians don't argue this way because they actually know what 'faith' is.
As for complaints about having religion imposed, you act like atheists are the only ones who want secular principles enforced. Most Christians I know are adamant secularists because they recognize that secularism is the only way to provide for the freedom of religion that protects their religion just as it protects every other religious and non-religious belief.
If your core epistemology is scientific and you believe in virgin births, talking snakes and magic healing spit you have a problem because these are empirical claims. Science and religion can be compatible, but it requires a lot of give on the side of the traditional religions to make them so. If you are Jewish, Christian or Muslim it is highly likely you will have to reinterpret your sacred texts and embrace a brand of theology which rejects any kind of literalism. This ends up being a highly technical argument when the core message is simple. Most peoples conception of faith and religion is incompatible with a scientific epistemology.
Most 'religious' scientists I've spoken to have a conception of religion very different from the popular one, and have far more in common with their atheist colleagues than they do with the wider religious community. If you ask them why they believe in God they will present arguments like the Kalam Cosmological argument or talk about the Divine Command theory of ethics rather than try to hand wave their god into existence as many ordinary religious folk do. Most certainly don't believe in talking snakes.
The problem is actually pretty simple. The scientific method has been so successful that in the popular conception it has basically become a god. Sure we have things like vaccination scares and the like where unscientific crap gets spread about but usually the justification for that is bad science, not a rejection of the scientific method. In that sense there is very much a conflict between science and the popular conception of religion because many religions make claims that are empirical in nature. Most religious scientists would reject those claims, or at least only hold to a version of them so metaphysical in character as to make them non-empirical. But the wider religious community does not. They want the new authority that the scientific method has, but are not prepared to pay the price by dropping their bronze age mythology.
Put very simply if your conception of religion makes empirical claims then it has a high risk of coming into conflict with science. If it doesn't then that is fine, but don't operate under the delusion that you are anything other than an oddity when it comes to religious thought. In fairness to you I will say that you are right, it isn't religion vs. science. It's modern theology, philosophy and science vs.vs bronze age mysticism.
I gotta say for me the problem here isn't the languages that were removed, it's the languages that are still there!
I mean VB.Net 2008! This is a very complicated language totally unsuitable for teaching. It's like starting a course on physics with a class on algebraic topology. C, C# etc are all equally unsuitable as a first language. If you are trying to teach something lower level like C for the sake of it then do assembly, but they shouldn't be a first introduction to programming. They should just mandate Pascal and be done with it. There are plenty of free, high quality packages available for it so it's cheap for the schools and colleges. If you are even vaguely competant as an educator you can pick it up quickly and it's designed specifically to teach students to program.
Calling the hack job the social sciences division of CUP did with "The Skeptical Enviromentalist" peer review is incredibly misleading. The work was simply too big and too original and too natural sciences oriented for that review process to have any hope of having a reasonable outcome, regardless of the credentials of those selected as reviewers. Given the nature of Lomborg's claims there should have been a statistician on the review panel. It was a publication concerned with the natural sciences and it should never have been reviewed by the social science division, they simply were not qualified.
His work is full of non-peer reviewed references, contains numerous statistical mistakes and was not peer reviewed in any meaningful sense of the word. Large tracts of it would certainly not have been published had it been put up for review by a high quality nat. sci. journal.
He should have submitted his climatology work to climatology journals, his ecology work to ecology journals and his economics work to economics journal, not burdened the social sciences division of the CUP with reviewing a book they clearly did not have the expertise to review.
What's sad is that much of Lomborg's work is actually extensions of some criticisms which do exist in the literature and had he submitted his work to apropriate journals I've little doubt some of his work is of publishable quality. He did not.
If you are looking to 'win' the argument then yes, technically this book went through peer review, but comparing the process this book went through to the exacting standard most papers in the natural sciences go through is absurd.
Not peer reviewed literature. Not a comittee with oversight of the scientific process. That was a book in response to a book Lomborg published, one that wasn't subject to peer review. In said book Lomborg borders on accusing an entire academic community of committing fraud himself.
When Alistair McGrath published "The Dawkin's Delusion" no one cared. Clearly this was intended as a personal refutation to the "The God Delusion" but if Dawkins had wanted the discussion conducted with the usual regards for measure and decorum found in the peer reviewed literature he would have published his theological work there. McGrath comes very close to suggesting that Dawkin's is deliberately misrepresenting the issue (although again there the conclusion of the refutation is that Dawkins is incompetent rather than fraudulent) and Dawkins didn't give a rats backside. Why? Not peer reviewed, not a real accusation of scientific fraud.
The book is titled "The Lomborg Deception" because just as in the above case the person writing the refutation believes (correctly in my opinion, although Lomborg hasn't successfully submitted his more outlandish claims for peer review in any respected journals that I know of so perhaps I'm wrong and his ideas just need tidying up) that Lomborg is either committing fraud or incompetent. Again the writer errs on the side of suggesting incompetence and again this is not an accusation dealt with by an body with oversight.
There is such a case if you look at the poster below you, and I point out why the DCSD investigation into Lomborg also doesn't represent an accusation of fraud either. There the committee again concluded that Lomborg is simply incompetent rather than fraudulent.
The entire Lomborg case is an excellent illustration of why new and original ideas in the sciences generally have to go through peer review first.
In the case you are referring to Lomborg was suspected of fraud because of his repeated misuse of data and mis-characterisation of others research. If his work had been published in a physics or economics journal of any quality it is almost certain he would have had his paper rejected. To actually get his work published in the same form as it appeared in his books he would have to commit fraud.
He did not however submit his work to the journals. This wasn't a witch hunt. He was investigated and it was found that the mistakes in his work could reasonably be put down to poor practices than to outright fraud. My point again, in the academic arena he was accused of incompetence, not fraud. This situation he could have entirely avoided if instead of publishing his work in a book he had published it in the journals first.
His 'exoneration' essentially amounted to the MSTI pretending that his work wasn't science (or at least didn't have to meet the exacting standard of the natural sciences and could instead be viewed as a work in the 'social sciences'), and that since the publication was not in the literature it was unclear the DCSD had remit to review the work. Hardly a ringing endorsement.
I read Lomborg's site before it was down so I'm familiar with his refutation. Again he chooses to conduct an academic discussion not in the literature but on his own website.
We have peer review for a reason, it keeps the standard of debate high by ensuring only research of a certain minimum quality is submitted for consideration. Both Friel and Lomborg's work in this regard is frankly a dash sloppy at times because neither has been properly reviewed, this is what happens when you don't use the peer review process for academic work.
In the academic arena ripping each others ideas to shreds is standard fare. No one is suggesting Lomborg committed fraud or going after him personally. People are suggesting he is wrong. Given that many of his more outlandish claims appear in paperback rather than in peer reviewed literature this is better than he deserves.
There /is/ a universal truth (at least in as far as geometry is 'universal') that when you enter the command "ls -a" on a *nix box it will give you a list of all files in a directory (given certain assumptions are true). In so far as it is an empirical fact that the circumference of a radius is proportional to its radius, it is also an empirical fact that typing "ls -a" at a command prompt will give you a list of all files in a directory. Please, go do the study rigt now if you like. You can even go away and build a model for why it happens. A good place to start would be the source code for the "ls" command.
Just because we designed the reality doesn't make it any less real.
By your argument is work on abstract high dimensional spaces patentable? That has applications in the real world but it does not reflect some universal fact of the real world in the sense you are using it. Should PCA be patentable? Where does the line get drawn?
You talk as though there is a nice fine line between 'real world' based mathematics like geometry and trigonometry and advanced subjects like codec design and differential topology, when that line is a great wibbly wobbly jiggly blurry mess. Fortunately there is a nice clean dividing line. Physical objects. These are clearly distinct from processes in that processes do things while objects merely are (or at most have potential to do things).
Physicist who programs in C++ / Python and has dabbled with everything from LISP to Haskell, not that it makes the slightest bit of difference.
If we are going to make ad hominem style responses I'm going to retort back by pointing out that while you might be a programmer you sure aren't a computer scientists or a mathematician. Other posters have directed you to where you can obtain information as to why all computer programs are by definition mathematics but I want to focus on one line in particular...
"A codec isn't a mathematical formula, it's a series of steps for transforming data into sound based on a set of arbitrary standards"
You have just described a mathematical formula. In goes some mathematical object from some space, out comes some mathematical object from some other space. That is literally the definition of a formula.
Now you could argue that the process for making a light bulb or a chair is a mathematical formula if you wanted. And you would be right. It takes some input object (wood and nails and so on) and produces some output object (a chair).
This is why I don't like process or business method patents either. You patent the darn chair, not the way you make it.
There is a reason the number is 10 years. If you do the analysis with 20 years of past data the warming trend is significant.
This meme will never go away because it is an abuse of statistics. If you have an effect in your data over time you will always need some minimum window size in time to see that effect with significance in the statistical sense.
For example random digits
1112211112211122322222122332222123333322333222333222333333444334
The above clearly trends upwards. But if you go away and do analysis you will be able to pick your window (for instance the sequence 3222221 appears in the above data) so that at any given point along this data set there appears to be no change or even the reverse change in the average magnitude of the digits.
This is what is going on here. It's a cheap trick by people who know the general public cant do stats.
Okay why is it that one form of mathematics can be patented and other kinds cant? All a computer program is is a mathematical algorithm. I'm a professional scientists, when do I get to patent the maths I derive? Not that I'd ever want one.
Software patents are insane because they allow you to patent maths. I'd like to think it's obvious why you don't want a field as interconnected and related as mathematics to be patented. What happens when some clever mathematician shows some alogrithm to be isomorphic (the standard of sameness) as some other method implemented in software patents! Without the physical device to point to and say "that mechanism" patents become a nightmare.
I'm assuming serious civilian casualties are something people want to avoid more than an occupation that is almost certainly imminent anyway by a relatively benign power. Everything you have said is both true, and assumes winning the war rather than doing what is in the best interest of the invaded country as a whole is the priority.
That said I feel I should point out that blatant use of civilians and civilian infrastructure is used for propaganda purposes by both sides and goes some way to legitimising the removal of the existing civil authority in a nation or region.
Your other objections to this weapons system are also well thought out, especially the one about launching a first strike against the US being a really bad idea. This is clearly a preemptive weapon. It seems that many parts of the world who oppose the US believe a little too much of their own propaganda. The US military has been on a tight leash for a long time now. It could have 'won' any of the wars it has been involved in if tolerance for casualties (both American and enemy civilian) were high enough.
All I see using this weapon as it is intended doing is getting a larger portion of ones own population and infrastructure blown up.
A reference? No I'd have to go hunting, I can explain the situation as best I remember it however. The first Q ships were using in 1915 prior to the full use of unrestricted submarine warfare in 1917 but after the declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare in the Channel, North Sea and neighbouring waters.
The rules of engagement for submarines were not well defined in the Great War. The British blockade extended to food, which cause diplomatic rumbles in the States and outraged Germany. Germany tried to respond in kind but there was concern that if they annoyed the USA they might enter the war. Early in the war German submarine captains would often pull up to a craft and forcebly disembark the crew before sinking her, especially if she was sailing under a neutral flag. German escalation of unrestricted submarine warfare inlcuding the February 4th declaration in 1915 by Admiral von Pohl meant that the British civilian ships were already under attack (as was neutral shipping at times). Part of the British response was Q ships. As far as the British were concerned the German use of submarines was already a violation of the spirit (and for that matter at the time the letter) of the rules of naval warfare.
The Germans accused the British of using Q ships with foriegn flags (whipping out the white naval ensign at the last minute) essentially 'forcing' them to shoot at everything that sailed. There were regular complaints from the Germans about the Q-ships.
The whole thing was a mess. All sides should have agreed realistic limits on how submarines could operate and how blockades could be conducted prior to hostilities because both sides ended up doing rather nasty things.
Not really letting my country commit war crimes, I object to them and write to my MP about them but beyond that not a whole lot I can do. I think I can complain about both.
Torture is bad, my government sucks for doing it and I don't like it. I want the people complicit on trial in the Hague.
People who fight under false flags, who use child soldiers and who hide behind notions of 'asymmetrical warfare' suck, I don't like them and I want them on trial in the Hague.
See, just did both, didn't even break a sweat.
The explanation from evolutionary psychology is a perfectly acceptable answer to the question "Why do we feel an obligation not to kill others". It does nothing to answer the question "Why should we not kill others". The former is a statement of scientific fact, we have moral codes because evolution has determined them for survival advantage. This in no way means that we ought to obey those preprogrammed moral directives given to us by our evolutionary background.
The scientific method cant answer the question "Why shouldn't you kill others" unless you provide an apriori assumption like "given that I want to procreate" or "given that empathy is the best value". Secular Humanism for instance assumes that we should base our ethics around empathy. There is no good reason to assume this (you could say the results of this assumption are good, but they are only good if one assumes empathy is the best value which is circular reasoning).
If Liberia was the power launching the missile it goes from fighting under a false flag to using foriegn nationals as human shields. Unless of course the Chinese-Malasian-Indian mixed crew were all mercenaries and oh sod it.
Something will be very wrong with this picture barring an alliance between China, Malasia, India, Britain and Liberia against the United States. Perhaps we could throw in a US admiral with stealth technology on his boat who wants to defect to Russia but who has a small arsenal of nuclear weapons. Only Jack Ryan can save us!
Point is, don't dress up military installations to look like civilian infrastructure, it's bad.
Fine, it would be a war crime. Fighting under a false flag. Technically you are right, not terrorism since it would not be intended to terrorise.
I agree that is how a sensible state will use it. That is not how the system is portrayed in the marketing video, at least, not my interpretation of the video.
You see to be under the impression I think this is a bad idea from a marketing stand point because people wont go for it. I think it's a bad idea because it's a good way to make civilians legitimate targets. I've no doubt there are customers for this sort of thing. I just think these customers are either evil or stupid, or both.
Good point, well made.
This would be a terrorist act however, and I was thinking of this in terms of a straight fight between states. I kinda need to get with the new warfare paradigm don't I.
The Church is not wider society. It is a political party. It is a social club. It is a business. It is a charity. It is an organisation, not a state of being. You find me an organisation (not wider society, the suggestion I leave that is asinine, how exactly do you propose I do that?) I'm actually a member of that protects child rapists and I will leave it. Are you now prepared to leave the Church?
Your use of statistics show how patently you missed the point. It isn't that members of the Church raped children (although that does make claims of moral superiority laughable, especially from a organisation whose leader bangs on about moral relativism). That doesn't make the Church complicit, what makes the Church complicit in these crimes is that they covered them up! The day they raped children was the day their policies gave tacit approval to it. Again I ask, show me an organisation I am a voluntary member of which is routinely complicit in the raping of children and I promise you I will leave it before the sun sets.