1) I got the timeless stuff from physics, not religion. Most religions are based upon human notions of time, whereas modern physics, last I heard, treats time like a videotape: it doesn't make sense to ask what comes before the beginning or after the end. There's no tape beyond those points.
2) I'm not a Christian, so I really don't deal with those paradoxes.
The Republicans in charge do get it, and get it very well. They know how easy it is to control people through religion, and it's one of the most powerful tools they have. They figured out that you can do pretty much anything you want in the name of God, and you will be supported by a lot of people because they can pretend to be following you in the path of God, whether they actually believe it or not.
The problem is that this kind of politics instantly alienates all the non-Christians. Not just the atheists, but people of non-Christian religions who might listen to a Christian preacher and think "that's not even wrong".
Okay, so god created the universe - who created God? You say a watch can't appear fully formed, someone just created it - but a god who is even more complex than us can appear fully formed, or is more likely to have 'always existed' than the universe?
Mu, the question is retarded. Have you ever heard a physicist explain that there wasn't any time before the Big Bang? It works like that. God doesn't exist in linear time as we see it, He just sticks his toe in occasionally. Thus, from our perspective He appears to have "always" existed when, in actual fact, time is really a much smaller place than we thought it.
Somersault, as someone who spent a big part of my life as an academic, I've seen more than one "spiritual awakening" of a very religious person who learns to set aside childish superstitions.
And how many formerly utterly secular people have you seen go black-hat?
You know, we could go back to relying on human intelligence instead of having machines do everything. I love computers as much as any Slashdotters, but they're basically retarded when it comes to the real world.
3. The whole thing about capitalism and the free market is that it's an optimization algorithm. It's really a genetic algorithm, based on semi-uninformed trial and error. The "genes" (processes, ideas, products) which are closer to optimal survive and are copied by others, and the process repeats, moving it all closer to the optimum. The genes which lost, and the companies which bet on them, die. Sometimes spectacularly, leaving a bunch of people temporarily unemployed.
They already did. The Iraq war got started because some idiot modded "OMG IRAQ TOTALLY HAS WMDZ!!1" up to +3 Funny, +1 Insightful, and +1 Justification to Invade Country That Fucked with Daddy.
But, there's a very fine line between preempting a crime, and just shutting up people you don't agree with.
No there is not. The police do not exist to preempt crime; that is not their purpose in any free society. The police exist to enforce the law when and ONLY when it has already been violated.
Welcome to the United Oligarchy of America. You've been here for 8 years already.
It's fresh in the United States? I've known for... well... pretty much since I can remember understanding political concepts -- not that long since I'm quite young but it sure as hell ain't fresh.
And this is yet another reason I'm voting Obama. When people tried a deliberate troll-protest, the Obama campaign let them in to talk peacefully. That is HOW a fucking STATESMEN handles things.
FUCK that shit, cuz I ain't the one. Punk motherfucker with a badge and a gun. To be beaten, and thrown in jail. We can go toe-to-toe in the middle of a cell.
Fuckin wit me cuz I'm a teenagah, With just a bita truth and an effigy. Searchin mah car, lookin fer da product. Thinkin every hippy is takin narcotucs!
No, but many if not most places, they do have them as "voluntary" classes where you have to pick at least N out of M courses. If you have to choose between, say, Track and Field, Religion, Outdoor Photography and Football, and you have a lame leg, then chances are that you'll go to Religion class whether you really want to or not.
Really? I've lived in 3 school districts while a kid, and not a one had a religion class. Must be because we're in the Evil Liberal Northeast.
Slashdot Mirror
1) I got the timeless stuff from physics, not religion. Most religions are based upon human notions of time, whereas modern physics, last I heard, treats time like a videotape: it doesn't make sense to ask what comes before the beginning or after the end. There's no tape beyond those points.
2) I'm not a Christian, so I really don't deal with those paradoxes.
The Republicans in charge do get it, and get it very well. They know how easy it is to control people through religion, and it's one of the most powerful tools they have. They figured out that you can do pretty much anything you want in the name of God, and you will be supported by a lot of people because they can pretend to be following you in the path of God, whether they actually believe it or not.
The problem is that this kind of politics instantly alienates all the non-Christians. Not just the atheists, but people of non-Christian religions who might listen to a Christian preacher and think "that's not even wrong".
Okay, so god created the universe - who created God? You say a watch can't appear fully formed, someone just created it - but a god who is even more complex than us can appear fully formed, or is more likely to have 'always existed' than the universe?
Mu, the question is retarded. Have you ever heard a physicist explain that there wasn't any time before the Big Bang? It works like that. God doesn't exist in linear time as we see it, He just sticks his toe in occasionally. Thus, from our perspective He appears to have "always" existed when, in actual fact, time is really a much smaller place than we thought it.
Somersault, as someone who spent a big part of my life as an academic, I've seen more than one "spiritual awakening" of a very religious person who learns to set aside childish superstitions.
And how many formerly utterly secular people have you seen go black-hat?
As always, conspiracies are just a conspiracy to get people to believe in conspiracies. Did you know 9/11 wasn't an inside job?
EASILY without it being noticed.
You know, we could go back to relying on human intelligence instead of having machines do everything. I love computers as much as any Slashdotters, but they're basically retarded when it comes to the real world.
3. The whole thing about capitalism and the free market is that it's an optimization algorithm. It's really a genetic algorithm, based on semi-uninformed trial and error. The "genes" (processes, ideas, products) which are closer to optimal survive and are copied by others, and the process repeats, moving it all closer to the optimum. The genes which lost, and the companies which bet on them, die. Sometimes spectacularly, leaving a bunch of people temporarily unemployed.
All social sciences are just applied ecology.
calculus is easy, excepting some of the trig crossover and the umpteen billion integration tricks
Where "trig crossover and the umpteen billion integration tricks" form most of college-level Calc 2. Grrr...
Or, God forbid, a tentacle-monster that claims it loves everyone.
Troll! TROOOOOLLLL in the dungeons!
Well Kahanism certainly worries the fuck out of *me*.
They already did. The Iraq war got started because some idiot modded "OMG IRAQ TOTALLY HAS WMDZ!!1" up to +3 Funny, +1 Insightful, and +1 Justification to Invade Country That Fucked with Daddy.
They're conservative, they're racist, they're self-conscious, and gosh darn it, people like them.
A fact I continue to fail to understand at all.
I consider myself an IT professional, and I got my degree in Japanese Literature.
Wapanese de-tec-ted. Launch missiles, EX-TER-MINATE!
Humans would not have been "brought low". There are plenty of humans outside of Europe.
But Doctor, why does this mean we need a some peanuts, a pound of iron ore and a sheep covered in chocolate syrup to fix the TARDIS?
LOL. Quite a while ago was the time for protests, strikes, and maybe even rioting. You want your country back *now*, make a revolution.
Oppression requires revolution.
HOW MANY GOD-DAMN YEARS HAS THIS TAKEN TO GET THROUGH TO YOU!?
Damn stupid country. This text inserted to bypass the Slashdot lameness filter.
But, there's a very fine line between preempting a crime, and just shutting up people you don't agree with.
No there is not. The police do not exist to preempt crime; that is not their purpose in any free society. The police exist to enforce the law when and ONLY when it has already been violated.
Welcome to the United Oligarchy of America. You've been here for 8 years already.
Authoritarian state != dictatorship. I think America looks more like an oligarchy right now.
It's fresh in the United States? I've known for... well... pretty much since I can remember understanding political concepts -- not that long since I'm quite young but it sure as hell ain't fresh.
And this is yet another reason I'm voting Obama. When people tried a deliberate troll-protest, the Obama campaign let them in to talk peacefully. That is HOW a fucking STATESMEN handles things.
FUCK that shit, cuz I ain't the one.
Punk motherfucker with a badge and a gun.
To be beaten, and thrown in jail.
We can go toe-to-toe in the middle of a cell.
Fuckin wit me cuz I'm a teenagah,
With just a bita truth and an effigy.
Searchin mah car, lookin fer da product.
Thinkin every hippy is takin narcotucs!
No, but many if not most places, they do have them as "voluntary" classes where you have to pick at least N out of M courses. If you have to choose between, say, Track and Field, Religion, Outdoor Photography and Football, and you have a lame leg, then chances are that you'll go to Religion class whether you really want to or not.
Really? I've lived in 3 school districts while a kid, and not a one had a religion class. Must be because we're in the Evil Liberal Northeast.