I've decided the second one is advising you not to stick a plunger to the side of the machine, or it'll beat you in the face with the plunger and pee on your leg.
Private commercial rockets and telescopes need encouraging, and as this article clearly shows, it's not the end of martian and lunar missions. There are other space agencies handling those.
"The common justification for piracy is that it is cheap and easy to violate artist rights. You can copy their work all you like easily and quickly because technology allows it. There is no discussion of right or wrong, only that technology allows it, so do it."
It can not be prohibited. It is not possible to more than slightly affect piracy short of eliminating the internet and all network-capable devices. Governmental actions can be and often are prohibited. There is a big difference between the kinds of "easy" we're talking about with those two issues.
I was disappointed to hear about this, actually. Now AMC's act of defiance doesn't mean anything, and people will go on thinking that ratings actually mean something.
In that case, all we need to do is get an old celebrity to change their last name to "piracy", "copyright", or "corruption" and wait for the problem to solve itself.
Governments aren't supposed to be doing what's cheaper and easier. Their job is to do what is best for their citizens. It is not the public's job is to do what's best for corporations or governments. The situations aren't analogous.
The logic of piracy is that it's so easy to do that getting people to stop would require shutting down modern civilization and turning the clock back to the 20th century. The same can't be said of governmental wiretapping.
Wait, I'm confused. People used to keep encyclopedias in books? And they enjoyed it? How did they handle citations and links? What did they do if one article referenced another? Were you just supposed to keep all 26 books out and available for referencing? That sounds a lot more cluttered and chaotic than just clicking on the thing you want to learn about.
Wow, really? All of that? It's fortunate that God loved us enough to set all that up, or we wouldn't exist. Clearly this is evidence of a super-God that cared enough about us that he created a God that cared enough about us to create a fine-tuned universe.
Eventually you have to get to a point where you just say "wow, that worked out well", or you get stuck in a cycle of intentionality that doesn't end even when the creators outnumber the stars. That point, for you, is God. That point, for me, is currently math. If there's ever any non-circumstantial evidence that math arose from something else I'll change my mind then.
The number of stars present in our universe or the particular characteristics of Earth are irrelevant. With physics in place, a universe this large and full eventually arising becomes more or less inevitable. And if a system like ours doesn't show up that first time, then the one after that might have it. Given infinite time all possible things will happen. Pointing out that life exists under conditions that we know life can exist in is not a useful or profound statement. Besides, a number of the things your article claims had to be present for life to occur are not absolute characteristics of Earth. In particular, atmospheric composition has varied greatly historically, and runaway greenhouse and freezing effects have occurred without spelling the end of all life. And, while I don't know the precise tolerances of all the things listed, that it considers Earth's presence in the habitable zone as evidence of precise balance shows that it's not looking too closely at how much variance could be tolerated before things stopped working; the zone that Earth could've formed in to allow it to support life is actually fairly wide.
"Because it isn't just about us being better people. Spiritual death does exist, and if you don't accept Jesus as the one to atone for your sin, you will pay that price instead when the time comes. I don't like talking about that but it's part of what Jesus spoke about and why he came. There's a part of us that nothing can fill except God, an emptiness that only he can close. We're made that way."
False. A lifetime of people telling you that you're a sinner and a pathetic being and that Jesus is the only way to fix that has drilled that God-shaped hole into your heart.
"All time, matter, space, and energy has a finite beginning. And for them to have that beginning, there must be a Beginner."
The same was once said of planets, species, and rain. And, as it turns out, all those things do have beginners. They just aren't capable of thought.
"Albert Einstein himself came to that conclusion, even if he didn't take the next step in admitting who that Beginner was. He at least admitted there had to be one. You really think you know better than him?"
Yes. Science isn't a religion, and Einstein wasn't a prophet. He was a very, very smart man, and relativity turned out to be very, very correct, but he wasn't infallible, and he would let his basic preconceptions interfere with his beliefs. He also thought that the universe was eternal and unchanging; he even tried to tune his theorem so that it would predict a static universe. How can you claim that there was a Big Bang or cosmic expansion when Einstein said otherwise? Do you really think you know better than him? The answer is yes, you do.
"Also, eyewitness testimony is considered legal evidence in a court of law, and eyewitness testimony is exactly what the gospels are. The earliest texts have been conclusively dated to within just a few decades of Jesus' death and resurrection, well within the lifetime of the apostles, confirming their authenticity."
There was eyewitness testimony of witchcraft in Salem dated much more closely to the event than a few decades. Currently more alien encounters happen than divine encounters (barring stupid ones like the char marks on your toast looking like Jesus), but that's not proof of an alien presence near Earth. I'll worry about this if atheism is ever tried in court.
"And yet you haven't mentioned a single one here. You made a claim but didn't make it up, so your argument fails."
I was just trying to clarify what I meant by "pretzel", but okay. This is the one you seem to be most affected by, along with this and its offspring. All of these also commonly characterize religions, though you seem to at least be trying to minimize them. I freely admit that I catch myself falling prey to those at times, too, particularly the last one, but most of my beliefs aren't built upon them anymore.
"You said it yourself, you know your body has a better chance of not acting out if you maintain it. That knowing is faith. That's what I've been trying to say. You're operating from a distorted definition of faith rather than what it actually is."
We already have a word for evidence-based knowledge. That word is "knowledge". "Faith" comes with a lot more troublesome attachments. I have never seen someone say, right out of the gate, that they have faith that gravity won't suddenly reverse unless they were trying to legitimize their belief in a religion. I have, however, seen plenty of claims along the lines of "faith doesn't require evidence". If your faith does require evidence, you're the exception, not the rule. And even then, you might as well just call it knowledge.
"What you've just shown is that you haven't learned how to look past the surface. Do you really think God didn't know what would happen? Of course he did."
Thus rendering the test and associated suffering completely unnecessary.
"He allowed it because we're all tested and live in a fallen world, and suffering is an inevitable part of that. However, if you had read through the entire book, you would have found that after it was over, God blessed Job and gave back all that was lost, even more than Job had originally had."
Your honor, I did kill that man's family, but if you think about it it isn't that bad. After all, his ancestors were sinful, and suffering is a part of life, so really what I did was perfectly reasonable. Besides, I contacted an adoption agency beforehand and got him some more kids. He's just being ungrateful.
"Also, you would have understood that the devil is, basically, on a leash. He can only do what God lets him do."
No, I understood that. The question at that point was why loosen the leash to that degree? What was gained?
"The fact that you allowed yourself to be so easily discouraged makes me think that you never really committed yourself to God in the first place. You could have asked someone to help you understand the story if you were having a hard time with it, instead of just abandoning everything."
I did ask about it. The answer I got was "the devil did that, not God, so it's okay", which wasn't a good answer for me considering the previous point. You're right, though, reading that was the last step of my deconversion, not the beginning. At the time I was a deistic agnostic, the result of a long struggle to believe in God despite everything else I had ever learned. Job was the killing blow, but the process leading up to it was not as easy as "hey, I think I'll abandon everything my parents ever taught me to believe in! That sounds fun!"
"Except that it's hardly the only account of God's nature in the Bible. Throughout the whole thing, God is described as being beyond time, doing things before time, before the universe existed. He, as Jesus, appeared in a locked room after the resurrection, another example of his extradimensionality. And those are just a few examples."
Then use those next time. Jonah's story is weak.
"Can you at least admit that you may not have come to the right conclusions, that it's possible?"
Of course. I've done it before, after all, with a number of different subjects.
"Go here to learn more, and don't just dismiss it because then you'll be acting just like a copyright maximalist. Actually spend time reading the articles and listening to the podcasts and try to take everything in. You might be surprised."
The first article I read showed that species that have adapted to life with predators tend to overpopulate when the predator is removed, and used that as proof that God put predators on the Earth to regulate their populations. I'll keep reading, some of its biblical analysis is interesting, but if that's the quality of evidence I can expect there, I doubt it'll change anything about my beliefs.
"The statistical probability of a universe without a Creator is so small as to be impossible."
Actually, it's just so small that it would take a very, very long time to happen. It's provably possible for a universe to arise out of nothing but basic physical laws. To preempt you, demanding to know what defined those laws is about as good an argument as asking where God came from, and I'd rather not have that debate.
"And by describing the faith as a pretzel, it seems you never really understood it at all, because it's really quite simple."
I know how simple it is. That doesn't mean it doesn't turn your brain into a ball of contradictions and cognitive biases that Escher would have been proud to have painted. Pull just about any entry from this list and there's a good chance that the religious show signs of it when defending their faith.
"Jesus brings us back to him through the cross and the resurrection, thereby giving us what we need if we accept it - a new nature."
And why do I want that particular cure? I know my flaws, and I know that being human is one of them, but there are ways to fix that without abandoning all pretense of logical thinking.
"Test first, and then draw conclusions? That sounds an awful lot like the scientific method to me. In short, God doesn't ask us to check our brains at the door, so don't ever think he does."
God's been asking us to check our brains at the door ever since our tests became sophisticated enough to come back negative. I'm well aware that people used to both expect and see evidence of divinity in their lives; I've read accounts of missionaries in centuries past using what in those days passed as empirical tests to convert people. Nowadays, however, we're better at correcting for experimental error, and there are a lot of scientists with an emotional investment in proving God's existence. That none of them have is telling, and that most religious people now feel the need to protect their God from falsification is even more so.
"But as for the body, you get up out of bed everyday, yes? And eat? And all that? Then you have faith that your body isn't going to suddenly act out as long as you maintain it and do what is within your ability to do to keep it so. That's what I meant."
I do not have faith that my body isn't going to suddenly act out; didn't you read what I said? I know that my body has a better chance of not acting out if I maintain its systems to a certain minimum standard, and I'm just hoping that none of them decide to stop working before I can trade up for an intelligently designed equivalent. I have no faith at all in a system that's prone to sudden failure and provides positive feedback for things that reduce its functionality, it's just that the only current alternative to maintaining that system is dying.
"What I meant was that you have faith that the people you know aren't really, for example, the total opposite of what you think they are. Or have hidden agendas you know nothing about."
Not really. I don't care what other people are like on the inside, because I'm interacting with their outside, and keeping a single layer of identity straight is hard enough. Mostly I just remember everything they've told me and ask for clarification when there's an inconsistency.
"That's exactly the point. Acknowledging that you have a God, in this case."
And I don't have a car either, so the comparison is apt.
"And? What is your issue with that story?"
God tells Satan, "Look at this dude, he's really pious and always prays to me and gives me sacrifices and stuff. I think he's my favorite human."
Satan says, "Mind if I destroy everything he's ever loved, ruining him financially, emotionally and physically?"
Your just and ever-loving God responds, "Nah, go ahead. It's not like he'll stop worshiping me. Just don't kill him, okay?"
There is something very wrong with that picture.
"Again you misunderstand me, and the nature of God. He isn't bound to our four-dimensional universe."
That's fine, it would be stupid if an omnipotent being was bound in such a way. Just don't go saying that a guy failing to hide in a house, in a boat, and in a whale is proof of that. He wouldn't be able to hide from me in any of those places either if I had one of those tags they use to track dolphins, and he wouldn't be able to hide from schizophrenia if he independently invented a generation ship and fled the Milky Way. Even if his account were honest it wouldn't be a very strong support for your conclusion.
"Imagine things from God's point of view for a minute. He doesn't see things as we do, because as I said, he isn't bound to a single point of space and time as we are. He's right here now, and he's Jesus preaching in Galilee at the same time, and he's the Father giving the commandments on Sinai again at the same time."
That's good. I never thought of God any other way. But when you bring up Jonas and say that he couldn't escape God no matter how far he fled, there's an implication there that Jonas fled far. If he didn't, then that claim is like if I were to take five steps without leaving my dorm and conclude that my dorm encompasses the whole of reality.
"It's hard for some people to understand, but yes, local governments do matter."
Could you explain this in more detail? I don't understand why a body whose highest purpose is filling in potholes should be allowed to regulate what I do with my computers.
When empirical proof is impossible to acquire, the next thing you use is logic, not a retreat to "don't even think about trying to explain this". The most logical reason for the increase in encryption is that previously unencrypted traffic is now being encrypted. As there hasn't been a decrease in unencrypted child porn, there's no reason for recipe sharers to be running to encryption services, and there has been a decrease in unencrypted piracy, the most logical conclusion is that piracy is now more widely encrypted. This is what you're supposed to do when direct evidence is not available.
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It can not be prohibited. It is not possible to more than slightly affect piracy short of eliminating the internet and all network-capable devices. Governmental actions can be and often are prohibited. There is a big difference between the kinds of "easy" we're talking about with those two issues.
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Eventually you have to get to a point where you just say "wow, that worked out well", or you get stuck in a cycle of intentionality that doesn't end even when the creators outnumber the stars. That point, for you, is God. That point, for me, is currently math. If there's ever any non-circumstantial evidence that math arose from something else I'll change my mind then.
The number of stars present in our universe or the particular characteristics of Earth are irrelevant. With physics in place, a universe this large and full eventually arising becomes more or less inevitable. And if a system like ours doesn't show up that first time, then the one after that might have it. Given infinite time all possible things will happen. Pointing out that life exists under conditions that we know life can exist in is not a useful or profound statement. Besides, a number of the things your article claims had to be present for life to occur are not absolute characteristics of Earth. In particular, atmospheric composition has varied greatly historically, and runaway greenhouse and freezing effects have occurred without spelling the end of all life. And, while I don't know the precise tolerances of all the things listed, that it considers Earth's presence in the habitable zone as evidence of precise balance shows that it's not looking too closely at how much variance could be tolerated before things stopped working; the zone that Earth could've formed in to allow it to support life is actually fairly wide.
"Because it isn't just about us being better people. Spiritual death does exist, and if you don't accept Jesus as the one to atone for your sin, you will pay that price instead when the time comes. I don't like talking about that but it's part of what Jesus spoke about and why he came. There's a part of us that nothing can fill except God, an emptiness that only he can close. We're made that way."
False. A lifetime of people telling you that you're a sinner and a pathetic being and that Jesus is the only way to fix that has drilled that God-shaped hole into your heart.
"All time, matter, space, and energy has a finite beginning. And for them to have that beginning, there must be a Beginner."
The same was once said of planets, species, and rain. And, as it turns out, all those things do have beginners. They just aren't capable of thought.
"Albert Einstein himself came to that conclusion, even if he didn't take the next step in admitting who that Beginner was. He at least admitted there had to be one. You really think you know better than him?"
Yes. Science isn't a religion, and Einstein wasn't a prophet. He was a very, very smart man, and relativity turned out to be very, very correct, but he wasn't infallible, and he would let his basic preconceptions interfere with his beliefs. He also thought that the universe was eternal and unchanging; he even tried to tune his theorem so that it would predict a static universe. How can you claim that there was a Big Bang or cosmic expansion when Einstein said otherwise? Do you really think you know better than him? The answer is yes, you do.
"Also, eyewitness testimony is considered legal evidence in a court of law, and eyewitness testimony is exactly what the gospels are. The earliest texts have been conclusively dated to within just a few decades of Jesus' death and resurrection, well within the lifetime of the apostles, confirming their authenticity."
There was eyewitness testimony of witchcraft in Salem dated much more closely to the event than a few decades. Currently more alien encounters happen than divine encounters (barring stupid ones like the char marks on your toast looking like Jesus), but that's not proof of an alien presence near Earth. I'll worry about this if atheism is ever tried in court.
"And yet you haven't mentioned a single one here. You made a claim but didn't make it up, so your argument fails."
I was just trying to clarify what I meant by "pretzel", but okay. This is the one you seem to be most affected by, along with this and its offspring. All of these also commonly characterize religions, though you seem to at least be trying to minimize them. I freely admit that I catch myself falling prey to those at times, too, particularly the last one, but most of my beliefs aren't built upon them anymore.
"You said it yourself, you know your body has a better chance of not acting out if you maintain it. That knowing is faith. That's what I've been trying to say. You're operating from a distorted definition of faith rather than what it actually is."
We already have a word for evidence-based knowledge. That word is "knowledge". "Faith" comes with a lot more troublesome attachments. I have never seen someone say, right out of the gate, that they have faith that gravity won't suddenly reverse unless they were trying to legitimize their belief in a religion. I have, however, seen plenty of claims along the lines of "faith doesn't require evidence". If your faith does require evidence, you're the exception, not the rule. And even then, you might as well just call it knowledge.
"What you've just shown is that you haven't learned how to look past the surface. Do you really think God didn't know what would happen? Of course he did."
Thus rendering the test and associated suffering completely unnecessary.
"He allowed it because we're all tested and live in a fallen world, and suffering is an inevitable part of that. However, if you had read through the entire book, you would have found that after it was over, God blessed Job and gave back all that was lost, even more than Job had originally had."
Your honor, I did kill that man's family, but if you think about it it isn't that bad. After all, his ancestors were sinful, and suffering is a part of life, so really what I did was perfectly reasonable. Besides, I contacted an adoption agency beforehand and got him some more kids. He's just being ungrateful.
"Also, you would have understood that the devil is, basically, on a leash. He can only do what God lets him do."
No, I understood that. The question at that point was why loosen the leash to that degree? What was gained?
"The fact that you allowed yourself to be so easily discouraged makes me think that you never really committed yourself to God in the first place. You could have asked someone to help you understand the story if you were having a hard time with it, instead of just abandoning everything."
I did ask about it. The answer I got was "the devil did that, not God, so it's okay", which wasn't a good answer for me considering the previous point. You're right, though, reading that was the last step of my deconversion, not the beginning. At the time I was a deistic agnostic, the result of a long struggle to believe in God despite everything else I had ever learned. Job was the killing blow, but the process leading up to it was not as easy as "hey, I think I'll abandon everything my parents ever taught me to believe in! That sounds fun!"
"Except that it's hardly the only account of God's nature in the Bible. Throughout the whole thing, God is described as being beyond time, doing things before time, before the universe existed. He, as Jesus, appeared in a locked room after the resurrection, another example of his extradimensionality. And those are just a few examples."
Then use those next time. Jonah's story is weak.
"Can you at least admit that you may not have come to the right conclusions, that it's possible?"
Of course. I've done it before, after all, with a number of different subjects.
"Go here to learn more, and don't just dismiss it because then you'll be acting just like a copyright maximalist. Actually spend time reading the articles and listening to the podcasts and try to take everything in. You might be surprised."
The first article I read showed that species that have adapted to life with predators tend to overpopulate when the predator is removed, and used that as proof that God put predators on the Earth to regulate their populations. I'll keep reading, some of its biblical analysis is interesting, but if that's the quality of evidence I can expect there, I doubt it'll change anything about my beliefs.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Opacity
Actually, it's just so small that it would take a very, very long time to happen. It's provably possible for a universe to arise out of nothing but basic physical laws. To preempt you, demanding to know what defined those laws is about as good an argument as asking where God came from, and I'd rather not have that debate.
"And by describing the faith as a pretzel, it seems you never really understood it at all, because it's really quite simple."
I know how simple it is. That doesn't mean it doesn't turn your brain into a ball of contradictions and cognitive biases that Escher would have been proud to have painted. Pull just about any entry from this list and there's a good chance that the religious show signs of it when defending their faith.
"Jesus brings us back to him through the cross and the resurrection, thereby giving us what we need if we accept it - a new nature."
And why do I want that particular cure? I know my flaws, and I know that being human is one of them, but there are ways to fix that without abandoning all pretense of logical thinking.
"Test first, and then draw conclusions? That sounds an awful lot like the scientific method to me. In short, God doesn't ask us to check our brains at the door, so don't ever think he does."
God's been asking us to check our brains at the door ever since our tests became sophisticated enough to come back negative. I'm well aware that people used to both expect and see evidence of divinity in their lives; I've read accounts of missionaries in centuries past using what in those days passed as empirical tests to convert people. Nowadays, however, we're better at correcting for experimental error, and there are a lot of scientists with an emotional investment in proving God's existence. That none of them have is telling, and that most religious people now feel the need to protect their God from falsification is even more so.
"But as for the body, you get up out of bed everyday, yes? And eat? And all that? Then you have faith that your body isn't going to suddenly act out as long as you maintain it and do what is within your ability to do to keep it so. That's what I meant."
I do not have faith that my body isn't going to suddenly act out; didn't you read what I said? I know that my body has a better chance of not acting out if I maintain its systems to a certain minimum standard, and I'm just hoping that none of them decide to stop working before I can trade up for an intelligently designed equivalent. I have no faith at all in a system that's prone to sudden failure and provides positive feedback for things that reduce its functionality, it's just that the only current alternative to maintaining that system is dying.
"What I meant was that you have faith that the people you know aren't really, for example, the total opposite of what you think they are. Or have hidden agendas you know nothing about."
Not really. I don't care what other people are like on the inside, because I'm interacting with their outside, and keeping a single layer of identity straight is hard enough. Mostly I just remember everything they've told me and ask for clarification when there's an inconsistency.
"That's exactly the point. Acknowledging that you have a God, in this case."
And I don't have a car either, so the comparison is apt.
"And? What is your issue with that story?"
God tells Satan, "Look at this dude, he's really pious and always prays to me and gives me sacrifices and stuff. I think he's my favorite human."
Satan says, "Mind if I destroy everything he's ever loved, ruining him financially, emotionally and physically?"
Your just and ever-loving God responds, "Nah, go ahead. It's not like he'll stop worshiping me. Just don't kill him, okay?"
There is something very wrong with that picture.
"Again you misunderstand me, and the nature of God. He isn't bound to our four-dimensional universe."
That's fine, it would be stupid if an omnipotent being was bound in such a way. Just don't go saying that a guy failing to hide in a house, in a boat, and in a whale is proof of that. He wouldn't be able to hide from me in any of those places either if I had one of those tags they use to track dolphins, and he wouldn't be able to hide from schizophrenia if he independently invented a generation ship and fled the Milky Way. Even if his account were honest it wouldn't be a very strong support for your conclusion.
"Imagine things from God's point of view for a minute. He doesn't see things as we do, because as I said, he isn't bound to a single point of space and time as we are. He's right here now, and he's Jesus preaching in Galilee at the same time, and he's the Father giving the commandments on Sinai again at the same time."
That's good. I never thought of God any other way. But when you bring up Jonas and say that he couldn't escape God no matter how far he fled, there's an implication there that Jonas fled far. If he didn't, then that claim is like if I were to take five steps without leaving my dorm and conclude that my dorm encompasses the whole of reality.
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Re: Re: This foolishly presumes...
Could you explain this in more detail? I don't understand why a body whose highest purpose is filling in potholes should be allowed to regulate what I do with my computers.
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