Opinions on Misotheists

[Baruch]

"The gambling industry is not in any danger of going bankrupt."

Nore are statisticians ;-)

I know what goes up, must come down.  What more do I need to know about physics?

[Mike Cl]

"The gambling industry is not in any danger of going bankrupt."

Nore are statisticians ;-)

I know what goes up, must come down.  What more do I need to know about physics?

Unless Trump is running the casino.

[Baruch]

Unless Trump is running the casino.

Ronald Reagan was teflon too.  I don't like Republicans, but life must have been hard for you in 1969 - 1977, 1981-1993 and 2001-2009 plus 2017 onward.  The intervening years were D-heaven, right?

As Kylo Ren just said:  "Leave the past behind.  Kill it if you have to." ... so now we know why Obama didn't want to investigate Bush/Cheney crimes in 2009 ... he was planning his own crimes ... Uranium One, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Yemen, Hezbollah drug running (Iran relations), interfering in the 2016 election, and post election etc.  Sorry, tearing down some old South statues isn't how you bury the past ... that was just virtue signaling while the other thug was out front keeping the get-away car hot.

[Hakurei Reimu]

"The gambling industry is not in any danger of going bankrupt."

Nore are statisticians ;-)

They don't need to be. Statistics explains why their games work, but they work regardless of your education.

I know what goes up, must come down.  What more do I need to know about physics?

The Voyager probes, which went up by any sane definition of the word, have exceeded escape velocity and are never coming back and will not "come down" in any realistic sense, ever. "What goes up, must come down," only works for your bog-level understanding and aspirations.

As Kylo Ren just said:  "Leave the past behind.  Kill it if you have to." ... so now we know why Obama didn't want to investigate Bush/Cheney crimes in 2009 ... he was planning his own crimes ... Uranium One, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Yemen, Hezbollah drug running (Iran relations), interfering in the 2016 election, and post election etc.  Sorry, tearing down some old South statues isn't how you bury the past ... that was just virtue signaling while the other thug was out front keeping the get-away car hot.

Unsubstantiated twaddle. Also, you have this distinct attitude of "You will never be better! Give up!" I will tell you now and forever: NO. I will not give up, because it's when you give up that you stop advancing and when you truly die. I'm sorry, sport, but I think that humanity's future lies beyond this mudball, and I will still work to get out there among the stars. I also think that humanity can be better than the apes we evolved from, and I will insist that we do better. Yes, even though I know that the universe will eventually run down and all life will eventually be snuffed out, that's still a long way off and there's plenty to do and see in the meantime.

So, Baruch, will you join me in life and advance, or will you stay where you are and truly die?

[Baruch]

I bet I look more like Luke Skywalker (present version) than you do ;-)  I understand this character, his many changes, his acceptance of fallibility.  Do you accept fallibility, accept mortality?  If not, you are more Christian than I am.

[Unbeliever]

Actually two things in GR contradict conservation of mass-energy ... the Big Bang (and Inflation) and gravitational waves.  The last couple of years, gravitational waves seem to be on firmer ground.  So basically nothing is conserved, if you consider all possibilities .. the trick is that conservation is relative to the circumstances.  In some, energy is conserved but mass is not, or mass is conserved and energy is not, or mass-energy is conserved except when it is not.  It is best not to be too hung up on Newtonian alchemy and Revelations voodoo.

I think I recently read that on very tiny scales, near the Planck time, virtual particles can violate conservation laws. But I don't see how gravity waves or the big bang to have done so. The universe has been called (by Weinberg, I think) the ultimate free lunch. The positive and negative energies both contribute to the total mass/energy of the cosmos, but balance each other, so no net energy is actually in play.






P.S. -
Ah, I see it was Alan Guth, who said the universe is the ultimate free lunch, not Weinberg:

"It is said that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. But the universe is the ultimate free lunch."
as quoted by Stephen Hawking (1988). A Brief History of Time. Bantam Books. p. 129

[Baruch]

I think I recently read that on very tiny scales, near the Planck time, virtual particles can violate conservation laws. But I don't see how gravity waves or the big bang to have done so. The universe has been called (by Weinberg, I think) the ultimate free lunch. The positive and negative energies both contribute to the total mass/energy of the cosmos, but balance each other, so no net energy is actually in play.

In another string, I quoted a grad school level discussion on this.  It depends on your definition of mass-energy.  You are using a non-standard definition yourself.  And anyone who thinks they know what happens on Planck scales is lying.

P.S. -
Ah, I see it was Alan Guth, who said the universe is the ultimate free lunch, not Weinberg:

"It is said that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. But the universe is the ultimate free lunch."
as quoted by Stephen Hawking (1988). A Brief History of Time. Bantam Books. p. 129

In another string, I quoted a grad school level discussion on this.  It depends on your definition of mass-energy.  You are using a non-standard definition yourself.  And anyone who thinks they know what happens on Planck scales is lying.

[Hakurei Reimu]

I bet I look more like Luke Skywalker (present version) than you do ;-)  I understand this character, his many changes, his acceptance of fallibility.  Do you accept fallibility, accept mortality?  If not, you are more Christian than I am.

Yes, I accept both my fallibility and mortality, but I don't accept that humanity is irredeemable, because believing that is true makes it true.

[Baruch]

Yes, I accept both my fallibility and mortality, but I don't accept that humanity is irredeemable, because believing that is true makes it true.

Well that is magical thinking.  And thinking that bullshit like redemption exists, makes you a Christian ;-)

The Leftist jihadis here, are just Islamists from a different mother.

[Cavebear]

Yes, I accept both my fallibility and mortality, but I don't accept that humanity is irredeemable, because believing that is true makes it true.

My apologies, but that illogic makes me gag.  Belief does not affect reality. But do apply that to the lottery.  The State wants your money!  And it will lower my taxes.

[Hakurei Reimu]

No, that's not nearly what I meant, and don't either of you pretend that it was. It's a self-fulfilling prophesy thing. If you believe yourself irredeemable, then you will (likely) behave in a manner that will make sure that you will never be redeemable, and therefore fulfill this prophesy as if it were a reality.

There are lots of concepts that have no reality apart from us, but we behave as if they do. Money is not real, but we behave as if it does, so you can't live in this society as if money has no reality because it does after a fashion, for it is through our actions that money makes itself felt on our reality. If we behave as if we do not have a future, then we will squander opportunity after opportunity that may present itself to escape that fate, thus we won't have a future â€" self-fulfuling prophesy, brought about through our actions.

So, yeah. Both of you, way to miss the point.

[Baruch]

No, that's not nearly what I meant, and don't either of you pretend that it was. It's a self-fulfilling prophesy thing. If you believe yourself irredeemable, then you will (likely) behave in a manner that will make sure that you will never be redeemable, and therefore fulfill this prophesy as if it were a reality.

There are lots of concepts that have no reality apart from us, but we behave as if they do. Money is not real, but we behave as if it does, so you can't live in this society as if money has no reality because it does after a fashion, for it is through our actions that money makes itself felt on our reality. If we behave as if we do not have a future, then we will squander opportunity after opportunity that may present itself to escape that fate, thus we won't have a future â€" self-fulfuling prophesy, brought about through our actions.

So, yeah. Both of you, way to miss the point.

So you are the "don't worry, be happy" guy?  The power of positive thinking?  Selling BitCoin?

[Blackleaf]

My apologies, but that illogic makes me gag.  Belief does not affect reality. But do apply that to the lottery.  The State wants your money!  And it will lower my taxes.

You seem to take things a bit too literally, Fuzzy.

[Baruch]

You seem to take things a bit too literally, Fuzzy.

Religious and irreligious seem to have that same problem.  Literalism means - I don't have to think about what I read.

[Hakurei Reimu]

So you are the "don't worry, be happy" guy?  The power of positive thinking?  Selling BitCoin?

Psychology, plus a bit of mental health. As someone who has been clinically depressed enough to require therapy and drugs, falling into ennui and hopelessness is the last thing I need. That's the mental health part. The psychology part is what I already explained: fortune favors the prepared mind â€" yeah, I know that's not exactly what Pasteur meant by the statement, but it fits.

Plus, I want humanity to reach the stars and become decently civilized doing so, and there's really no reason why anyone should want for anything in a truly galactic civilization â€" it's a big universe, even with some aliens, and we know how to harvest a great deal of its resources with existing technology, let alone future technology. Even if I never see that day, I want that for humanity, because that's fucking awesome.

Dream big, and work towards that, because humanity never got anywhere being content with its lot. If I believed as you do that humanity will never break the cycle of savagery and be forever trapped on our little mud ball, then I will not be helping to solve those problems, but a contributor to them. That doesn't sit well with me.