cyberjesus gets the prize. It all comes down to evidence (but funny how we tend not to accept the evidence that indicates that what be actually believe to be true might be wrong).
Nickolas
JoinedPosts by Nickolas
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37
Let's make a deal
by Nickolas ini'm an atheist, my wife's a jehovah's witness.
each of us knocks on your door and has something to sell to you.
it's up to you to choose.
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TV's best Series-ending episodes
by Nickolas inand now for something a little lighter.. i enjoy well made movies and television series, especially when they push the envelope, do something different.
there are currently two tv series i'm following closely (dexter and breaking bad), both of which have great promise for spectacular endings.. here are my biased rankings for a few television series that actually wrapped up with a final episode (out of 10).
m*a*s*h, "goodbye, farewell and amen" - february 28, 1983, after eleven seasons - 7/10 (series went on too long, got stale, ending was overdue).
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Nickolas
Someone gave me Deadwood on DVD. I watched the first couple of episodes and couldn't get into it. Do you recommend it?
Yeah, Giordano, the ending of The Sopranos should have been really shocking, like Tony getting his brains blown out along with his entire family. That would have been memorable, and much more satisfying.
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41
Look at the Bonobo, the Peaceful Bonobo
by Satanus inpeaceful bonobos may have something to teach humans.
march 8, 2011 by miles o' brien and ann kellan.
brian hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at duke university, spends several months of the year in the democratic republic of congo, where he studies bonobos.
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Nickolas
The link is great, MS! I've only read the forward but can already see that the author is one man who is absolutely convinced that he is right and everybody else is wrong. I forgot to count how many times he used the words "arrogant" or "religious zealout" in reference to the reader, as his way of luring the reader into the site to explore his proof. The insult the reader approach. Unique. I wonder if the Nobel Committee has seen it, yet? However, I am interpreting your link to come directly from you. As the words you would say, so it's time to call a truce. As much as I was thoroughly enjoying the conversation, it's now gone sour. But to do a post mortem: The thread went offtrack because I responded to V's conjecture:
IF there are other intelligent species in other parts of the universe who are aggressive and war-like, I doubt we'd fare well against them if we were too much like the Bonobos.
The conjecture supposes that we as humans would not fare well against an invading intelligent species from some other part of the universe. I took it as a serious conjecture. Perhaps I should not have. The conversation went to the probability of life existing elsewhere in the galaxy (which is a tiny, tiny fraction of the universe) to narrow the scope a bit, then it went to distances between planets with intelligent life, then to relativity and how it restricts speed to c, then to lack of existing evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence, then to the probability of being visited by extraterrestrials in the next 100 years. We didn't even get to talk about the probability of the existence of a highly advanced civilisation existing anywhere in the universe including our galaxy, or any verifyable evidence that aliens have ever visited Earth. There's no precedent. Accept this if you can. On the basis of just that, it's very unlikely that you or I will ever meet an extraterrestrial. You guys disagree with this proposition, so you introduce wormholes and space time distortion and other things not excluded by relativity but none of which has a single mathematical proof. Relativity also doesn't exclude fairies in the garden. It just doesn't address the stuff. Physics, not philosophy, is the ultimate level of human language describing what we really understand. Nothing else in human terms describes the real world as precisely as does physics and it is largely because of physics that we live in the age we do. Physicists exercise conjecture constantly, and they talk openly about it. That's how they come up with their expanded perceptions of reality. But it is only when they provide a proof, a new theory, that our understanding can be translated into language and set a new benchmark for the next challenge. Right now the benchmark is relativity. The rest is still up in the air.
I need to ask you guys a couple of questions. Please don't take offense if I'm wrong. I don't worry at all that extraterrestrials will one day visit us but perhaps you do? Do you also not believe in evolution through natural selection? For the record, I do. We as a species have come to this particular advanced stage of our intelligence that we are just now talking about the possibility of interstellar travel by aliens. We'll, we've been obsessing about it since the 50's, but that's still recent vs a billion years. No proof yet exists but we're now smart enough as a species to even attempt to develop one and if we did, it would be a remarkable coincidence if aliens just now decided to show up. Maybe Jesus will, too.
My wife is a Jehovah's Witness. That's why I'm come to this board (and I bet you thought it was to debate shit that doesn't matter). She suffers from dillusion, at least that's what I believe. She can't provide proofs for what she believes and she also can't process things that I put forward as proof that the Society to which she has belonged for 33 years is not what it represents itself to be and that what she believes but can't prove may be false. Cognitive dissonance.
No hard feelings, guys. You guys are smart and a blast to talk to, and it was a good conversation while it lasted. I'm movin' on.
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41
Look at the Bonobo, the Peaceful Bonobo
by Satanus inpeaceful bonobos may have something to teach humans.
march 8, 2011 by miles o' brien and ann kellan.
brian hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at duke university, spends several months of the year in the democratic republic of congo, where he studies bonobos.
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Nickolas
10 famous science predictions that failed to come true. I'm familiar with them, MS. They were predictions, not scientific theories. All of them, including Einstein's, offered no mathematical proof for their speculation (Enrico Fermi provided the proof for splitting the atom within a few years of Einstein's conjecture, using, not incidentally, Einstein's relativity theory as the foundation. Einstein never went there, which is why he is so often erroneously identified with the atomic bomb.) whereas there is a solid mathematical proof, special relativity, that has not been disproved in 105 years and which supports my previous statements (or, more accurately, my statements are in support of it. No special insight on my part). All you need to do is defeat special relativity theory, and you will prove that what I believe is out to lunch. I'd be proud to tell everyone that I was acquainted with you when you take the Nobel Prize for Physics and join the ranks of the greatest geniuses this world has ever known.
Aside from Einstein, the other individuals you quote were not exactly mental giants - have you ever heard of them beyond those quotes? Regardless, even geniuses have their foibles. Perhaps the smartest person ever, Isaac Newton, thought that the alchemist's Philosopher's Stone just might exist and have the ability to turn lead into gold. Interstellar space travel at speeds exceeding or even approaching c is the new age Philospher's Stone.
Hasn't this been done several times in the past decade using the big particle accellerator at CERN?
Nope. CERN has achieved closing speeds approaching 2c, when two particles are fired at one another, each travelling near c, and then collide.
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24
TV's best Series-ending episodes
by Nickolas inand now for something a little lighter.. i enjoy well made movies and television series, especially when they push the envelope, do something different.
there are currently two tv series i'm following closely (dexter and breaking bad), both of which have great promise for spectacular endings.. here are my biased rankings for a few television series that actually wrapped up with a final episode (out of 10).
m*a*s*h, "goodbye, farewell and amen" - february 28, 1983, after eleven seasons - 7/10 (series went on too long, got stale, ending was overdue).
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Nickolas
even tho it was a thursday night/ book study night
the BS met at my house and by 9:00 everyone was
gone and yes i went straight to the tube and sat
to watch ER in my dress clothes!!!Now *that* is dedication!
I'm getting the feeling that there are very few JWN minions who had the tolerance for shows like The Sopranos and Six Feet Under. Both had some cringeworthy aspects to them - violence, profanity and, in the case of the latter, a whole bunch of sexual taboos. I waited five years to start watching the Sopranos and didn't start watching Six Feet Under until late last year. Both were exceptional.
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24
TV's best Series-ending episodes
by Nickolas inand now for something a little lighter.. i enjoy well made movies and television series, especially when they push the envelope, do something different.
there are currently two tv series i'm following closely (dexter and breaking bad), both of which have great promise for spectacular endings.. here are my biased rankings for a few television series that actually wrapped up with a final episode (out of 10).
m*a*s*h, "goodbye, farewell and amen" - february 28, 1983, after eleven seasons - 7/10 (series went on too long, got stale, ending was overdue).
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Nickolas
I had forgotten about all those, OTWO and Ding. They were all great endings. Never watched Lost, Friends or Twin Peaks and only watched MacGyver sporatically.
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41
Look at the Bonobo, the Peaceful Bonobo
by Satanus inpeaceful bonobos may have something to teach humans.
march 8, 2011 by miles o' brien and ann kellan.
brian hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at duke university, spends several months of the year in the democratic republic of congo, where he studies bonobos.
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Nickolas
I agree with the loophole theory.
The loophole theory is just plain loopy. How and where do we look for this loophole, or do we create it somehow? Do we need some kind of machine to exploit it? What does it even look like? Where's the physics??
Remember, we're talking about extraterrestrial space travel.
Even with a rudimentary understanding of special relativity, we know that propelling matter at speeds above c isn't going to happen. Period. So the loophole would have to be some sort of shortcut through the spacetime continuum whereby point A is somehow closer to point B through some kind of existing tunnel in which the laws of physics no longer apply - a so called wormhole. If such a thing exists (and there is absolutely zero evidence that one does) that would facilitate alien space travel to the Earth, it would coincidentally need to have one opening near Earth and the other near the alien planet. The exceedingly long probabilities, of the goldilocks requirements of the two planets, abiogenesis happening on each planet, and now coincidental wormhole exits, begin to collide and pile onto one another and, much like particles approaching infinite mass as they get closer to c, the probability of extraterrestrial space travel being possible approaches zero. (Unless, of course, you inject some sort of suspended animation scenario into the equation, which has its own set of problems to deal with).
This, I'm afraid, is one more human foible, just like belief in invisible gods and other beings. This one's more modern, but it's still irrational belief without a shred of evidence or even clear logic or theory to support it.
Nick... oh ye of little faith.
Guilty as charged.
How did we get from talking about monkeys to interstellar travel and the speed of light?
Bonobos are apes, not monkeys. Just want to clear that up. Besides, isn't interstellar travel a more interesting topic than orgiastic primates?
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41
Look at the Bonobo, the Peaceful Bonobo
by Satanus inpeaceful bonobos may have something to teach humans.
march 8, 2011 by miles o' brien and ann kellan.
brian hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at duke university, spends several months of the year in the democratic republic of congo, where he studies bonobos.
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Nickolas
Stephen Hawking IS brilliant indeed, but his musings on the subject are not the be-all\end-all of physics research either...
I am unaware of any serious physics researcher who is even remotely close to busting open special relativity theory. After more than a century of brilliant minds trying, there is no experiment that has contradicted special relativity. None. The fastest experimental acceleraton achieved of subatomic particles has been .99 of c, at which point the mass of the particles became so large there wasn't enough energy available to move them faster, which is precisely what Einstein calculated. Hawking is just agreeing with Einstein and, for the time being at least, special relativity is the be-all/end-all of physics.
If we want to achieve travel to other places in our galaxy that is effectively faster than light (if not literally), we will achieve it.
That sounds a great deal like faith, MS. Einstein's calculation that objects gain mass as they accelerate has been confirmed time and time again. As an object, regardless of initial mass, approaches the speed of light, its mass begins to approach infinity as does the amount of energy required to further increase its speed. To go beyond infinity is impossible, and that is why nothing can travel faster than light speed. Sorry guys, that's just the way it is.
Anybody wanna snuggle? Eat a few head lice?
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41
Look at the Bonobo, the Peaceful Bonobo
by Satanus inpeaceful bonobos may have something to teach humans.
march 8, 2011 by miles o' brien and ann kellan.
brian hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at duke university, spends several months of the year in the democratic republic of congo, where he studies bonobos.
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Nickolas
Oh, I believe that life exists in the universe, MS. It's entirely conjectural, of course, but logic tells me that if it happened here (without the intercession of a Creator) it can and must have happened elsewhere. But the universe is a very big place and that alone complicates the question of space travel much more than the probability of abiogenesis, whether carbon based or silicon based or whatever based.
As to c, well, I bow to the thoughts of a scientist who is much, much more intelligent than you or me:
"The idea that one could go right round the universe and end up where one started makes good science fiction,but it doesn’t have much practical significance, because it can be shown that the universe would recollapse to zero size before one could get round. You would need to travel faster than light in order to end up where you started before the universe came to an end – and that is not allowed!" Stephen Hawking: A Brief History of Time
Anybody got any bananas?
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41
Look at the Bonobo, the Peaceful Bonobo
by Satanus inpeaceful bonobos may have something to teach humans.
march 8, 2011 by miles o' brien and ann kellan.
brian hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at duke university, spends several months of the year in the democratic republic of congo, where he studies bonobos.
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Nickolas
I'm surprised by the frequent reference to extraterrestrials on this board. Is it as simple as credulity?
A particularly bright primate came up with relativity theory which, so far, holds unchallenged that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light (c) and there are practical limitations to what speeds matter can attain. This means, for there to be extraterrestrials visiting Earth, even if they were as close as alpha centauri, space travel would require at least decades. Alpha centauri is only 4 light years away but it is a binary star system which makes the probability of any form of life in that region of space quite low, never mind life sophisticated enough for long distance space travel. The odds of the kind of goldilocks zone enjoyed by the Earth are very, very low and the probability of life becomes negatively exponential when you factor in the astronomically low odds of abiogenesis. That does not mean there aren't other earths. Even if the odds are one in a billion that might mean 50 earth-like planets in the Milky Way galaxy alone, but if so they will be statistically hundreds if not thousands of light years away from us, all but ruling out the possibility of space travel within the bounds of relativity theory. SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) has after half a century failed to detect any confirmed transmission indicating intelligent life. The development and transmission of information is a prerequisite to developing even the beginnings of advanced science, and that would include space travel. Radio waves travel in space at or near the speed of light. It follows that if SETI was to discover an intelligible radio transmission, it would a) originate from a distance of at least 50 light years, b) the civilisation that transmitted it would not likely at present have advanced sufficiently for long distance space travel and c) if they had, it would take a century or more to reach us. If sophisticated extraterrestrial civilisations exist, they are very, very far away.
Bonobo musings.