patrick.net

richwicks says

Nomograph says

WookieMan says

I feel like I'm turning into Richwicks at this point. I don't trust a fucking thing anymore.

That is a dangerous place and will lead you to deep unhappiness. Clinging to false ideas is not the way to go.

Argh.

If I'm incorrect about anything, please point it out and challenge me on it.

I would be OVERJOYED to be wrong, but I'm not.

I used to be quite a religious guy when I was a kid. Then I went into a hard science education and walked out of it as an atheist. You really can't contest Darwinism when you understand a genetic algorithm or AI. You can't believe the world is 5,000 years old when you understand various radioactive dating methods. You can't believe that you're in the "right" religion when you've been exposed to a dozen of them. I read abou...

You can still believe in a creator or creating force which created the universe as you discover it.

mell says

You can still believe in a creator or creating force which created the universe as you discover it.

I can believe Santa Claus is hanging out on Neptune as well. I just don't have any evidence for it.

Default position is that any claim is false until evidence is made available to support an assertion.

You've heard of Occam's Razor haven't you? Most people think it means the simplest explanation is the most likely explanation. That's not Occam's Razor. It's the explanation with the least number of assumptions is most likely to be the correct explanation. An explanation that makes no assumptions must necessarily be correct.

I have no evidence I'm not a meat robot, and it's logical to think I am if a dog is or if a cow is. Perhaps as my mind deteriorates in age, I can stop thinking this way.

richwicks says

mell says

You can still believe in a creator or creating force which created the universe as you discover it.

I can believe Santa Claus is hanging out on Neptune as well. I just don't have any evidence for it.

Default position is that any claim is false until evidence is made available to support an assertion.

You've heard of Occam's Razor haven't you? Most people think it means the simplest explanation is the most likely explanation. That's not Occam's Razor. It's the explanation with the least number of assumptions is most likely to be the correct explanation. An explanation that makes no assumptions must necessarily be correct.

I have no evidence I'm not a meat robot, and it's logical to think I am if a dog is or if a cow is. Perhaps as my mind deteriorates in age, I can stop thinking this way.

How was the universe created then. By what force?

mell says

How was the universe created then. By what force?

I don't know but making any assumptions of what made it exist, that's the height of arrogance.

And if it's to be answered with "god did it" you end up with the same problem - what created god? You end up with the same unanswered question again.

I simply don't know what created the universe but here's something I bet you didn't know. We really don't have evidence of the big bang. Many of the predictions of that model are wrong.

www.youtube.com/embed/3KkhRibBllU

I think the theory is going to break down. Some scientists have claimed they have proved it couldn't have happened. Ultimately, it's simply unknowable, at least by me.

richwicks says

mell says

How was the universe created then. By what force?

I don't know but making any assumptions of what made it exist, that's the height of arrogance.

And if it's to be answered with "god did it" you end up with the same problem - what created god? You end up with the same unanswered question again.

I simply don't know what created the universe but here's something I bet you didn't know. We really don't have evidence of the big bang. Many of the predictions of that model are wrong.

www.youtube.com/embed/3KkhRibBllU

I think the theory is going to break down. Some scientists have claimed they have proved it couldn't have happened. Ultimately, it's simply unknowable, at least by me.

That's fine but it doesn't invalidate the possibility of a creator. Not knowing is more agnostic vs atheists claim they know there is none. Either way no need to convince each other. I just don't think religious beings are the simpletons they are being portrayed as. Some may be. But many scientists and discoverers were religious.

But many scientists and discoverers were religious.

True, but the motive for those brilliant people stemmed from something other than logic or the scientific method. Einstein's famous "God did not play dice with the universe" quote seemed to have more to do with his religious beliefs. Even so, it its turning out that the laws of chance seem to have overwhelming influence on the Universe, especially if one subscribes to quantum theory.

You can't believe the world is 5,000 years old when you understand various radioactive dating methods.

One not need even that level of education. A look at the Grand Canyon and a little common sense can tell you it took muck longer than 5,000 for all those layers of strata to build up, plus the time for the Colorado River to cut through them.

richwicks says

You really can't contest Darwinism when you understand a genetic algorithm or AI.

Suppose two chicken in a hen house suddenly gained high level intelligence and much of our knowledge except for relating to chicken. . . one chicken philosopher might postulate that Darwinism is sufficient for explaining why hens lay so many eggs: the more eggs they lay the more offspring they have; the other chicken would like to point out that natural selection alone might not be the reason why hens lay so many eggs: there is a possibility that a far higher level of intelligent life form exist outside the hen house (or existed/intervened before chicken gained high intelligence and knowledge) that had a hand in artificially taking wild chicken ancestors and selectively breeding them into hens that lay 300+ eggs per year instead of less than 10 eggs in a year.

All the farm animals we know today and all the dog breeds are not products of Darwinism, but Intelligent Design (by human) through deliberate breeding/selection; and in recent years many plant lives and some animals (e.g. giant salmon) through direct genetic engineering. It is entirely possible that human species is a product of genetic engineering by far more advanced space aliens, who also handed down survival knowledge to human ancestors in the form of religions. Furthermore, historical sudden breakthroughs in human knowledge through specific persons that seemed to have gained knowledge quite out of their own living context, may well have been "divine inspiration," i.e. knowledge transmission from a far more technologically advanced civilization/being that chooses not to intervene in our lives frequently but nonetheless intervenes from time to time.

mell says

That's fine but it doesn't invalidate the possibility of a creator.

I'm not saying the creator isn't possible.

I'm saying I have no evidence for one, and therefore I MUST take the default position that it is simply a claim that has been made without evidence, Without evidence, I have to assume the claim is false.

The Abrahamic religions are used as political tools. I don't know want to change your mind or challenge your faith, but there is a reason to lie about the existence of a god.

Proof that belief in God is rational, as best as I can type on my phone when I am 4 drinks in which is when I do my best posting on pat.net. Prove me wrong.

1. A rational person believes everything has an explanation. Something that doesn’t have an explanation is irrational.
2. There are 3 possible ways to explain everything that we know that happens:
a. Scientific. A system is in a particular state. A scientific process occurs. The state changes to another state.
b. Identity. Things are because of definition. A triangle has 3 sides by definition.
c. Personal. Some being made a decision that caused something to happen. The apartment complex got build because the Donald wanted it to.

3. The creation of the universe cannot have a scientific explanation because every scientific process must have a pre existing state.
4. It also cannot have an idempotent explanation because there are other states that could have happened.

5. Therefore, the only rational explanation for the creation of the universe is personal. You can of course choose to believe otherwise but it would be an irrational belief that flies in the face of all known scientific evidence.

There’s other god proofs too. I just get annoyed by all the atheists that took a biology course and figure they are smarter then all the theologians that have been thinking about this stuff for thousands of years.

Not to mention the irreducible complexity of a single unit of Life. Can’t be muddled towards at random. Has to be designed, requiring a designer. Intelligent design follows, mandating an intelligence to do the designing.
It’s pretty simple, really. Without acceptance of Intelligent Design theory, nothing about our existence can be remotely explained. Now, this doesn’t mean that we can NEVER explain our existence without a Creator, but that we don’t currently know of a way to do so without violating the core precepts of Science!

Something that doesn’t have an explanation is irrational.

No, something can simply be unknown. Consider the scientists debating the source of the sun's energy circa 1870. There were 2 groups, those that favored gravity as the source and those who thought burning hydrogen was the source. Both were able to poke holes in the other's theories. At the time, the Sun's ability to output so much energy just did not have an explanation, other than God's will. Of course, the key is nuclear fusion, which was incomprehensible in the 1870s. It will likely take such a similar stride in human knowledge as nuclear fusion was in order to understand the origin of the Universe.

HeadSet says

No, something can simply be unknown.

I think In my drunken state I mistyped the first part of the proof. Should probably just look it up and just link it.

First part is more like “The belief that everything has an explanation is rational. If something has no explanation then the belief in it is irrational.”

So just because something isn't known doesn’t invalidate the proof. The point is, we only know of 3 ways to explain the existence of anything. Once you figure out how the thing works that you don’t know, it’s going to be one of the 3 categories.

If you believe that something exists that doesn’t fit into one of the 3 categories I described above, that’s fine, you’re just irrational.

I like this theory. It’s true by definition. Like BLM.

TrumpingTits says

WTF has happened to this thread?

Winning!

richwicks says

how "morality" is constructed over time not only in human societies, but animal societies.

FACT CHECK: True Story!

Is this Carl Fucking Sagan vs. AC Grayling or an Election Thread?

This thread sure changed quick.

I also like how after the god particle theory was disproved all the physics people started leaning towards multiverse or simulation theory, both of which are non falsifiable and might as well just admit they have no clue what’s going on and there’s a sky god.

richwicks says

The Abrahamic religions are used as political tools. I don't know want to change your mind or challenge your faith, but there is a reason to lie about the existence of a god.

While religion HAS been used for political power, the argument that "Everything from sex to soap to pronouns to knitting, etc. is a power relationship" is bogus postmodernist Foucault Fuckery.

A great deal of it of either hardwired evolutionary behavior, or the product of a million years of societal development, where cultural standards were developed over time for surviving as a cohesive entity.

That being said, it's okay if you don't believe in, you know, the thing.

richwicks says

The Abrahamic religions are used as political tools. I don't know want to change your mind or challenge your faith, but there is a reason to lie about the existence of a god.

1. You can’t offend a true believer by challenging them in good faith.
2. I’m catholic and 100% agree that religion is a tool that has been used to control people. (Case in point current pope is a dip shit). This does not invalidate the principle.
3. I don’t see any argument around a creator being. The stuff about he loves us and has a plan for us I take on faith but that has helped me tremendously in times like the current election.

I could give a shit what religion people are into so long as it's peaceful and nobody tries to use religion-logic at me to try to poopoo evolution.

NoCoupForYou says

That being said, it's okay if you don't believe in, you know, the thing.

lol

Occam's Razor only applies when the minimum set of assumptions can explain all the observed phenomena.

One of the most remarkable stories in the Bible was the Tower of Babble story. It absolutely boggles the mind to see how ancient people could have the wisdom that globalism was a bad idea! Einstein once said that he didn't know with what weapons WWIII would be waged, but WW4 would be fought with sticks and stones. If that's the case, who is to say there hadn't been thermonuclear resets on this planet already? literally having bombed earth back to the stone ages? Multiple times? None of today's man-made structures would survive for more than a few thousand years; modern concrete structures would crumble much faster than the pyramids without constant maintenance. Multiple chapters in ancient Indian scriptures essentially described combat involving modern or futuristic air force, space force and thermonuclear weapons. With today's establishment pushing for global bureaucracy, and what we know about the inherit inefficiency of bureaucracy, how long will it be before bureaucrats start killing each other fighting over slices of a shrinking economic pie?

BTW, current human knowledge is actually quite limited: never mind long long ago and far far away events like the origin of the universe, we don't even fully understand how the Sun works: the nuclear fusion theory can't explain why the solar surface is only 6,000C whereas the corona is 150,000C. If we didn't know anything about nuclear fusion, the Sun would clearly look like a massive Tesla electrical discharge sphere (plasma globe). Remember, around 1910, world's leading authorities thought humanity had almost finished learning all there was to learn in physics and chemistry. Humans are full of hubris and sh*t.

Despite historical faults with religious bureaucracies (usually operating under institutional religions), religions serve three very important functions in society:

1. Putting a lid on earthly political powers, which are inherently corrupt; ironically, exactly the opposite of the "progressive" faith. The overwhelming majority of the population are submissive towards power . . . which is catastrophic when the pinnacle of power is an earthling, making it unsafe for everyone surrounding the "dear leader" and the "dear leader" himself. Limited government is not a charity gesture for the plebs, but a safety device for the elite themselves.

2. Bolstering faith in crime-and-punishment. Given the fact that only 15-20% of murders get solved in cities like Chicago, faith is extremely important in preventing a society turning into a Hobbesian nightmare of war of all against all.

3. Inducing women to be submissive to men, and inducing men to be honorable towards women under their protection, so as to facilitate family formation/stability and reproduction / demographic stability; you know, women always fuck upwards preferring men superior to themselves, so turning men into rugs to be stumped on by women like the Progressives want is essentially demographic suicide.

You don't have to believe in the thing to see the value of it!

ignoreme says

Proof that belief in God is rational, as best as I can type on my phone when I am 4 drinks in which is when I do my best posting on pat.net. Prove me wrong.

1. A rational person believes everything has an explanation. Something that doesn’t have an explanation is irrational.
2. There are 3 possible ways to explain everything that we know that happens:
a. Scientific. A system is in a particular state. A scientific process occurs. The state changes to another state.
b. Identity. Things are because of definition. A triangle has 3 sides by definition.
c. Personal. Some being made a decision that caused something to happen. The apartment complex got build because the Donald wanted it to.

3. The creation of the universe cannot have a scientific explanation because every scientific process must have a pre existing state.
4. It also cannot have an idempotent explanation because there are other states that could have happened.

5. Therefore, the only rational ...

I really don't want to argue this. Again, you have the same problem what was the pre-existing condition to make God? What God made God?

If God could have always existed, so could the universe. It's unknowable.

It's not as if I just reject morality because I'm an atheist either. There are certainly things I think are "good" and "evil". If there is a god, why do you assume it's good? Would it be moral for a god, that you don't believe in through the thinking process it created, to torture you for an eternity because you came to the wrong conclusion? It's the god that screwed up in that case, isn't it?

I honestly don't think I would want to exist for eternity regardless. I didn't have any say in that, and eventually, that's hell in and of itself.

I have no argument with religious people, and I recognize the usefulness of faith in many people, I also have seen religious belief used as a shield to hide severe immorality. I prefer not to expose my thinking entirely in my conclusion that forced me to be an atheist because stripping some people of their faith can be detrimental to them, and I consider that immoral - even if I'm actually correct.

False beliefs, in many things, are beneficial to some people, but ultimately, I've always wanted to know the truth, regardless of the consequences but I don't think I will ever abandon my morality regardless of what I conclude and I am always, constantly aware that conclusions I draw, can be incorrect. I am open to being wrong, but I've been an atheist for 30 years. You won't convince me and you should not feel responsible to do this. You cannot "save" me, and I do not want you to spend time attempting this. You're wasting energy on me.

I'm an extremely strong independent thinker, I don't even mind ridicule, I ignore it. I only look at data and any argument you throw at me, I can almost guarantee I've seen before and rejected it.

Reality says

Multiple times?

My take on theories like this are that (1) We've only been around about 300K years and (2) resources: We're squandering them now the past 100 years and are starting to run out. I seriously doubt all of that once easy coal, oil, etc., have just 'regenerated' in that amount of time.

just_passing_through says

Reality says

Multiple times?

My take on theories like this are that (1) We've only been around about 300K years and (2) resources: We're squandering them now the past 100 years and are starting to run out. I seriously doubt all of that once easy coal, oil, etc., have just 'regenerated' in that amount of time.

You might enjoy this:

www.youtube.com/embed/aDejwCGdUV8

Take it with a grain of salt, but it's enjoyable to speculate. Göbekli Tepe is entirely unexplained and basically smashes current understand of history. There may have been many advanced cultures before our culture, but we may have reached the highest level - Randall Carlson thinks the highest level we reached was a type of Victorian age, but he leaves room to think human civilization went far further than that, even further than we are now.

But again, take it with a grain of salt. This is like reading science fiction for me. Fun to speculate, but all predictions of the ancient past are about as good as predictions of the distant future. It's fun to dream.

just_passing_through says

My take on theories like this are that (1) We've only been around about 300K years and (2) resources: We're squandering them now the past 100 years and are starting to run out. I seriously doubt all of that once easy coal, oil, etc., have just 'regenerated' in that amount of time.

Oil wells get refilled in a few decades from lower levels due to pressure from below; see abiogenic origin of petroleum. If a human civilization cycle lasts about 10k years (between stone age and inventing orbital bombing battle stations bombing the surface back into the stone age, initially perhaps even radioactive after bombing therefore preventing quick resettlement of the surface from the small population of the orbital stations), that's far more than enough time to regenerate.

There can be dozens of 10k-yr redo's in a 300k-yr time span.

Reality says

Einstein once said that he didn't know with what weapons WWIII would be waged, but WW4 would be fought with sticks and stones. If that's the case, who is to say there hadn't been thermonuclear resets on this planet already?

I believe that this is the theory that 'Sodom & Gomorrah' was a metaphor and that Lot's wife was not turned into "salt" but was actually turned into ash in a nuclear explosion because she lingered around instead of running to a safe distance from the blast radius.

Patrick says

It would take some investigation to know for sure. Will that happen?

It would take a citizen journalist such as yourself. But more importantly would it change the end result?
Probably not... but its a start.

Again, I don't want to belive this election was rigged. It was close, but that was not a surprise. There was a shift as mail in ballots were counted. Also not a surprise. But the data will show if there are anomalies or not.

Was there some attempts at inflating the outcome? Probably. Was it widespread? At this point I can't say. In isolation, some of the reports of "inconsistencies" can be explained away, but the data is the data. For example, the jump in Biden vote totals in the middle of the night gave me pause. I hope that its nothing nefarious, but its worth looking into all the same. If nothing else, its peace of mind that the process still has its integrity mostly in tact.

Dead people voting in large numbers, postal offices back dating ballots, etc. That's a problem.

Reality says

Multiple times? None of today's man-made structures would survive for more than a few thousand years; modern concrete structures would crumble much faster than the pyramids without constant maintenance.

We have solid evidence of the last historical reset. The fall of the Roman Empire. They were at basically early 1900s tech with paved roads, sewers, and hot tubs. They were so good at stone cutting the people would use stones from old Roman structures to build new ones because stones of such uniformity could not be produced for like a thousand years.

What caused it? Bread and circuses to placate the population while the ruling classes plundered the wealth of the nation. Technology stagnated allowing other cultures to catch up and the professional military didn’t have the will or leadership to bother protecting the rotting corpse of the empire from the barbarians.

Sound familiar?

ignoreme says

They were at basically early 1900s tech

Can you imagine what an 800 AD Model T would look like?

NDrLoR says

ignoreme says

They were at basically early 1900s tech

Can you imagine what an 800 AD Model T would look like?

LOL. And what was the Roman equivalent of 1846 Colt Walker revolver?

FuckCCP89 says

LOL. And what was the Roman equivalent of 1846 Colt Walker revolver?

The gladius

Shaman says

FuckCCP89 says

LOL. And what was the Roman equivalent of 1846 Colt Walker revolver?

The gladius

Nah, that would be the equivalent of the cutlass.

I said basically. And maybe more like 1850s then 1900 tech. Some areas were for sure more advanced then others. Plumbing was more advanced for sure. I think the main deficit was even though they invented the steam engine, they never used it for practical applications.

Did you know they had mock Naval battles inside the coliseum?

Talking about snakes....

ignoreme says

professional military didn’t have the will or leadership to bother protecting the rotting corpse of the empire from the barbarians

Here's the missing piece, as the professional military went into decline, they actually outsourced the defense of the perimeter to barbarian armies which kept their original chain of command. Talk about a huge mistake.

And thus, from that type of boneheaded thinking to the eventual Fall of Rome (along with the invasion of the Italian peninsula), was just a matter of time.

Notice my emphasis on outsourcing

And what did Donald Trump say about outsourcing, esp hi-tech, to China?

I mean no one's complaining if the PRC makes toys, baby strollers, and garments.

But the buck stops when F-35 components are made there instead of some Honeywell or Texas Instruments plant stateside!

Rin says

And what did Donald Trump say about outsourcing, esp hi-tech, to China?

I mean no one's complaining if the PRC makes toys, baby strollers, and garments.

But the buck stops when F-35 components are made there instead of some Honeywell or Texas Instruments plant stateside!

i thought he was cutting off all the hi-tech outsourcing.