If you don't consider what I said to be accurate then maybe you could explain to me why you keep muttering on about the "multiculturalist religion" having brainwashed me.
Ok, I'll explain you why, given that you are seemingly willing to listen.
I have presented criticism of the islamic culture in Europe, backed up by reputable sources (mostly reputable newspaper articles, rather than for example right-wing propaganda neonazi websites). You are, of course, completely and absolutely free to disagree with these arguments and refute them (preferably with your own reputable sources, which I have asked several times). We could have had a rational discussion about this.
Instead, what do you do? You belittle what I have written ("Blah blah blah blah blah let me repeat again that I really don't care too much about what you think"), you insult me without even knowing me or my opinions ("I regard you as an extremely bigoted individual"), you attribute opinions to me that I do not have and have never expressed ("Someone who's apparently incapable of seeing that Islamophobia even exists") and you outright refuse to answer any of the questions I have asked you ("Why on earth should I spend even two seconds trying to convince someone like you?") giving the strong impression that you are doing so either because of some self-righteous sense of superiority, or because you are deliberately avoiding difficult questions that could make you look bad. You are acting in an extremely prejudiced way against me, while accusing me of being prejudiced.
Additionally you saw fit to criticize Bisqwit's signature and the video it linked by distorting completely what they were saying, and interpreting them as being a prejudiced attack against islam. You presented a very similar attitude in this case as well, such as belittling and insulting ("I found it a rather unremarkable and incoherent paranoid rant by an Islamophobe").
In other words, rather than engage in a rational and civilized discussion about the subject, your reaction is hostile, dismissive and extremely prejudiced.
Additionally, you say "I certainly never claimed that all criticism of Islam is hatred or racism or what have you" but your actions show different. You immediately and furiously dismissed even the slightest criticism of islam as prejudice, racism and bigotry.
Do you know what that reminds me strongly of? You guessed it: Extremist religious attitudes. The same kind of attitude that, for example, the members of the Westboro Baptist Church or Scientologists have when their ideologies are confronted. (Yes, there is actual footage of this around. It's not just hearsay.)
Like them, you keep repeating the religiousmulticulturalist propaganda, like comparing criticism of islam or immigration to nazism and antisemitism, and things like "And a lot of it is just the same old anti-immigration nonsense that we've heard for generations, blaming immigrants for either "stealing jobs", or not taking jobs and living off of the government, and then blaming "the Muslims" for refusing to get jobs, ignoring entirely the fact that economic realities and a lack of opportunity are far more accurate demographic indicators." (No sources, of course.)
You are not discussing. You are preaching.
Btw, do you know why you are refusing to answer my question of whether those people I linked to, and who are critics of islam, are "bigoted prejudiced islamophobe racists" or not? Because no matter what you would answer, you would be in a difficult position.
If you answer "yes", then it would be difficult for you to justify the answer. Are they being racist against their own people? How are they prejudiced, given that they are muslims or ex-muslims (by definition prejudice is a judgmental opinion formed before fully knowing someone of something)?
If you answer "no", then it would be difficult for you to explain why they aren't but, in your opinion, I am. What is the difference? Is it because I'm white?
If you dodge the question with something like "I don't have to answer the questions of a bigoted person like you", you will only emphasize that you don't want to answer the question, making you look bad.
So seemingly your only option is to skip the question completely and hope it goes away.
Blah blah blah blah blah let me repeat again that I really don't care too much about what you think. I'm sorry, but I just don't. I regard you as an extremely bigoted individual. Someone who's apparently incapable of seeing that Islamophobia even exists, let alone to a significant degree in Europe, where it has become a mainstream political position. Those who dare speak out against this new form of hatred have, apparently, been "brainwashed by the multiculturalist religion".
Why on earth should I spend even two seconds trying to convince someone like you?
I am the bigoted one? Please read your own text.
And please tell me exactly where have I denied, doubted or in any way disregarded the existence of islamophobia and prejudice against islam in Europe. Also please show me exactly where I have said that opposing islamophobia and prejudice against islam is being brainwashed. I would like to know, because I do not remember writing those things, nor anything like it.
You are only reading what you want to read. You see things that aren't there. You are attributing opinions to me that I do not have, nor have expressed in any way (in other words, you are putting words in my mouth).
I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you are not responding to my sourced statements in the other thread because you are just too annoyed to bother, rather than because you have no response, no matter how tempted I am to assume the latter.
If you are unwilling or incapable of commenting on any of my other sources, could please at least comment on this one point: Do you think these people are being islamophobes, bigoted, prejudiced and racists?
What is more, there are many different interpretations of QM, some of them not even having a defined notion of history or past -- hence, no true way to talk about "randomness" (as "randomness" means that an event is causally disconnected from its past -- no past, no randomness).
The result is that any claims about QM being stochastic or random are nonsense
I think that the relevant question is not so much whether quantum effects are random, but whether they are predictable. The notion of determinism is that everything is subject to an absolutely strict cause-and-effect chain of events: Every single event has a unique cause that unambiguously produced that event in that exact way. Hence if you could take into account all possible causes in a certain situation, you could predict what will happen due to the strict cause-and-effect chain.
However, if there are events that are physically impossible to predict (ie. not just "very hard to predict", but outright impossible, even in theory), that means there is no deterministic cause-and-effect chain. You say "no past, no randomness". I would also say "no past, no cause" (because a causal relationship requires by definition a strict timeline).
Am I correct in assuming that if the so-called quantum entanglement phenomenon does indeed exist, and that measuring for example the spin of one of the particles determines the spin of its entangled pair (regardless of their physical separation), and that if one could somehow predict the spin of the particle in advance, this could be used to transmit information (by choosing between a group of entangled particles) with no delay whatsoever regardless of distance?
You are judging his signature without actually watching the video. Neither the signature nor the video are criticism against islam, but against the United States government. In other words, you are showing a great deal of prejudice based on a superficial glance (which is really ironic), and jumping to conclusions.
First of all, I did watch the video.
That actually makes it worse. If you hadn't watched the video I would have simply attributed your mistake to an opinion based on a hasty glance of what the text in the signature might be implying, without actually thinking too much about it. It happens. (It certainly happens to me from time to time; I do sometimes jump to conclusions based on a fast skimming of what someone has written, rather then reading it carefully.)
However, the fact that you actually did watch the video and still think it's an attack against islam shows how absolutely prejudiced you are. Just because a criticism of something deals with islam doesn't automatically make it a criticism against islam. However, seemingly in your mind you filtered out everything else in that video other than the mentions of islam, and concluded that it's "a rather unremarkable and incoherent paranoid rant by an Islamophobe". How you came to this conclusion is beyond my comprehension.
The point of the video, which I think was very clear and unambiguous, is a criticism of the blatant hypocrisy of the American government towards religious books. The burning of the koran is severely condemned, and instructions are given to soldiers to treat said book with the utmost respect and care. At the same time, these same soldiers were ordered to burn bibles as trash, by the same United States government.
Now please tell me where exactly is the "islamophobia" in this. I'm curious to know.
I think it's sad that the multiculturalist religion has brainwashed you so completely and so successfully that you see nothing but hatred, hatred and more hatred everywhere. You filter any criticism of islam or multiculturalism through a filter that says "hatred, prejudice, bigotry, racism, discrimination, conspiracy theories".
Also please see my answer to your accusations in the other thread. I would really like to see your credible sources for your claims.
Well, that's what I think is wrong here. It's true that there was an incident whereby a Quran was burned that had disastrous consequences
Way to totally misinterpret the video. That's not what the video is about at all.
You are one of the most polite and helpful people I've ever known, which is why I find it so strange that you have this as one of your signatures. You should know better than to ascribe such damning attributes to huge, heterogeneous groups of people (numbering more than 1 billion individuals in this case). I don't think it befits you.
You are judging his signature without actually watching the video. Neither the signature nor the video are criticism against islam, but against the United States government. In other words, you are showing a great deal of prejudice based on a superficial glance (which is really ironic), and jumping to conclusions.
What I regret is getting so angry at Warp the other day. I don't regret speaking out, but I should have done it in a far more composed manner. I didn't check back to see his response, because then I'd be compelled to again misuse a topic that wasn't supposed to be so deeply divisive.
Do you think it's polite to throw a tirade of accusations at someone, and then not even give them the courtesy of reading their response? (My response was based on reputable sources, which I linked, and I expected you to give your reputable sources for your claims.)
I could be wrong, but I think it's only non-deterministic from our frame of reference, much like we have free will from our frame of reference. I think that there is far more information in "reality" that we don't (can't) have access to. Just because *we* can't predict something doesn't mean it is truly unpredictable. In other words, stuff that we can't perceive could be determining quantum outcomes, but since we can't view the input we can't predict the output.
As I have said, I'm by no means any kind of expert whatsoever on QM, but my understanding is that the stochastic nature of many quantum phenomena are truly random and non-deterministic. This does not mean "too hard to predict", but "not predictable". Literally. It cannot be predicted. (Also, if I understand correctly, being able to predict some of these phenomena might cause the breaking of some of the most fundamental laws of physics.)
It's just a theory though. Just like gravity.
Avoid confusing the colloquial term "theory" and the scientific term "theory" because they are certainly not the same thing. (The colloquial term means the same as "conjecture" or "hypothesis". A more apt term for the scientific term would perhaps be "model".)
But it could be that the natural laws are not laws, but wills instead, like I explained on page 1. Many people agree that humans, animals and insects move because of will, so perhaps all the other things in the universe also move because of will, and not because of laws.
It's always amusing to see how you don't have any idea what you are talking about.
You actually remind me of Charlene Werner.
Really the title says it all. I would really love to see someone try to tas mario 3 with the NSEZZE game genie code. For those who have not seen this code in action, it makes the game unpredictable and weird, with the ever present threat of being consumed by glitches. Im not really sure if it is possible to complete, but if anyone can find a path to the end, it with a tas.
No scientific "evidence" or any finite amount of experiments is capable of proving natural laws, whether the scientific method crafted by humans can accurately predict the laws of the entire universe is ultimately tied to an individual's personal beliefs
No, it isn't. Either all natural laws governing this universe can be studied and determined from within this universe, or they can't. It's not a question of opinion.
That's as silly as saying something like "whether energy exists is a question of belief". No, it isn't. It either exists or not, and beliefs and opinions don't change that fact.
As much as I wouldn't want to say this, but I found this run a bit confusing. Even the various Mortal Kombat TASes are less confusing than this, and those are full of crazy glitches (while this isn't).
The game is very fast-paced, which one would think is great from a TASing point of view, but it only helped to worsen the confusion.
I'm sure that if I had played this game extensively I could appreciate this more, but from an "outsider's" perspective it wasn't all that entertaining.
I have to vote meh. (A 'no' vote would be way too harsh because I didn't see anything technically wrong with this, and I am certain that people who have played the game will enjoy this run.)
Unless someone here is seriously claiming that quantum randomness is deterministic (and hence predictable).
It could be that things at quantum level are as deterministic as macroscopic objects like planets, but because our tools at present aren't efficient enough, they appear to be random. If we have better microscopes (or something) some day and can film things at a few septillion FPS, we might see order there.
While I know next to nothing about quantum mechanics, I wouldn't be surprised if the ability to predict the outcome of many phenomena, such as quantum entanglement, would break some law of physics, such as being able to transfer information between two points faster than c. (Because if you could predict eg. the spin of an entangled particle, you could choose which entangled particles from a group to measure and use this to transfer information to their paired quanta, which may be physically located at a large distance. This transmission would be immediate rather than having a delay of c, thus breaking the fundamental law of physics.)
There's actually no scientific evidence whatsoever that the universe is deterministic.
I think you mean "there's evidence that it's not deterministic", which is not the same thing.
Of course there is evidence for a deterministic universe if you pick and choose. Newtonian laws are but just one example. However, this evidence alone is not enough.
I don't even understand why this is a question. Unless someone here is seriously claiming that quantum randomness is deterministic (and hence predictable).
I remember seeing a side-view 2D game for the Amiga where you controlled a bouncing ball. The only thing you could control was which direction the ball would rotate and how fast, and the ball would then bounce from the scenery. I do not remember what the goal was.
Surely this same idea has been used in countless games on many platforms, but it would be nice to see the original Amiga one.
I think I was pretty concise, considering this is a subject you could write an entire book about.
In summary, I presented three points of view, two naturalistic and one supernaturalistic.
I have to disagree. Many quantum effects are definitely and absolutely non-deterministic and unpredictable, and do not follow cause-and-effect. Quantum effects can escalate to macroscopic levels.
Whether we have "free will" depends on its definition.
The (mostly) religious definition implies, basically, that our consciousness transcends the physical world, and thus we are able to make decisions independently and regardless of what happens in it. In other words, our thinking process is (at least in part) not bound to the physical world.
(The religious view stumbles on a minor problem when deciding whether animals have free will or not. Are they completely bound to physical laws, or do their consciousnesses also transcend the physical reality? Many people have differing opinions.)
From a naturalistic point of view there are only two things that can affect decisions: Deterministic cause-and-effect, and quantum randomness (which is real non-deterministic randomness, not just apparent one). Whatever decisions we make are always a result of either of those, or a combination of both. Thus there's no real free will from a naturalistic point of view.
However, there's the practical philosophical definition too: Basically, since it's not possible for one person to predict with absolute precision what decisions another person will do, that other person has effectively free will from the first person's point of view. Most decisions also show a logical chain of deductions, which at least gives the impression of it not being completely random.
Also, more importantly, the first person cannot force the second one to form an opinion or make a certain decision (not inside his mind at least) under normal circumstances. He can affect to a certain degree what the other person thinks, but he cannot force him to form a certain opinion. Thus in practice the other person has free will from his point of view. His opinions are his own, not forced by someone else.
Talk about obeying the letter of the law, rather than its spirit. It's almost frightening.
Because public prayer = a theocracy.
Why does it stop there? Does the constitution say "public prayer is ok, but no other laws endorsing any religion is"? The argument you presented was "the constitution only talks about the laws that congress passes, not the laws that individual states pass". So what exactly stops this at public prayer?
Unless public prayer is mentioned explicitly as an exception to the rule (which it isn't), the interpretation can only be that either everything goes or nothing goes: Either the governments of the individual states can endorse a religion or they can't.
Don't pidgeon-hole him; show me one article / video of him talking about evolution / creationism, and I will give you ten of him talking about ending prohibition. His personal beliefs mean less to him than his policy, and his policy is ending prohibition on a federal level.
You are missing my point. My point was that the same person both holding fundamentalist Christian beliefs and endorsing the legalization of prostitution feels like a multiple personality disorder, which is what I found curious.
He also mentioned that asking him of his beliefs on the issue is inappropriate as he isn't a scientist, nor did he ever claimed to be one.
Actually he has said he is a scientist. Direct quote: "On abortion, I just recognize as a physician and a scientist, that life does exist prior to birth."
I was talking about evolution, and you're jumping to abortion. He's not claiming to be an expert on the theory of evolution, but he is a former medical doctor. Was the term scientist too general a term in both uses? Perhaps. Sue him.
Seems like we have a fanboy.
You didn't say "he isn't an expert on the theory of evolution, nor did he ever claimed to be one". You said: "he isn't a scientist, nor did he ever claimed to be one". He has claimed to be a scientist. Even an MD is not a scientist, unless he is active in an actual research field of medicine (which, in fact, is much closer to biology than most other branches of science, which would put him much closer to being an expert in evolutionary science).
Anyways, none of this is about my original point.
Not if life is deterministic, and I believe it is
Quantum effects introduce absolutely non-deterministic elements, by the very nature of them being purely stochastic and unpredictable (which doesn't just mean "extremely hard to predict, too hard for us to do", but truly unpredictable in that it's impossible even in theory to predict). Quantum effects can escalate to macroscopic levels.
Alcohol has any number of uses -- it sanitizes, so it can be used as a cleanser (including for injuries, so that qualifies as a medical use). It's usable as fuel, albeit not as energy-dense a fuel as gasoline. Most gas in the USA has a 10% ethanol mix as part of our addiction to corn subsidies. You can also use it as a solvent (part of why it makes a good cleanser -- it thins out oils) and I'm sure it has tons of industrial applications.
I don't think it's pure alcohol that's being heavily taxed, but alcoholic beverages (ie. those intended for recreational uses). So the question of what other uses those beverages might have is a valid one.
Alcoholic beverages, especially certain ones (such as red wine) can actually have positive health effects when consumed with moderation. The major problem is that most people don't.
On church and state, he has stated that although the first amendment protects the right of an individual to worship or not worship as he pleases, it does not allow the government to prohibit worship, either. As such, he again designates the right to allow / disallow public prayer to the states, which is the most accurate interpretation of the constitution whether you like it or not ("Congress shall write no law").
Wow, that's really astute, I must say! The United States constitution basically dictates that the country cannot become a theocracy, but since the text only mentions "congress", not the individual states, that means that the states themselves can be as theocratic as they want, and it's not a violation of the constitution. So as long as the congress does not pass theocratic laws, everything else is permitted within the states themselves.
Talk about obeying the letter of the law, rather than its spirit. It's almost frightening.
Lastly, believing in the theory of evolution has nothing to do with the ability to govern
It tells something about his ability to govern on subjects regarding science and education. If he stays out of matters regarding things like deciding school curricula and scientific research funding, then his beliefs are inconsequential. However, if he does affect those, then it becomes worrying. (The Texas school board of education is a good example of this.)
(OTOH, why am I worrying? I don't live in the US...)
Anyways, my point in mentioning that was not that it would affect his capacity as a state leader, but that it's a typical symptom of a fundamentalist young-earth creationist, which seems at odds with wanting to legalize prostitution and cannabis.
He also mentioned that asking him of his beliefs on the issue is inappropriate as he isn't a scientist, nor did he ever claimed to be one.
Actually he has said he is a scientist. Direct quote: "On abortion, I just recognize as a physician and a scientist, that life does exist prior to birth."
Oh yeah, you criticized the media for not explaining why Ron Paul is "unelectable". I don't know much about American politics but I think it's kind of obvious why someone proposing the legalization of prostitution and marijuana would be considered unelectable.
I don't understand. Are there two Ron Pauls in the United States running for president? Because I thought Ron Paul is a pro-life creationist who doesn't believe in the separation of church and state, nor in the theory of evolution. (Not that that latter thing has anything to do with prostitution or marijuana, but it's a very typical feature of an American young-earth creationist fundamentalist.)
Did you know that there is no species of animal called "weasel", but that it refers to an entire genus of animals called "mustela", which the ferret is a part of? Very astute of you to say they look like weasels, because ferrets are weasels!
They look like non-ferret weasels. Actually I would even go so far as saying that at first glance they look like raccoon dogs.
