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That sounds a lot like possibility #2 that Pangloss presented... Honestly I don't think they could, hence why attaching strings to the funding would make an effective bargaining tool in promoting them to seek peace with the Palestinians, while at the same time the Osamas of the world would see we aren't just blindingly funding them in their fight against the Palestinians

So you're seriously contending that the two possibilities you enumerated are the only ones that exist? I argued a third possibility (fund Israel's military with conditions that result in a peaceful resolution with Palestine) Another is we cut military funding and Israel does fine without it

This is pretty much a textbook example of a false dichotomy, which is a logical fallacy: Excellent! Committing to avoid logical fallacies is a great way to improve your argumentation style.

I asked you for a source to back up your assertions. That's "dodging and changing the subject"? Your question is based on the assertions I asked you to source. Give me a source and I'll answer the question. I'm wanting to evaluate both sides of the argument before responding. It'd be helpful if you could provide this information. Comey and Mueller's testimony is mutually supporting. Gonzales's is contradictory. Who should I trust? Based on how you believe I'd hypothetically respond to a different situation, I'm spin-doctoring? Zuh?

A substantive argument is a nice change of pace. However the US is giving Israel $3 billion in military aid per year. This affords Israel nearly the highest per capita military spending in the world. Yes, true enough, it cuts both ways... but regardless, the US is pumping money into Israel military which is in turn being used against the Palestinians. Why shouldn't there be strings attached to move Israel towards a peaceful resolution?

I prefer not to respond to questions phrased in the form of a logical fallacy. To answer what you're getting at, precisely the point is to leverage the negative consequences of withdrawing US support in order to encourage the Israelis to move past the present state of apartheid / genocide towards a peaceful resolution. Right now for all intents and purposes we are economically supporting those actions, providing the Palestinians nothing as they're massacred by the Israelis, and doing nothing to encourage a peaceful resolution. The optimal scenario rests precisely in the middle of the dichotomy you presented.

I really appreciate someone like Smolin who's willing to put work into a theory before realizing it's unteneable

I greatly respect his physics work, however his philosophical conjectures, particularly in regard to neutral monism and the non-computability of consciousness (by a universal computer), have been thoroughly debunked by the scientific and mathematical communities while simultaneously being lapped up by crackpots, such as the individuals who made the "What the Bleep" movie and book. His story certainly makes the case that scientists with a philosophical bone to pick shouldn't try to use math or science to back up what is in the end a purely metaphysical conjecture. His assertion that microtubules in neurons exhibit some sort of non-classical quantum behavior did lead to one of the best refutations of the quantum mind hypothesis I've seen to date (by Max Tegmark), however. It was quite interesting to see Solomon Feferman, also a neutral monist who believes consciousness is non-computable, debunk Penrose's attempts to mathematically prove monism.

http://arxiv.org/abs/0708.4013 Interesting...

Okay, nitpicks aside, memetics was pursued as a science for a decade. There was a peer reviewed journal (the Journal of Memetics), and people pursued namely externalism before eventually deciding it was unteneable. The journal published a series of "obituaries" for memetics and subsequently shut down. It's interesting reading, and might elevate your opinion of how those who scientifically pursued memetics actually thought about it and what problems they encountered trying to do so

I'm sure she was coached on a variety of possible questions and appropriate responses, but unfortunately they all became jumbled in her head, so when it came time to respond to a particular question the response was a nonsensical mismash of of the possible answers.

That would require a formal definition of meme. As a science memetics was split between externalism and internalism, namely: Externalism: A meme is a self-replicating environmental artifact Internalism: A meme is a self-replicating idea Dawkins formulation was decidedly internalist (he described what the externalists described as a meme as a "meme vehicle") Unfortunately internalist memetics is presently possible to place into a scientific model (how do you scientifically define an "idea"? What does an "idea" look like? How do you observe them?) Externalist memetics at least stands a chance of being placed on scientific grounds, but the approach is much more haphazard as it's difficult to trace direct connections between artifacts which inspired each other. In the specific case of Internet memes, there's a list of them available here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_phenomena From an externalist perspective, that's a list of observed memes.

Can you perhaps link me to one of these "plenty of news stories"? Can you also detail why you don't trust Comey, who was actually present during the alleged events? After all, his testimony is what you need to discredit, not Mueller's. If anything Mueller's allegations only further to substantiate Comey's.

False dichotomy

Even as a materialist I'm going to say that consciousness cannot be part of a scientific model of the brain because consciousness is ontologically distinct from the brain. Trying to describe a model of the brain that includes consciousness is making a metaphysical statement, not a scientific one. As far as science is concerned the brain is a classical physical system. There are scientists who study consciousness. They're called cognitive scientists and they study perception. They perform double blind experiments, toggling different perceptual experiments on a randomly wired switchboard, and record what the subject says. They can later correlate the perceptual experiments with what the subject reported, and compare them across multiple subjects. This is as close to a scientific investigation of consciousness as humans have come so far. All that said you are trying to hijack the discussion.

You might have a look at Seth Lloyd's "ultimate laptop" http://arstechnica.com/wankerdesk/01q2/limits/limits-1.html Certainly more. Sun is already building a 500 TeraFLOPS supercomputer called Ranger. Given past trends we can expect that kind of power on our desktop in 5-10 years.

It's certainly not your fault. pioneer appears primarily to blame. While I love to endulge in speculation regarding the brain, I at least try to study neuroanatomy and have articles or papers to substantiate my position. pioneer doesn't seem to care for that sort of thing. To be fair most of the video deals quite little with neuroanatomy. The neuroanatomical basis of HTM is detailed more extensively in Jeff Hawkins' book, On Intelligence. The majority of the neuroanatomical discussion in the video takes place at the very end, when a number of neurologists ask questions following his talk. The video still works for me.

You know, I thought I had something to say, but really I have nothing. Uhh, wow, hooray for relativity? In that respect we're constantly traveling forward in time without violating the laws of physics. What's so exciting about that?

Being blonde doesn't make you stupid. Being in a beauty pageant? If you have average or above average intelligence, then you're something of a statistical anomaly. That said she demonstrated unmitigated stupidity. I liked this edit of the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Szcx0VkRo An interesting take on it is what your reaction to the question would be. I would question the credibility of the source claiming that 1/5 of Americans don't know what America looks like. Unfortunately, I'm sad to say that I wouldn't be surprised if the statistic came from a credible source. If it really is the case, it's indicative that a large group of Americans don't even understand the rest of the world is real, even enough to comprehend the shape of their own coastline...

I believe our support of Israel stems for a legacy dating back to the formation of the United Nations. There are mutual benefits, primarily in the development of military technology, however such an arrangement is interventionist in a way is damaging to America's image abroad. We have Osama attesting that our support of Israel was one of the primary motivations for the September 11th attacks, although individuals such as Bush and Giuliani would rather pin it on our freedom (to which David Cross responds: then why aren't they attacking the Netherlands?) I entirely support maintaining friendly relations with Israel. I do not support giving the money. I do not support what they are doing to the Palestinians. While it's hard to apply the label of genocide to a race that was the target of the worst genocidal atrocity in human history, that seems to be what they're doing to the Palestinians, and it's a humanitarian tragedy. I think the US should at least make economic and military support conditional on establishing peaceful relations with the Palestinians and working out a territorial treaty that both parties can agree to.

Can you detail for us what specific assumptions you believe I'm making in my conclusion which are generalizations of established premises? This seems largely a debate about what facts have actually been established in the matter and how much is speculation.

And you know that how? Give me liberty or give me death Live free or die Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety And all that jazz Yes, see, some of us care more about freedom than paying lip service to it while handing our civil rights over to an increasingly totalitarian government I want my fourth amendment and FISA rights protected. I care about freedom. Obviously you don't. Oh please. I could just as easily say that the illegal spying program is an outright attempt to undermine our civil rights because Bush hates freedom. Freedom is a double edged sword. I'd rather err on the side of freedom. If you don't like the fourth amendment and think it makes you unsafe, perhaps you should move to a different country where they don't have these freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. We must take away freedoms in order to be free? That makes a whole lot of sense...

Therefore they're wrong? Ad hominem perhaps? Some administration officials are liars therefore all administration officials are liars? Composition fallacy perhaps? Actually I'm taking the FBI director and the then deputy attorney general at their word. I guess you're calling them both liars. Any reason why?

He certainly functioned as a major impediment of any Congressional investigation of the executive branch, and in that regard was harmful to the function the Justice Department is supposed to serve. I'd be more likely to describe it as "Rats fleeing a sinking ship" Indeed, the lily-livered Democrats are afraid of appearing weak on terrorism, and thus "compromise" in the form of giving Bush everything he wants... for a time. That aside, I still consider the program both unconstitutional and in violation of (then) federal law. Gonzales's attempt to get a barely conscious, heavily medicated, post-surgery Ashcroft to sign off on the program should go down as one of the most despicable acts in the history of American politics, at least if anyone were actually paying attention. Sadly, you raise an important point here. One would hope that the Senate confirmation process would allow the Democrats to weed out anyone as corrupt and incompetent as Gonzales, but given their recent track record, they'd probably approve Goering. And just as a bit of juxtaposition to that, I found this quote interesting:

http://www.bangkokpost.net/News/28Aug2007_news02.php Greenpeace protesters in Bangkok dumped tonnes of papayas on the doorstep of the Agriculture and Cooperatives Ministry. The result? The surrounding crowd snatched them up. Don't get me wrong: I understand there are potential risks involved with GMO crops. I'd support them being labeled as genetically modified. I understand there are exploitative corporations trying to enforce intellectual property laws on them. But... but... people are starving. Doesn't that take precedence?