bascule

What needs to be elaborated on? It's no different from saying you don't exist because you're just an assemblage of atoms.

Emergent effects still exist, even though they're explainable as combinations of simpler systems.

Well, as a liberal hippie douche, I'm obviously going to go for a moderate over a neocon. McCain is the kind of Republican I could seriously see myself voting for, especially if Hillary were running on the Democratic ticket. You'd be hard pressed to find a Democrat I'd want to be President less than Condi, at least as far as ones who have any hope of winning the Democratic nomination go. She's one of the more admirable members of the Bush administration, I guess, but the social policy she advocates is almost diametrically opposed to my viewpoints. If nothing else, instant-runoff voting. Unlike the electoral college the primary process is not set in stone, and if all the good ol' boys who vote for the Kerrys over the Clarks and the Bushes over the McCains were forced to rank the remaining candidates, I think it would result in a substantially fairer representation of who the party really wants to be president. As it stands, I think you wind up with the good ol' boys always winning over everyone else because the remaining group, who comprises the majority of the party, winds up divided over the other candidates, and can't compromise on picking a single one to oppose the good ol' boy candidate.

I voted "no" because I'm not full of SMUG! That and I hope to make a bicycle my primary means of transportation very soon.

What I can't figure out: What if you've been trapped in the "friend zone" and a girl starts being much more ambiguous about her motivations towards you? Am I supposed to wait until she makes a move, or is there some kind of tactful way of letting her know you feel the same way (provided that is the case) without destroying your friendship if you're wrong?

You know what I'd really love to see? Feingold vs. McCain But our horrible primary system is probably going to spit out Hillary vs. Condi or something equally bad, or worse

The important measurement made in this regard recently is the value range for omega calculated from WMAP's CMBR measurements. Right now things are looking like the universe is closed...

http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_2006/2006-04-07/feature1p/index.html I can't verify the authenticity of this, and the guy who wrote it may be biased. It's all his firsthand account with no corroboration, so whatever, reader beware, this may very well be BULLSHIT! But uhh, yeah, basically an anthropocentrism-hating biologist who thinks we're destroying the earth and the solution is to exterminate 90% of humanity via airbourne ebola. WTF?! The author claims he received a standing ovation after his speech. God bless Texas... Ed: Well, here's a little bit of 3rd party corroboration: http://www.zo.utexas.edu/courses/bio357/357evaluations.html

It would be interesting to see how/if this trend continues into higher IQ groups

Yay, or something. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4862112.stm

I'm evolving at an accelerating pace, just like human society. Whee!

Upon further inspection, it appears to be the same article. My bad

No, but I think there's a contingent of right-wing extremists in the Republican party who would refuse to vote for a woman, let alone a black woman.

Salon had a story on Tuvalu today, I guess: Tuvalu is drowning

For anyone who has read any of my posts on the subject I'm quite the a-life/computational biomodeling fanatic (namely in regards to the creation of a computer simulation of a human being). So I was really enthused to see this story about a company working on creating commercial a-life software for the general public: http://www.economist.com/science/PrinterFriendly.cfm?story_id=6740040&CFID=78583140&CFTOKEN=39f9741-109e11f6-1292-4b21-93bb-7a3672e4ced1 Really, I guess isn't anything new... there were several a-life titles from Maxis, including El Fish, Unnatural Selection, and their upcoming game: Spore. But this looks to be far more complete a simulation, supposedly operating at the genetic level. It also looks like they've coined their own term for computational biomodeling: "virtual cell biology"

That's not a solution either. The Kyoto Protocol will only bring about a change in global mean surface temperatures which is less than the precision to which global mean surface temperatures can presently be assessed. The effect of limiting CO2 output is negligable. The solution, in my mind, is a collective effort by all nations on earth to identify and correct regional anthropogenic forcings, the "if everyone does a little we can do a lot" philosophy.

Oh boy, time to nitpick at everyone's terminology Yes, the focus should be on identifying and seeking solutions to climate vulnerabilities. That's not exactly a solution for a country like Tuvalu that sits only slightly above sea level. I believe the phrase you're looking for is "tipping point"

You're right, why administer lidocaine to heart attack victims when it's an artificial compound that will do no good? Or any other pharmeceuticals or synthetic drugs, for that matter. By the way, your comment is an example of the naturalistic fallacy. And what does any of that have to do with LSD?

There was a pretty cool article published on this today: http://chronicle.com/free/v49/i21/21b02001.htm 1. The discoverer pitches the claim directly to the media. 2. The discoverer says that a powerful establishment is trying to suppress his or her work. 3. The scientific effect involved is always at the very limit of detection. 4. Evidence for a discovery is anecdotal. 5. The discoverer says a belief is credible because it has endured for centuries. 6. The discoverer has worked in isolation. 7. The discoverer must propose new laws of nature to explain an observation.

You're not going to be able to power much "intelligence" with a freaking PIC

Which the most recent WMAP data regarding omega would lead us to believe is less likely than a finite universe An infinite flat universe can still have a finite amount of matter, so there's no reason to assume that either

Hooray!

Ray Kurzweil more or less invoked the Fermi paradox in order to support his conjecture that we are alone in the universe. See the "Why SETI Will Fail (and why we are alone in the Universe)" section of the Law of Accelerating Returns article: http://www.kurzweilai.net/articles/art0134.html?printable=1 Particularly this chart from Scientific American: I feel that if there are aliens more intelligent than us, they're outside of our light cone and the speed of light must be a truly insurmountable barrier. Here's the summary of the Fermi paradox from the Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox

Ugh, I don't want to think about that election (or for that matter, Condi v. Hillary) However I wonder how many other liberals there are besides myself would choose McCain over Hillary... (Ed: "there are like me there are"? Wow, and I thought I got enough sleep today)

Sadly I think the last election could be framed as people showing up to vote "against Bush" or "against Kerry" rather than voice their support for the candidate they actually chose. That's a terrible state of affairs. I really think there's some serious problems with our nation's primary system that need to be addressed. If Hillary wins the Democratic primary it will only underscore these problems further.