Peterkin

For you. Not for me. And therein lies the unbridgeable rift.

Depends what you consider 'very long'. And just because they live in conjunction with mangroves now, we can't assume that they have not changed habitats and food sources sometime, or many times, during their history. Let's give the researchers a couple of days to study on it.

That would be very long and widely off-topic. If you were to compare size of empires and number of nations invaded, the Christians would win by a comfortable margin. Of course, it also depends on how far back in history you wanted to go and whether you were comparing military aggression by religion only, or other factors. I'm sure Wikipedia can supply whatever answer you want.

True. That was my assumption, from the little bit I've read on it. Of course, it's still a descendant of our common family tree, but on a twig very, very far from the one on which we're hanging. Okay. When? From what? There has to be some observed data to prompt a hypothesis, and I'm not aware of one that posits a recent origin for this species. That doesn't mean it's wrong, just that I don't know enough (given I only learned of its existence this afternoon) about T. magnifica to speculate.

Of course. One branch went on to branch and branch and branch, until it became all kinds of organisms, many of which have since become extinct. This branch remained unchanged or changed very little, (like ants and hydras) I suppose because they found an ecological niche that still works for them. The "missing link" does not refer its evolution but to our knowledge. I would very much like to see a magnified cross section. Haven't had time to search.

There is a little more in the Science article, linked to this one. No enlarged microscopy pictures, unfortunately, so we have to rely on their description of the insides. But, wow! what a stash of DNA!

Why should scientists care about the appearance of some new species that far in the future? It won't be humans, you know; it will be one or more species nobody's ever seen before. If they're viable, they will look appropriate to their surroundings and food sources. I notice, though, that the artists depicting these imaginary future humans were just as concerned about the "human" identity as you are: they kept the same face. It's quite improbable that the shape of the nose, the size of the mouth and the placement of the eyes would stay the same, when everything else changes. It won't bother you on this one, either. If you're still here to see them, you will look like them and you will think it's the only possible way for your species to look, just as you were more than okay - you were very pleased - with this appearance : https://www.britannica.com/topic/Notharctus 50 millions years ago. If you're not here by then, whoever is here won't bother you. (Spacefaring cockroaches, probably.)

They don't need to. None of those projected models could possibly become real. Look at them! Can you imagine their habitat and mundane activities? They're simply not functional. Nature kills off the non-functional. How any species evolves depends on where and how it lives. Whether the human race survives that long, whether it mutates, how it evolves, all depend on what happens to the land it inhabits. How do you know? Beauty, after all, is in the eye of the beholder. Another one of them could find that giant prehensile anus irresistible.

And you know who the villains and innocents are and how justice ought to e meted out. Certitude and rectitude of Elijaic proportions.

Happy reading!

I can't. I don't have an emotionless, non-political version of events. "The truth is out there." It's as accessible to you as to me. I would never set myself up as your teacher of history or world power dynamics. Here is a handy starting point https://teachmideast.org/articles/timeline-of-the-middle-east-in-the-20th-century/

If you find your way back, can you tell us what you discovered?

I detect a certain semantic dissonance in that paragraph. 1. Never have I denied you the right or opportunity to express your views - nor, for that matter been in any position to put any obstacle to your expressions of anything you like. I did not delete, censor, edit, obscure or complain to a higher authority about any of your five and half thousand posts. That, to me suggests that you have been expressing quite freely. 2. Explaining why you have failed to change my mind, explaining as many ways as I could think of, as many times as you asked the same questions, over and over, is not an accusation. 3. In any case, nobody can accuse you of doing in a debate exactly what a debate is designed to do: state your position in such a way as to convince your interlocutor and audience. That we have both failed is a result of different world-views, not of anybody being denied self-expression.

None that I can see. Sure. You don't react to everything all the time; you only make a decision when a decision is required. If no new information is coming in, the will is in "stand by" mode until a decision is required again. This doesn't mean you're in suspended animation or unaware: most of an organism's activities, most of the time, takes place without conscious control. The free will is called in only when an intelligent decision is required. Of course, there is no state in which a living organism does not receive some external information, but it doesn't have to act on all of that information. You might, then, imagine a non-conscious entity - a rock or an item of furniture - also being bombarded by information from the outside, but physically incapable of action. You might posit that they react to to the outside environment by changing... It seems rather fanciful to me, and redundant, applying gold leaf to a lily or a putting an evening gown on a butterfly. Of course. But a bacterium is already quite sophisticated organism. What about the stone and the spoon? Even if they are conscious, they don't have the equipment with which to express a preference or make a decision, let alone take action. That's why they're so easy to kill.

There is no such thing. Police are ranked hierarchies: somebody gives the order. It's you, or whoever is in charge, who determines the status of "the situation". In the kind of situation where someone who is morally opposed to torture, resorts to torture, his personal perspective is very much in play, whether he's aware of it, whether he admits it or not. This is why I said "your children are in danger" and "a thousand strangers are in danger" are two very different questions. In your code of ethics, not a universal one. There is no universal code of ethics, just a variety of philosophies, religious tenets, constitutions, legal codes, cultural norms and internal guidance systems. We can each talk about our own perspective; I doubt we're in such a position, or relationship, as to influence one another's. Leaders, reformers, prophets and calamities do that for nations; teachers and role-models do it for individuals.

Mr. Spock does not live in a modern westernized society. He would be utterly bewildered by the layers of hypocrisy, hyperbole, obfuscation and double-think that runs through our political and legal systems.

Consider. You say numbers are not important bu the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, but numbers don't count. I know he thinks the same: that he would be willing to kill some of my people to save his people - however many of each. He was prepared to risk getting caught, tortured and killed, for what he considered the greater or greatest good.... He thinks like you. If i were on the other side of this never-ending war, it could be you I'd have to consider torturing for information. At least I wouldn't forget our common humanity, or feel virtuous. I told you my position. It has nothing to do with despots or any of the other imaginary characters you set up as villains. Most of the many thousand people who are, and have ever been, tortured in the relatively short history of civilization were not and are not cartoon villains. We most emphatically do not accept any such nonsensical lie!

Not me! The boy you're about to torture because he won't tell you where the bomb is. You keep telling me that. Might as well say "Don't be so short." or "Don't be so pedantic." Old leopards may have faded spots, but they don't turn to stripes. Hah! They'll turn on you in heartbeat. "You tortured a prisoner?!!! Broke the law! How could you!!?" If you had saved the child, they'd pretend they didn't notice the little matter of torture, because it would look bad on them prosecute the hero of the moment. If you fail, you're road-kill. I know that; you've only said like 35 times. What's it got to do with me or my decisions? So? was not about your concern, it was a reply to this:

That's what the terrorist/patriot said, sir. Might, if I were desperate/frightened/enraged enough. If I did, it would be an emotional reaction, not a rational decision. As I also reiterated several times: I don't know my own capacity for evil or the limit of my self-control, but I do know that, if pushed beyond that limit, I would know that what I did was wrong. I might apologize for it; I might perform some act of atonement. I would not pretend it was good, just because I couldn't find a better way to get what I needed. And even more, if I did do it and failed. So?

It's not particularly helpful, in the current political climate, for entertainment media to embrace all forms of torture, for all kinds of purposes, so full-throatedly. It's contributed, I think, to the general attitude: "Meh, they're scum. Whatever works."

Why does the universe need our puny little questions (What if I get caught? How many calories in that cupcake? Does this baby need changing? What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?) to learn about itself? If it was one big mind, it would already know. If it's made up of zillions of little tiny mind, such as a spoon, bacterium or asteroid might have, wouldn't they all be asking their individual puny little questions? I suppose all of those input as a vast cacophony of answered and unanswered questions could inform the universe about its own multifoliate outward appearance. OTOH, I wonder about the difference between mind and mind-like aspect. It seem to me the latter is more akin to a soul than a reasoning, questioning mind. I'm okay with a universal soul; can provisionally accept monads of consciousness (not the sleeping animals or hive-minds) - but not one big computer whose ultimate task is to arrive at either 42 or "Let there be Light!"

Is this last post connected in some way to the first two? Or did you post in the wrong topic?

Tell that to the victims of US airstrikes, CIA training camps for terrorists, arms exports to warring factions, and various intrusions in to Muslim countries since 1947. If you're so keen on the value of numbers, compare those. Violence begets violence; a culture of violence condones torture.

Long before birth, at about 6 weeks after conception, the foetal brain is receiving input and making neural connections, learning to operate body parts, interpret sensations and store memories. By the time it is able to formulate a question, the brain already has a great deal of information to ask questions about. No. It's main function is to stay alive. That's the goal toward which the most important questions are directed. Once survival is assured for a reasonably foreseeable period, it has the leisure to pursue secondary, then peripheral and finally frivolous lines of inquiry. Whether so or nay, there can never be a final goal - only the next goal. The only application I can see for such a technology is to achieve a specific, limited result. Like harnessing a team of 6 or 8 horses to a particularly heavy wagon, I can imagine linking a team of human brains to control machines that carry out some very complicated task far away - like building a space ship on an orbiting platform, while the human "construction crew" remains safely (and cheaply) on Earth. Kind of like Borg, except they all return to Unimatrix Zero at the end of their shift.

Yes, I think it was.