Sisyphus

Ok, for "events," then, as that is what we're talking about. Ok, but how do we know what carbon's chemical properties are? How do you know what a law of physics is? By observing consistent behaviors in comparable circumstances. But if your entire history of observation is limited to within the bounds of the diamond, then "there is always another carbon atom" is as consistent an observation as any physical law. I think the analogy still holds. But we know that because it isn't consistent any theory that fits our observations, not because we're unable to imagine or describe it. I don't know why there should be, or what that would mean. I'm just saying there is no logical contradiction in it, and that we don't have a sufficient perspective to rule it out. I'm pretty sure Bell's Theorem rules out the possibility that hidden variables (unknown causes) can account for our observations. Falsified?

As Capn says, what about random events? And what actually is a cause, exactly? It's an event to the pastward of the caused event, specifically of a type consistently observed in a similar spacetime relationship to similar caused events. Two rocks collide -> loud noise. Adding intermediate steps (electrons repel, concussive waves expand, etc.) makes it even more consistent, but the relationship is the same: merely a consistent pattern of proximity. So why is that logically necessary? (Corollary: is "everything must have an effect" a law?) Perhaps you "always" see the similar pastward event because, in our window of observation, there is always a past. Much like looking at the middle of a diamond, there is always another carbon atom to the left, linked "inextricably." Until there isn't. Perhaps the earliest event in the universe is analogous to the leftmost carbon atom in the diamond.

I don't know whether it's "bent," but from the description it does sound at least partially what we're talking about. A straight line passing through a portal continues out the other side. If, for example, you made a cube, then made each pair of opposite edges portals to one another, then you've got yourself a torroidal universe, right?

Whose plan is that?

Not that I'm entirely up on gaming, but it is weird that I can't think of any, since the 2D equivalent is so common. The example given was Pacman, but I think Asteroids is an even better example, if you're familiar with that. I guess 2D is inherently easy with a 2D display (objects that "go off the screen" in one direction emerge on the other side). You could have the same thing with a 3D display, I suppose, but it probably wouldn't be as seamless with a 2D rendering of a 3D space. A 3D FPS would have interesting effects. Like, if there was a clear viewpoint all the way across the map, you could see your own back in the distance. That kind of thing could really help people visualize the "finite but unbounded" concept, I imagine.

What do you mean by "the military should not interfere with that?" The military is sworn to uphold the Constitution (which doesn't provide for violent overthrow of itself, whatever the founders might have intended). And who is the "we" that's shooting them in the face? At what point does the will of one assassin or group of assassins become the will of "we the people?"

What do you mean, "the public?" A law that anyone can interpret for their own purposes is not a law. What a judiciary does is decide whether a law has been broken in cases that come before it. This by necessity requires interpreting what that law means, i.e. who if anyone between the two opposing interpretations before the court is right. The Constitution supersedes all other laws, by explicit design. Therefore a law can itself be illegal, by being in contradiction with the higher law. If this is a defense for someone accused of breaking the supposedly illegal law, then a court has to decide if it is a valid defense. And the Supreme Court is the highest appeal, and so by necessity has the final say in how that highest law is to be interpretted.

The problem is that it's not really unifying the features, IMO. A smart phone fits in your pocket. Really, that's the defining feature of a smartphone as opposed to other computing devices. And it seems like it will probably be too much of a closed system to really replace laptops, no matter how big the "app store." Can it even multitask? I mean, I'm all for unifying functions, but if that's the concept here, then so far I'd say it's a fail.

Judicial review is not explicit in the Constitution, but I think it is a necessary consequence of what is explicit. Are there people who still dispute it?

Most states are quite heterogeneous, so state-level data is probably going to be pretty muddled. Data between cities or even neighborhoods would probably tell you a lot more, as well as urban vs. suburban vs. rural. For example, the very minor inverse correlation between wealth and violent crime (presumably it surprised you because you thought it would be stronger?) might be explained by the fact that more urban areas probably means both more wealth and more crime, though probably not in the same urban areas. As far as the education vs. crime, I think npts has it about right. I don't think it's about what you learn in school, but rather that a) options are very limited without a high school diploma, and b) idle youth get in trouble. And I imagine high crime rates and weak schools are mutually reinforcing.

Yes, that's right. That's what civility requires. It's not about "telling the truth." It's about pointlessly incendiary and off-topic tangents. Nobody is denying the Spanish Inquisition happened, but it has nothing to do with anything in this topic. What does matter is that the evidence for certain phenomenon, such as evolution, that a Biblical literalist might have a problem with is so great that not even the organization that didn't apologize to Galileo until 1992 is willing to deny it. Do you understand that that is what the point was?

http://cbs2chicago.com/business/obama.deficit.task.2.1449286.html Obama and moderate Democrats tried to get an amendment onto the recent bill expanding the U.S. government's borrowing limit that would establish a bipartisan taskforce to reduce the deficit by curbing spending and tax breaks. It failed. It got 53 votes (36 Democrats, 16 Republicans, and 1 independent), but needed 60. It was killed by AARP lobbyists (the fear being that social security and medicare would be reduced) and "anti-tax" (though apparently not anti-deficit) advocates. This isn't really surprising, as the default instinct of both parties is to increase spending and cut taxes, and attempts to curb the deficit go against both instincts. But, um, we still need to do it. Obama is expected to create a "weaker version" of the taskforce by presidential order, but what that actually means isn't clear yet. So, is there any hope whatsoever that we can pay off our debts?

Wow. I think Mr Skeptic was trying to say "even the Catholic Church accepts evolution, so why can't you?" The point being that being so literalist and dogmatic towards Galileo taught them a lesson (eventually). Long, anti-Catholic rants are not really welcome here (I say as a moderator), although illustrating their historical blockheadedness actually supports Mr. Skeptic's point.

Why?

Talk about sensitive.

Admittedly I'm speaking from ignorance, here, but has engineering not progressed in the last 40 years, that building more Saturn V rockets would be a good idea if we did have sufficient plans?

pywakit - Where did I say that time and space began with the BB? I didn't, because neither I nor anyone else knows if that is the case. So I guess that kind of takes the wind out of your whole rant, huh? Is there anything I did say that is disputed by anyone taken seriously? Not that I know of. I spoke in very general terms partly to avoid getting bogged down in stuff like that. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged But why would a young earth creationist accept the Copernican revolution, even today?

A smartphone you can fit in your pocket and have with you at all times. A laptop you can sit down and get some real work done on. A tablet, I guess, would be a really awesome replacement for anyone who uses a clipboard. Right now, I just don't see any use for it. I'm open minded, though. And of course, iPad is a really stupid name. But not as stupid as the premium version, the Max iPad, for total connectivity saturation.

Are ghosts responsible for the Bermuda Triangle? Did the Bible Code predict that Hitler is actually an alien? Find out tonight, on the totally legitimate History Channel!

From what I gather, it's something like: material in molten form accumulates uranium but diffuses lead, so no lead accumulates. This would be determined experimentally for each material. Once it cools and solidifies into crystal form, it becomes a closed system, and so lead can begin to accumulate. Thus, you have an identifiable "zero point" at which the clock is reset: the point at which it last dropped below the critical temperature, i.e. the point at which the rock formed. I know they have methods for determining whether there would be contamination, but I don't know what they are. But it does make sense that the crystal structure would be a closed system with a uniform ratio of uranium to lead throughout, so deviations would be easy to detect. Also, you can cross-check between different dating methods (like U235 vs. U238), so the probability that various points in the same sample are contaminated uniformly by the right, different minerals to give you the exact same wrong result for different methods would be ridiculously low.

More recently than that, too. The average British officer in WW1 was about 3 inches taller than the average enlisted man, due solely to differences in nourishment between social classes. The average adult male height during revolutionary France was under five feet tall.

Oh, sure, correlations for traits. I think there are only a couple of genes for eye color, for example. But there's more to eyes than color, etc. I just meant that answering "why is this person attractive" (however you define it) is going to be very complicated, if only because "attractive" has many and subtle aspects.

I very much doubt any of it is as simple as Mendellian inheritance of a single or a few different genes. Humans have tens of thousands of genes. There isn't a "nose gene," let alone one gene that determines multiple aspects of "attractiveness." Often changing one will have a noticeable effect (which is how Mendellian inheritance was discovered in the first place), but the "full package" is a ridiculously complicated interaction of all your genes.

At first it might seem like zero has the same problem: You can't measure "infinity," you can only measure "bigger than we can measure." You can't measure zero, you can only measure "smaller than we can measure." However, it's not really the same. As ajb says, zero is a real number, and infinity is not. And the problem in measurement is not actually analogous. With zero it's just a problem of precision. Any physical measurement you make is going to have a degree of precision and a margin of error. You can't measure "exactly zero" with unlimited precision, but you also can't measure "exactly three," for exactly the same reason. With infinity, you just have to say it's at least larger than the largest finite thing you can measure, which is, shall we say, infinitely imprecise.

I still don't understand what you mean by this. GPS satellites do compensate for relativistic effects: http://www.astronomy.ohio-state.edu/~pogge/Ast162/Unit5/gps.html And that's hardly the only "experiment:" http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/experiments.html If you think that special relativity is incorrect, what is your view on the fact that it makes accurate predictions of observed reality, and you do not?