Phi for All

! Moderator Note Congratulations on joining our forum and ignoring the rules you agreed to! We were created, of course, to serve only you, so your behavior has been simply exemplary! We welcome your muddy feet anytime! I'm just surprised someone like you hasn't come along sooner to correct all these obviously flawed scientific concepts, even if they do work.

Are you kidding me? All this was to advertise your book?! Great example of setting up a situation where failure is the only outcome. You should know by now that we can't advertise for you. It's against the site's rules. And people should be able to participate in this discussion without clicking external links. But now you get to claim I'm the "bad" guy. How long is it? Can you post excerpts? That's allowed.

We normally stop ignorance with knowledge. In the case of "YouTube swamping", ignoring it works also. You won't be swamping SFN with anything. You cry mockery, but nobody mocked your ideas at all. We've been asking clarifying questions, and then trying to decipher your defensive and rude replies, which are mostly ungracious and have no actual answers.

! Moderator Note Seriously, we attack the idea here, not the person. Please stop with the ad hom attacks. NOBODY is treating YOU this way.

This still doesn't answer my specific question. You claimed, as fact, that there "has to be" an absolute, objective, "scientific" definition of good and bad, something universal to everything, or at least all humans. You further claimed that it's a definition we're all currently unaware of. This seems to be at the heart of your hypothesis, and it seems to be a real stumbling block. When you're looking at anything objectively, you can't use words like "good" and "bad", since they're entirely subjective. Even if you just use humans, there are few universal truths about them that aren't tautologies (you can't say "All humans are alive", you have to say "All living humans are alive"). Even here, you seem to be basing what is good or bad on what's been done to you. That's very subjective. Could it be that you're lumping all such "quoted messages" together and judging them to be inadequate? I can see where "Just change your way of thinking and stop being depressed!" would be an unsophisticated and shallow suggestion. But variations of that sentiment are at the heart of any successful therapy I've ever seen. For instance, I know some folks who get into a tough situation and start listing their alternatives, but only the negative ones. They set up their own False Dilemmas by painting themselves into a corner, by only considering options that are doomed to fail or won't bring the desired outcome. If they feel like they're trapped in a hole, they don't give themselves a way to climb out. In these cases, thinking differently is essential. I'll read further, since you've set this up as an attempt to discuss a cure, rather than asking about your particular depression, but I wanted some clarity on why you think good and bad could ever be defined in an absolute way.

Can I assume you're thinking about buying an expensive boxed set of a few seasons, and that's why you're asking about a moral judgement before you've seen it? I would suggest you find a way to watch a few episodes, and make this moral decision based on actual evidence and not just hearsay.

Penn & Teller did an episode on that. It takes a fraction of the time spent building fences to circumvent them. Under, over, or through, you can't build a fence you can afford over that much land that can actually keep people out. And even with sensors, we don't have enough manpower to patrol the whole thing.

That's swansont, all right. Physicist/thug/suppressor for the US Naval Observatory. What would someone who keeps our atomic clocks running know about precision?

I got to here and now I need you to explain why you think this is a fact. I'll read further once you've explained. I don't think this is true at all, but I'm willing to be persuaded by evidence.

! Moderator Note We're a resource for students, and we need to have the mainstream sections free from inaccurate or unsubstantiated information (you said yourself you're still putting this all together). This is why we have a Speculations section. It does sound like you aren't ready for the type of reviews we do on new ideas. We aren't pushovers that require little rigor, but you should be able to find plenty of sites that are. Be warned that you'll get equal amounts of praise and ridicule, in a manner that is far less civil than we require here. Best of luck elsewhere.

I know this one! [math]x=0[/math]

! Moderator Note Despite the warning, replies to my modnote were posted, and then removed as promised. If you have a problem with a modnote, use the Report Post feature, don't derail the thread further.

! Moderator Note Please don't use someone else's thread to advertise your own. Also, your concept is speculative, and doesn't belong in the mainstream sections. Please confine unproven hypotheses to the proper section. If you respond to this modnote, it will be removed. Report it if you have a problem with it, so the thread is not further derailed.

Well, I'd hate to get ripped in half a millisecond before I was vaporized, just because I forgot and used my atomic punch. I just want to be responsible about where the other half of my body goes.

It's quite possible. I don't know how to deal mathematically with the assumption he's making, that there is data every senior knows. It's not correct. Is he the type that would respond to a formula, or would you rather call him out on bad reasoning? If he were posting here, I'd ask him to provide a link to the data every senior knows... including him. Then I'd quiz him to make sure.

It sounds like throwing a punch fast enough to have that much energy would rip you in half (a solitaire game of crack-the-whip), since the recoil takes effect before the punch lands.

It's not a physics problem, and I'm not sure math is the right tool either. It's more of a logic problem. There's no list of data that every senior knows, not even just the seniors at your school. So there's no way to establish "...you should know that". If such a list existed, then by definition you would know all the data on it because you're a senior. Or, if the list existed, your troll could claim you weren't a senior if you didn't know all the data on it. But, your troll established the antecedent "You're a senior" right away, so he's actually contradicting himself with his comment.

I'm going with "what?", since you had to first defend the question with an empty assurance that my future president isn't a monster.

! Moderator Note Private message is not fine, this is a discussion forum with members, both amateur and professional, and we all prefer more transparency. Also, you're ignoring evidence that's being presented because you claim it lacks detail, which it does NOT. You're encouraged to ask questions, but please don't try to claim you have new science when it's clear you don't understand what mainstream science (our absolute best current explanations) is trying to tell you. And there is no truth in science. Just the explanation best supported by evidence. Please don't respond to this modnote in this thread. Report it if you object.

Absolutely. Reason alone might tell me that it would be in the best interests of my survival to eliminate at least half the world's population so I'll have more resources. My emotions would never allow that. There are probably too many examples of this to list comprehensively. In just about every example I can think of, removing either emotion or reason from the process leaves you with flawed decisions.

If you make enough for reconstructive knee surgery, you'll be farther along than everyone else who's made this claim.

It might help to know what you're looking for in such a list. Are you trying to show that reason isn't the best tool in every situation? Perhaps you should come at this from the other direction. Can you list examples where an emotional stance is better than one arrived at by reason? I used to think emotion and reason were completely separate in their various processes, like Plato and his horses pulling in opposite directions, but I find more and more that we function best when one tempers the other, and decisions work best when a blend of reason and emotion are used. Both are connected; reason helps channel chaotic emotions, and emotions give motivation to clinical reasoning and help us prioritize what's important to us.

If you could generate that much power with a punch, you have to also pretend you had a body that could use it. If your arm were traveling fast enough to deliver a blow like that, your fist wouldn't survive the trip. It would have to be moving so fast that, for a jab that's only going a few feet, you'd probably leave everything but bone behind, all the soft tissue would stay at your side while your skeletal arm slid right out. The bone wouldn't survive much longer. I don't think the punch would ever land, but it wouldn't have to.

In a Red Herring sort of way, or did you have something specific in mind?

In a discussion, a basic premise is that your viewpoint might be sound enough to convince someone it has merit and should be considered. When we talk to people about a subject that offers a perspective that can shade opinion, a reasonable person keeps an open mind. You often discuss religion with others while making it clear that your mind is already made up, that GOD IS THIS, GOD IS THAT, THIS is the WAY things are! This is known as preaching, or soapboxing. Like anyone else discussing religion, you have nothing solid, no evidence that supports your stance more than any others, yet your claims are adamant and assertive, like you're stating Truth. I'm not saying you're wrong, but you seem to be saying there's no way you aren't right. Rational discussion assumes you're willing to be reasonable and listen without automatically dismissing other stances. I don't think it helps anyone's understanding when you treat your viewpoint like plate armor, and everyone else's viewpoints like arrows.