Phi for All

Really?! You think formal logic is the same as informal logic or symbolic logic, except that they're just subcategories of the same thing? I would suggest that the differences between inductive and deductive reasoning alone show this isn't true. And again, logic doesn't form the foundation of science. You keep saying this but it isn't true. I specifically asked you to tell us why "coalescent systems are required for independent though and self-reflection" . You seem to be saying one has to have "systems" that combine before one can think independently. What does this mean and why is it relevant to what we're talking about? Instead, you've given me a hand-wavy defense of the accuracy in the way you use words (yet several other members have mentioned a problem with your word salad posts). Which seems to be exactly what happens when people of differing religions discuss them. They all have a different definition of religion, god, faith, you name it. Please tell me how you can use language to give everyone a universal definition of religion (or god, or faith) all can agree on. Even Ranch dressing doesn't make this palatable. Except there is. No matter how you define sentience, at some point our ancestors didn't have it. You may have to go back a ways, perhaps before our first real primate ancestors, or you could go all the way back to the first vertebrate fish who had their skeletons on the inside for the first time. At some point, our ancestors were not what we could call sentient. Let me show you what I mean by "word salad". Take this above sentence. What it says to me is, "You're wrong because you think empiricism is required for logic, but it's just one of two major components". It's a bad statement, if you really take a look at it. It's like saying, "You're wrong to say that cars need wheels to move because they also need an engine". The rest seems like you're trying to fill in what you don't know with what makes sense to you, and then you call the whole thing "logical". And that's the really bad part, because you've reached all your conclusions so subjectively that it can only be thought of as opinion, yet you'll continue to think you're doing science.

dave the SFN Admin? A different Dave? This was the problem we ended up with last time. Banning an entire subject can hardly be considered light-touch moderation. I have no problems with telling people that religion is the one thing they can't mention here, but historically the problems are not as simple as you think. Yours are not the only reasonable arguments.

So, would it have been better to block him from posting about the subject, or is anything gained from discussing it with him? I know a lot of people with passion for a subject that can't be persuaded away from ill-conceived stances, but I also know that many readers walk away with insights they don't bother to share.

History tells us people want to talk about religious topics, but they don't want to listen to people preaching at them. Without the section specifically for religion, members start introducing god(s) into other conversations, and we really don't want that in the mainstream. We've done without the section briefly before. We just made the rule that nobody could bring up religion at any time, which led to questions about any supernatural subject (if we can talk about Bigfoot, why not God?). The censorship angle was what made us put the section back. We figured out it was better to have a section you aren't forced to visit rather than a subject you aren't allowed to talk about. The software doesn't let us remove religious topics from the front page though, and that seems to cause a problem as well. It makes the section more visible to those who wish it would just go away.

I'd be very careful with this. You're claiming people are ignorant of the nature of languages, or of what you wrote, but you can't possibly know that. Also, computer programming logic doesn't make you logical in all you do. It's not even the same kind of logic you keep mentioning. Please tell me why you think this is true. With meat this time, no salad. I'm not ignoring the definition, I'm saying there are too many, and very little desire for any of the parties involved to redefine themselves for the benefit of accurate definitions. Religious people are not known for their flexibility with regard to across-the-board cooperation, Can you give me even one example of a universal truth arrived at by your "process of truthful deduction"? And while I can appreciate that you find it all absurd to deny what you seem to have stumbled upon, your personal incredulity is not enough to convince me you might be correct. Science is not about Truth, science is about finding evidence to support your explanation. If you have a mountain of evidence, and nothing to refute your idea, we can start making predictions that will teach us more. Without the evidence, your word salads are particularly unappetizing.

You seem to be misusing the word "logic". Logic in science/math is not the same as "this makes perfect sense to me". Uh oh, "emergent greater order", "certain coalescent systems", you've started tossing words into a bowl because they sound cool, but instead it's showing us you have a minimal science background. This type of argument makes you sound like you've walked into a locker room and started talking smack about a sport you aren't familiar with. All of these are subjective criteria, except for logic, which really can't be applied. Trying to get everyone to agree on how we understand religion seems to have eluded us so far, and your arguments aren't compelling enough to persuade me to try, Really? Truth?! There is no Truth is science. Only a preponderance of evidence to show us the best current explanations. How can you accept that words can't fully define something, yet still believe there is some kind of Truth applicable to everything?

! Moderator Note Moved from Science News to Speculations.

Are you looking for ways that studying past weather events can help us to devise better methods for dealing with them?

Windows 98 operates the system, but the newer systems have features that didn't exist when it was written. It would be like asking a person who has only driven a Model T Ford to drive a brand new Maserati.

It's nice to know time still works. Happy New Year, everyone. Stay safe but have an awful lot of fun.

Imagine a skeleton playing tennis. Or moving boxes onto a truck. As we set our feet for balance, we can still twist at the hips and shoulders, as well as bend our legs at the knees and ankles. And our backbones aren't rigid like a stick, if that's what you mean by stationary. All the vertebrae act as a flexible bridge to aid in movement and support for a creature with four limbs. Our hands and upper bodies have evolved to suit our bigger heads and the broader variety of things we now use our hands for, but the spine is such a major piece of skeletal framework that it would be really expensive (in an evolutionary sense), to change it just because we're now walking upright.

Normally, I would tell you not to misuse the word "theory". In science, theory doesn't mean "an idea I've thought a lot about", it means that idea has been thoroughly and rigorously tested to the point where we practically assume it's true. Normally, I would tell you that science doesn't try to "prove" things. Proof is for maths, but science looks at the preponderance of evidence to support its explanations. But you've said one thing that "proves" you wrong. Since Christianity is a theistic religion, and atheism literally means not-theistic, the two would logically seem unable to both be real (real as in existing or occurring as fact). How can "God(s) exist" and "God(s) don't exist" be simultaneously real explanations?

As Strange mentioned, quantum theory isn't as simple as classical models, but in reality it's more functional and describes the real world better. There are many examples of this in science, explanations that seem right because they're simple, but in reality they're wrong. We all know why streamlining makes objects travel more effortlessly through the air, so why do we design space capsules to be blunt and non-aerodynamic as they re-enter our atmosphere? Why is the blunt design better at being a heat-shield that one with a slim profile?

Yeah, we're just horrible, but with you here to spotlight our corruption, we'll get no benefits from it. We're all very grateful for your dedication, Dekan.

I've never had a creationist make this claim before. Are you seriously pointing at science as mysticism, while you believe in an inerrant bible and an infallible, omnipotent deity? What you're doing here is setting up some misinformation to automagically be true. You make an incorrect assumption about the fossil record, then claim there's no explanation for how this came to be. It's like you're saying that Ford never made any cars that fell apart, so there is simply no explanation for how I could have a Mustang that's now falling apart.

I'm going to guess at this, and say it's probably because unconsciousness is involved. If you're not in bed when you take them, you run the risk of being overcome by sleep at a time when it's dangerous, like walking down a staircase, or working with the stove, or near sharp objects. I think there's also a danger of becoming too artificially relaxed, which can cause breathing problems, and you're unconscious so you can't do anything about it. Iirc, Heath Ledger had 3 or 4 different sleep meds in his system, or a couple of sleep meds and pain killers that make you drowsy.

! Moderator Note Since evolution is one of the most heavily evidenced theories in all of science, your claims are unsupported. This section is for mainstream evolution questions, the kind students like to be accurate about, so I'm moving this thread to Speculations. I'm going to also suggest that most of your misinformation can be cleared up by visiting http://www.talkorigins.org/. It will clear up misconceptions like suddenly having birds with wings. You're going to be asked to provide evidence to support your position, and everyone else will be required to do the same. Please take some time to read the Speculation rules.

I think this is a very common but incorrect view. It makes an elegant sense, but in reality, reality wins. Science is just looking for the best explanations, which are not always the simplest.

What a great job that would be. All bark and no bite.

It's your fault, for walking around on two legs instead of four. Your backbone was designed to be a horizontal bridge connecting the limbs of a quadruped, not a vertical column to support an upright torso. Also, remember that you're putting more weight on your spine when you pick something up. The hand is more for grasping, the arms do part of the lifting, and your back and leg muscles are usually involved as well, depending on how heavy the object is. Humans are balancing their torsos and their big-brained heads over their hips when they walk or pick something up, plus we're also twisting and torquing our backbones in ways other mammals don't. Since the back has the poorest design for that type of work, it's your back that suffers.

No, he's joking that he could set up his own site and take your donations... and keep them. AFAIK, the cost of maintaining the site is covered by the little advertising we do. The site owners have never mentioned donations, other than some attempts to have SFN T-shirts available at a profit.

Ah, that makes sense. You'd want the strings to slip easily in the grooves. Except naming it "the nut", that makes no sense. The nut sounds like it should get tightened. String guide, prime fret, "the comb", these I could understand. The nut?!

Part of this argument assumes the jobs losses are bad. I've had a few jobs where, in hindsight, I wish had been lost before I got there. And more businesses fail than succeed, usually for a good reason. I guess you have to ask yourself if a crap job is better than no job, or would you be out looking for something better if you didn't have this crap job?

These are the holes in the tuner pegs that the strings slip into, these nut slots? I can see the usefulness of graphite over anything sticky in this application, but I'm still not clear why you want the string to be lubricated in the nut slot. Isn't the idea of the nut slot to grab the string tight so when you twist the tuner pegs, the string is tightened or loosened for tuning? It seems like you would need a better grip on the string to keep it in tune, not a more lubricated grip. Is there a piece of this mechanism I'm missing? How does a string bind and get intermittently stuck as it's being twisted around a tuning peg?

Sorry, I obviously read too much into it when you said you didn't have a good relationship with your HS. Look, forget what's fair and not fair. This is your higher education at stake. If making phone calls to teachers doesn't work, you move up to the next rung on the ladder. Find someone at the county level, or perhaps through your board of education, who can help you get those transcripts. Alternately, you can call a friend from school who went to college and find out how they did it. And if that doesn't work, be prepared to take your request all the way to the county or state superintendent's office (you most likely won't have to). You can't just say Oh, I called teachers a number of times and then think your part is over, that you're blocked out and can't go to college. Your part is getting those transcripts, focus on that and not about mocking computer teachers and the fairness of the system. You want to go to college, right? You're not doing all this to stall until it's too late to enroll for next semester, right? You're going to make sure you get those documents, right?