Phi for All

There's already a site like that. It can be found here.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that! A doctor and a lawyer were talking at a party. The doctor asks the lawyer, "What do you do to stop people from asking you for legal advice when you're out of the office?" "I give it to them," replied the lawyer, "and then I send them a bill." The doctor smiled and decided to give it a try. The next day the doctor went to his mailbox to send the bills and he found a bill from the lawyer.

Hey, I'm not a professional stripper / comedian like you! I had the naked part right but I just couldn't do the... the stand up bit. It was raining and cold before we squeezed in that warehouse window, remember?! And you sure weren't helping out with all those jokes about thrust and angular displacement, phunny man!

Hey, Bee, how are you? I hope to be able to draw you back more with some cool ideas we have for the Astronomy subforum. Promise you won't delete your bookmarks and I'll PM you soon about the ideas in order to get your input.

Somebody had to distract Elsa, the cute but ultimately traitorous security guard. Like you didn't cry like a little girl when I got the long straw.

I'll see if I can get AP back for a bit, at least. Fools beware: lightly she will not suffer thee. We paid our debt to society. 'Nuff said. Yeah! What *he* said (nice one, bro, that'll bring 'em out)! Pucker up, Kissassanova!

Can we please get over this, Tom?! It was a long time ago, I was scared and not thinking straight. At least *I* didn't hide in a sack and say, "Potatoes!" when the cop kicked it.

Look, until someone said, "Hey, come look at the shapes in the clouds!" everyone at that party probably would have glanced upward and their brains would've said, "Clouds, cumulus, big, white, no rain". As soon as someone suggests there are other things to be seen in them, everyone's brains started reclassification. The cross would've been obvious to most (unless the mathematician at the party had seen it first and said, "Hey everybody, there's a big plus sign in the sky!"), but then someone else's brain (probably biased by the religious tone) found a demon's face. As soon as someone mentions it then everyone's brain looks for the demon, and will eventually find it (remember how badly the brain wants to classify information). This is definitely more of a psychological question as opposed to an environmental one. I'll bet Glider would have some great input if the thread starter would like me to move it to Psych/Psych.

You can't fool me. You were hoping all the lingerie model / scientists we've been hiding would post to tell you how wrong you are. I actually hope your scheme works, you devil.

False. Do better research.

Aren't DVDs distributed by region these days, with regional versions of language options? Most of the ones available in the US only have French and Spanish subtitles available, but I've seen DVDs from Europe that had different options.

Absolutely. Your brain is looking to categorize whatever your senses feed into it. The brain hates a mystery so you'll generally classify all input almost without thinking about it. The same is true of sounds, smells, tastes and textures. Ever hear something you didn't recognize at first, then you figure out what it must be, only to find out later it was something completely different? I did this once when the plastic end of a curtain cord was ticking against the wall as the wind moved the curtain. I couldn't place the sound at first, then it very clearly resolved itself into the sound of someone walking up my front steps with hard heels. I had to rethink this classification when the clicking of the heels didn't stop or change rhythm, but my brain so much wanted to be right that the first alternative that came to me was that the person was *pacing* on my front steps.

Put that way, it *is* uninteresting. Leave it to some greybeard grandfather to take it the wrong way. I was rather thinking that Newton might have realized that his physics didn't answer many questions and would have realized that Einstein was onto something. Perhaps farfetched but I was hoping one genius could recognize another. Then again, Newton was known for his ego and arrogance so Al probably wouldn't have made it past the butler.

When your work passes peer-review in *your* day and becomes theory I can imagine it's difficult when years later someone new comes along and says, Yeah, but...". But Sisyphus is right, you'd expect science to be able to recognize the insights that advancements over time can lend. Of course Galileo's *inquisitors* would never have reconsidered. That wasn't their job and neither were they scientists. I think the more intriguing question would be this: What would old Newton have said to young Einstein if the two could have sat down for a spot?

That's why I prefaced the statement with, "I felt less like an American" instead of "More like Al Qaeda". Well, *I* think differently. I think the misguided and poorly reasoned beliefs stemmed from the pressure to catch Bin Laden. We couldn't find him so we tried to turn that quest for retribution on someone else. The analogy holds for me. They'd never get away with making it policy. Instead we are constantly reminded that anyone can be a suicide bomber. While true it also lends itself well to justifying collateral damage. Very convenient. I don't remember the name of the mullah who took refuge in the mosque right after the invasion and made us destroy the building to get him out. It was a ploy (and a despicable one) but we sure took the bait. And although the military changed the name of Operation Infinite Justice after protests, the damage was done. Why use such a phrase stolen from the Koran if you didn't want to inflame the Muslims? Forget the strawman, Dorothy. Equating? No, you asked if I felt we were *more like* Al Qaeda. Let's leave the goalposts where they are. No, there was talk of inhumane torture before there was talk of waterboarding. Where's the generalization? I simply pointed out that torture of prisoners makes me feel more like Al Qaeda. I guess I'll make generalizations when we start beheading them and taping it. This is not conventional warfare, even though we often treat it as such. We invaded a country to stop terrorists not even from that country. I think if you want to stop Al Qaeda's recruitment then non-terrorists need to perceive us as a better alternative. We need to demonstrate that we're better humans.

I think it's not only possible, but absolutely imperative to hold your government to a higher standard of morals when it comes to war. Obviously a parent of a kidnapped child is completely out of his element in a way that doesn't apply to soldiers and their conduct in war. Kidnapping is a random and improbable occurrence for civilians; being captured is a distinct possibility for a soldier. American soldiers used to be held to higher morals in war and young men flocked to join out of patriotism. Today, patriotism isn't earned, it's expected. Absolutely. I felt less like an American because my leaders shunned the opportunity to gather the rest of the world to our side just when their sympathies were with us. I always liked the "America leads by example" image I was raised with. I felt less like an American because, after failing to get the man who orchestrated the attack against us, my leaders decided to wage war against a different enemy, one that had no ties to our attacker. Like a big fat bully who can't catch his little tormentor so he punches the guy he *can* catch. I hated those types growing up. More like Al Qaeda? My leaders tell me this war is about justice against the savages, our only means to keep ourselves safe from their ever-increasing threat. We try to kill everyone, not just soldiers, because every casualty leads to victory and you never know who might bring about your downfall. My leaders tell me God is on our side but this isn't a war about religion, even as they bomb churches and mock the enemies faith. And, of course, my leaders also feel that the ends they seek justify any means, so torturing thousands of prisoners and sifting through the hundreds of thousands of bits of information they gibber at their interrogators to find a few nuggets of truth (outdated as those might be) is justified in their minds. I feel like this whole approach to conflict is one big False Dilemma. My leaders are trying to tell me I have no other choices and they've been telling me this for a lot longer than the present administration has been in charge.

Certainly not censored, and not really out of order, just misplaced and poorly supported. This thread was originally started in General Physics for some odd reason. I've often heard that the best accountants and administrators have a bit of OCD or they couldn't be effective. The same should hold true for anyone who has to do repetitive, exacting work. Probably a #2 pencil.

It would definitely be your call, doc. I think everyone who speculates here should know that if they do a good enough job and pass our tests of fire that their speculation can get upgraded to more serious discussion.

I deleted the duplicate thread you had in Genetics. We don't want two sets of responses. Are you making this conclusion before your analysis? Why are you lending more weight to one side of the argument? I would recommend you post your questionnaire online somewhere so people can fill it out and save it. Many people won't send emails to throwaway accounts for fear of spam attacks. The "precious lives" part sounded very sarcastic and patronizing, like my "precious life" can't compare in importance with this questionnaire.

Moved to Speculations with a chance of winning your way out and into Psychiatry and Psychology if you don't pursue the implied attack on religion angle. OK, funny, but wrong (at least the ad hominem part). Fifteen minutes in the corner with no lab equipment, young man. [/wrist slap] ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Dr.CWho, your statements in the OP give little latitude for discussion. The only question you ask is the title of the thread and the answer is well documented. Anal retentiveness is NOT a mental illness, it's a personality trait. Extreme cases might be considered obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) but I see nothing that qualifies in what you've presented about Gardner. The conclusion to which you're attempting to jump, that anal retentives have hampered scientific advancements, seems to be derived from one source, Martin Gardner. You have failed to show Gardner's opinions of Buckminster Fuller hampered anything. Do you have any evidence that people didn't just ignore Gardner and that taking him seriously somehow put all of science "behind the times"? Why do you think we're not where we should be scientifically? Isn't that line of reasoning tainted with both Begging the Question and False Dilemma fallacies?

You can't really measure the success until you factor in the potential of the wasted time and resources. Is torture effective when you waste so much time tracking down false intel? Could the time and resources be used in a more effective way that didn't waste so much to yield so little? If you do put a price on lives isn't the potential to save more than just the one suicide bomber's victims a bit more attractive? I know I could easily spend a million dollars on scratch tickets in order to win a bunch of small prizes and maybe the $25,000 jackpot but common sense tells me I could find a more potentially effective way to invest the million, perhaps something that wasn't so crude and uneducated.

You join here to ask us about another science site? Something doesn't seem right about that. Do you work for this other site? What's wrong with this site? When you're dating one girl, do you ask her about what other girls are like?

Interesting statement. I'm sure it helps to sell Bragg's organic vinegar, olive oil and sea kelp seasoning. Does it have to be truthful to be commercially viable?

Nice recycling! I appreciate the prosperity but please keep the fruit. I just got your batch from last year (you snails should think about a faster courier service). Happy happy, joy joy!

Not now please. Now is the Hour of my Broom....