Mr Skeptic

And don't get me started on the ugliness you get if you measure finer: degrees, arcminutes, and arcseconds. Finer still, you put a decimal point on the arcseconds.

There's no paradox. A photon has zero rest mass but will have non-zero relativistic mass (more commonly referred to as energy). An electron has non-zero rest mass and non-zero relativistic mass. You will find that there is a minimum mass-energy that an electron may possess (when you slow it down as close to zero as possible). A photon on the other hand, can't be slowed down but can have as little energy as you can measure. There is no minimum energy a photon may have. Think of it this way: how much kinetic energy does a 100,000 ton train at rest have?

In unrelated news, the LHC won't be switched on to full power until 2013. So disappointing. I'm so impatient; I hope they can get it running by the end of december 2012 at least

I think part of it is that Republicans value "sticking together" more than do Democrats, and also that Democrats are a majority and so ought to be more diverse statistically speaking.

He does do a decent job of building a moral code once he has his premise (or axiom, assumption, given, value judgement, opinion, whatever you want to call it) that "it is good to maximize the well-being of humanity" though. Then again, that idea is thousands of years old.

I think that if we keep universal healthcare it's only a matter of time before we get the public option added on to lower costs.

"If my dad ever finds out what I've been up to he's gonna crucify me" -- Jesus's character, in Hamlet 2

How much spacetime is there inside the event horizon of a non-spinning uncharged black hole of mass M? I know that a black hole has a Schwarzschild radius of [math]r = \frac{2GM}{c^2}[/math] and a sphere a volume of [math]V = \frac{4}{3} \pi r^3[/math], for a black hole volume of [math]\frac{32}{3} \frac{\pi G^3 M^3}{c^6}[/math]. However, I think the above volume would be in our metric rather than accounting for the distortions of spacetime. If you account for spacetime distortion when measuring the volume, what would you get?

The seafloor base would be much easier, and much less useful. Our first extraterrestrial base would be a stepping-stone to the rest of the solar system. It would be a source of national (or international) pride. The seafloor is still in earth's biosphere.

Actually he did. It's simply a special case of the more general thing he said. "his framework of knowledge for dealing with morality" is a subset of "all frameworks of knowledge".

You could ask your dentist about it. You'll have to tell him anyways, so he doesn't throw them away. Stem cells from the umbilical cord can be saved too. It's really ideal as they are very young then and you never need your umbilical cord once you're done with it..

A black hole can be made of anything that contains energy, and it is not known what form the energy takes. It could be light, it could be the original particles. It very likely does not matter anyways (see the no hair theorem). There is no point at which the black hole is "saturated" or "full". Adding more matter will simply make the black hole bigger and less dense (as measured by the volume inside the event horizon).

It would also explain that one side of the universe (the side towards the "center") appears strongly blue shifted, which happens not to be true. Also, there probably is no center to the universe. I too think string theories are suspect. There's a few alternatives; string theory just happens to be the most famous of them. There's MOND, loop quantum gravity, and a few others. None of them are particularly better nor easier to test.

I already highlighted it: he calls the people who disagree with his premise "profoundly stupid" because he can't "withstand such skepticism".

A filter is a barrier that only blocks certain things. We really do need barriers (filters). You even have said filters in your brain, doing far more than you might think. Here, have a look: http://www.eyetricks.com/wordjumble.htm http://www.eyetricks.com/fcount.htm http://www.qualitytrading.com/illusions/bird.html

http://www.project-reason.org/newsfeed/item/moral_confusion_in_the_name_of_science3/ Thus, by starting my talk with the assertion that values depend upon actual or potential changes in consciousness, and that some changes are better than others, I merely assumed what I set out to prove. This is what philosophers call “begging the question.” I am, therefore, an idiot. One of my critics put the concern this way: “Why should human wellbeing matter to us?” Well, why should logical coherence matter to us? Why should historical veracity matter to us? Why should experimental evidence matter to us? These are profound and profoundly stupid questions. No framework of knowledge can withstand such skepticism, for none is perfectly self-justifying. Without being able to stand entirely outside of a framework, one is always open to the charge that the framework rests on nothing, that its axioms are wrong, or that there are foundational questions it cannot answer. So what? Science and rationality generally are based on intuitions and concepts that cannot be reduced or justified. So yeah... Even science rests on subjective assumptions (that we all agree on as scientists). That in no way justifies the claim to have objective answers to morality. Even if all of humanity agreed with him as to the objective of increasing well-being, of how well-being might be increased, and what sorts of well-being exist, it would still only be subjectively validated. He disparages consensus and part of his claim depends on consensus (we all agree these are dumb objections!). Sure, we could put the few people who might disagree (eg psychopaths) in jail, but that still doesn't give inherent justification, only a might-makes-right approach. Which I agree with... someone who gets their kicks from decreasing human well-being should be dealt with by the rest of us in the name of increasing human well-being. Cause we said so, and we can. Not cause it's "inherently the right thing to do" or other silly excuses.

Oh, and just to clarify: just because something is well-designed for a purpose doesn't mean that that in fact is its purpose, nor does being poorly designed preclude something from actually being the purpose. For example I have seen sentences that are well-designed to make people laugh, but their author intended them for the purpose of changing people's minds. I suppose the purpose of such arguments about design of things is supposed to say something about the claims as to purpose, or the competence of the designer. A problem of this for religion is that originally god designed Adam and Eve to live forever in a pleasant environment, and then cursed the entire earth (and humans) when they ate a fruit he told them not to. Said curse is rather vague, but certainly excuses any poor design that may appear.

In choosing what the universe (or mankind) were "designed" to do, we can judge it to be poorly designed if it for some given purpose, or otherwise given that it is well-designed infer the purpose(s) for which it may have been designed. For example: The universe is poorly designed to give glory to a specific god -- many people who study it closely don't see evidence of any god in it. The universe is well-designed to conserve energy. Humans are poorly designed to follow biblical restrictions on sexual conduct. Humans are well-designed to reproduce. Humans are poorly designed to trip over elephants. You could make a long list of things the universe is well-designed for or poorly designed for.

Science illuminates, like a flashlight. A flashlight will show you your options, but you must decide which way to go. If you want to go jump off a cliff but its too dark to see, the flashlight will help you get there, just as it can help you find your way home if that's where you're headed. Science is a tool, not a guide. Another analogy is a compass: it points north, but you use it not to follow the little arrow but to know what direction you're going. Once you define what "good" and "bad" are -- what ought and what ought not -- science can tell you whether something fits the definition. Science can't tell you what ought to be. It can however examine your sense of empathy and a few other physiological aspects related to morality, but even so claiming that this makes it "right" is the naturalistic fallacy.

Just to be clear, I think that the drawbacks of believing in a god that happens not to exist are also fairly clear. I was more interested in any benefits there might be. Compare to the thread, What does atheism offer?

Wood contains lots of hydrocarbons (cellulose is essentially a chain of glucose sugars). The heat can get these to react and form something volatile. Wood is largely made of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. Some of the carbon can form volatile substances (methane, ethane, alcohols, carbon monoxide, ...) by combining with the hydrogen and oxygen, and some remains as charcoal. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrolysis#Fire

Assuming that no gods actually exist, is there any benefit that people gain from their belief in a god or from the religious moral codes? (I think its pretty clear what the benefits are of believing in the correct God should one exist as described). That is, what earthly secular benefits does religion bring? For example, Catholics discourage the use of condoms. Given our evolved nature (sex is pleasurable, people are lazy), this results in plenty of children. While bringing up lots of children can be a pain, it also makes you evolutionarily successful. Thus an irrational belief can be evolutionarily beneficial.

As opposed to what? People who take anyone's word for anything at some level chose not to think for themselves. Due to the sheer amount of information, someone who personally verifies anything before accepting it is going to be extremely poorly informed. That it increases the proportion of people who are Catholic relative to those who are not? Ie, increases the fitness of Catholics?

alk;jd an;as e'aewop[v ka[oas p[ekv ciosl.a[as' lfc[o The above is information, but not the sort of thing we want to encourage. We construct barriers to eliminate gibberish at the various levels (words, grammar, sentences, logic). The first two are taken care of largely by language, the third by not being a moron, and the last is the one we have to watch out for (logical fallacies, meaningless claims).