Greg H.

Science is not a tournament where you toss down your gauntlet and demand that others pick it up and prove you wrong. I'm not even sure what this has to do with any of the rest of what you said. Could you elaborate for the rest of us how atheism and materialism are preventing humanity from uncovering the truth about the universe through rigorous scientific study?

That's not always true. You just have to learn to be a discerning viewer and separate the good from the bad. Think of it as sort of like the Internet for cable television. Good information with a lot of crap mixed in.

There's an interesting topic. When is it unethical to keep someone alive?

No, but I have four cats - the effect is the same, I think.

I am fairly certain that physical collisions of that nature aren't going to result in the spontaneous formations of previously absent chemical bonds. Though I suppose if the collision generated sufficient heat, it may - I'm just not sure about that.

There is significant difference between partial loss of motor function and not being able to do anything but stare helplessly upwards at the ceiling and wait for someone to come change your colostomy bag. There are many partially physically disabled people who live quite fulfilling lives. The physical disabilities aside, what about the mental ones? If my last act as a rational, sane human being with the mental capacity to do more than drool into my pillows is to spare my loved ones and my family the burden and the horror of watching me turn into a driveling idiot who can't even find the bathroom, much less use it, shouldn't that be my choice? What gives you the right to make that choice on my behalf? As for anyone with an emotional problem being able to just walk right up and pop off to heaven, several folks have mentioned the idea of counselling lasting years as part of the process to insure that you are really capable of making this decision and quite sure this is what you want.

I stand (or sit as the case may be) corrected. Particle physics is not something I am intimately familiar with, so I appreciate the correction when I veer off in the wrong direction. Thank you both.

Electrons occupy a certain amount of volume as well. See Point Particle for more details.

You would have to check with them. As Cretin says, it depends on what they're hosting the web site on.

That's an interesting viewpoint, but I think it's outside the premise of the OP. (I could be wrong but) I think there's an inherent assumption in the opening post that finding a method of termination isn't the issue so much as why is it deemed wrong to want to exit life at a time and in a manner of my choosing in order to preserve my own dignity and quality of life. Maybe the discussion of the impact on the provider of such services should be a separate thread?

It's not the acceptance of death that sounds off, it's the invitation of it to visit that most people can't come to terms with. Wanting to die is so far outside our normal existence that most people can't understand what would drive someone to desire it over continued life. The vast majority of people simply cannot conceive of a time when they would choose death over continued life. That aside, in terms of assisted suicide, I think it's important that we place as much value on the dignity and quality of a person's life as we do on the simple length of it. Surviving is not the same as living.

In a broader sense, I think you've basically proven that the solution set includes any a and b where [math] a=\sqrt{b}^3[/math] So a = 64 and b = 16 is also a solution, as is a = 125, b = 25, etc.

It's not my fault if the dictionary is occasionally redundant, is it?

Not to be obtuse, but you lost me. I see your point, but aren't you assuming that we care about the amount as a concrete quantity? It is possible to acknowledge the presence of some intervening space without quantifying it in terms of fixed units? To your original point up the thread a bit, though, in scientific terms, the concrete measurement is what is useful, and what will be used and discussed in those contexts.

So the assumption is that if God exists, he's benign and has the world's best interests at heart? That's a fairly large leap, if you ask me.

Just for the heck of it, I went and looked up the definitions of time and distance. Distance is defined fairly simply and straightforward: Nice and abstract, but still useful. It explains the concept of what distance is, without going into the measurements or the math of how we determine distance. Then we look at time What the...? So distance as a concept is restrained, finite, with a definite beginning and end. Time, on the other hand, is infinite, and encompasses every when that ever was or ever will be all at once. Is that because we, as humans, have limitations in envisioning time as being limited in the same ways we can limit distance?

People are always wasting time and energy on things that are impossible. That doesn't make them any less impossible. And based on Feyman's account, I'd say the Navy recreated the original pretty spot on, though you'd have to compare the explosions somehow to figure out how accurately.

It's that last part that I have issues with. Just because God exists, why does it necessarily follow that we must do as he commands? Because he says so? What if he's a liar and a cheat? Are we still obligated to do what he says? I prefer Dylan Thomas: Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Ok, so the context of the discussion is the gist of the argument. What's he's really getting at is the measurement of this thing we call time, as opposed to the concept of time itself, at least in this context. So I wonder why that is? What is about time that makes it seemingly so much harder to quantify and understand than length (for example). They both (to borrow my earlier example) describe a separation that can be quantified into measurable units.

I'm posting this here because the material I'm reading deals with cosmology and the origin of the universe. If the topic belongs in a more appropriate location, please advise me, and I'll ask the mods to move it. I've been reading The Origin of the Universe by John Barrow and I'm starting this thread to discuss an idea he puts forward that I have to disagree with. I'll quote the salient passage here and then put forth my counter-argument. The last line is the part that I take issue with. From my understanding, what Professor Barrow seems to be saying is that we cannot define time unless we append some concrete units to it - pendulum swings, seconds, vibrations, etc. It seems to me that we can arrive at a more abstract definition of time by thinking of it as a separation, in much the same way that distance is, in an abstract fashion a separation. Where distance is a separation of two points, can we not think of time as a separation of two events? Or is that simply redefining the more concrete definition of time using different "units"?

Really? I'm with Appolinaria here. If you have enough emotional detachment that you can murder your own child on the say so of a man claiming to be the Almighty, please do the rest of society a favor and proceed directly to your nearest mental health facility for a mandatory 72 hour hold and eval.

If you'd like a decent introduction to the idea of the formation of the universe and the subsequent expansion thereof, pick up a copy of The Origin of the Universe by John D. Barrow. It covers a lot of the questions you're asking and doesn't require a PhD to understand (thankfully for me).

Having been trained to shoot by the military, I can't say I have ever fired a gun sideways (drill instructors get really aggravated when you mishandle a weapon), but I suspect you're probably correct on both counts.

Sadly, that's just about always the case. The idea of what's normal and abnormal is subjective (at best) and often defined by a society over time. The further away from the subset of "normal" an individual is, the more likely they are to be viewed by that society as in need of some kind of help or intervention. We are what we are and that's all that we are?

I heard that too. Perhaps smart people are tired of being around so many people who aren't as smart as they are. I doubt it. If that were the case we'd probably still be living like serfs in the late middle ages as all of history's geniuses offed themselves in a pique of "no one understands me, boo-hoo". My supposition is that if we looked at a cross-section of IQ to high stress environment (job, family, education, societal duties) you'd find the underlying cause of the seeming correlation.