Strange

You don't know that. The evidence (what people actually say) contradicts it. But, once again, you are stating your personal opinion as fact. The problem is, you presented your personal experience of a small number of people as a fact about all. Which is why you were asked for evidence to support these "facts". You wish. Unfortunately the evidence disagrees. Sorry, this might be a terminology problem. By "argument" I don't mean a disagreement or fight, I mean a proposition or point you are making. (This may come from a combination of [some] study of philosophy and one of my second languages.) An argument (in this sense) requires support in the form of logic, math, evidence, etc. Otherwise it is just an unsupported assertion and, as such, can just be dismissed as having no value. If you had said that to start with, I would either have ignored it or just said "that's not my experience". End of. You initially presented it as a universal truth. That is what I objected to. Different people are motivated by different things. I have no interest in going to a strip club, but I am always interested in learning. (Even from you )

I would say so. Read about software test, development processes, testing, design patterns, test strategies, algorithms, validation and verification, data structures and, of course, test. p.s. did I mention testing?

That would not be a problem if you could provide any evidence or reasoning in support of your opinions (which were presented as fact).

Maybe. But science is a human enterprise. If you remove it too much from human drives and desires then no one will bother with it. Personal rivalries have, occasionally, been an important part of the development of science. The web is full of conspiracy theories and nonsense.

Or, to ask a sensible question based on your (very good) introductory comments: if the universe is infinite, then it doesn't matter how many galaxies you catalog, there will always be another one. (Your question appears to be utterly irrelevant.)

To give another perspective, "reality" is the question you were actually asked. You should engage with that, rather than answering another (simpler and often caricatured) question because it is polite and constructive to do so on a discussion forum. To avoid doing so and engage in tactics such as strawman arguments is lazy, rude and intellectually dishonest. But you just carry on if it makes you happy...

As noted, the right place for this discussion is elsewhere. But it is worth noting that whenever this comes up those who give negative votes (a lot of people never do) are definite that they do not do it for simple disagreements. Instead them give them for irrational arguments, failing to support an argument, relying on logical and rhetorical fallacies, being evasive, repeating an argument after it has been shown to be wrong, and so on. These are all characteristics of your posting style, so it is not surprising that you have earned a large number of negative votes. There are many people that I disagree with but would never give a negative vote to because they do a competent job of arguing their case and providing support for it.

There is no evidence that the universe "started" then. Unsupported speculation. Gater claims, with no support whatsoever, that they are both infinite. The point is I don't know. Neither do you or Gater. The difference is that I am quite happy with the fact that we don't know, and possibly can never know. You two are just fuelled by irrational beliefs. IF the universe is infinite, then the infinity of stars is equal to the infinity of integers (and therefore less than the infinity of reals).

I think most people here have a perfect good understanding of of the meaning of infinity. Many also understand something of cosmology. What I don't understand is what motivates your certainty in your beliefs in the absence of any evidence or rational thought. You keep mentioning "logic" and yet your behaviour is quite irrational. It has a very literal and well-defined meaning. It is interesting that you are utterly convinced (with no reason) that the universe must be finite while gater is utterly convinced (with no reason) of the opposite. Two totally irrational people engaged in a dialog. Fascinating to watch. If a limit is a literal concept, then so is infinity.

I would say that is one of the least important aspects of programming. If you use a language regularly, you will pick that sort of thing up. But it just syntax. I often have to maintain or write code in languages I am not familiar with, so spend a lot of time looking up the names of functions I need, etc. It is far more important to understand the principles of software engineering: requirements, specification, tests specs, design, modularity, algorithms, data structures, something about complexity and efficiency (e.g. when is it more appropriate to use a bubble sort or a quicksort), and so on.

Another infinite set. Which is how we know there is more than one value of infinity. (An infinite number of infinities, in fact.) This is not terribly complicated. You do know that an idiom is an expression which does not have a literal meaning? So the definitions you quote are quite likely irrelevant. "It is raining cats and dogs" does not mean that it is raining cats and dogs.

That seems a little low. A quick estimate gives me a number more than 10 billion times larger.

Ironic from someone who repeatedly (for more than a page) claimed that I had said something I hadn't. Eventually, I had to quote my own post to prove what I had actually said. At which point you made a childish joke (about the size of your dick, or something).

No, it just mean incorrect or based on a false belief.

No. http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/spurious

Some animals can count so that is obviously false. Please don't drag this nonsense up here. You have at least one thread devoted to it. As you know nothing of historical linguistics and have no evidence for these ideas, it clearly belongs in the Speculations forum. So you are redefining common words to try and make it seem as if you are making sense. You are "correct". "Correct" as I am using the term, means making false and unsupportable claims.

Your opinions don't upset me at all. What an odd thing to say. It is rather like: "There is a good movie on tonight" "Oh, what is it called?" "Well, I'm sorry if my opinions upset you." I'm sure there are some that were ridiculed by some people. Has this ever been a problem? I'm not sure. Scientists and technologists are human. So there will always be some who oppose new ideas, some who jump on them before they have been confirmed, some who wait and see, and some who use it to inspire their own further work. However, when it comes to science, this reluctance to accept new ideas is what makes it so successful. It means that (most) scientists expect convincing evidence before they will accept an idea. Famously, Einstein never really accepted the consequences of quantum theory (despite getting a Nobel Prize for his work in the area). He, with Podolsky and Rosen, wrote a paper where they said that if quantum theory is right it leads to a conclusion which is obviously ridiculous. This encouraged people to look at the issue more deeply, especially Bell, and eventually perform experiments to test the idea. Quantum theory was right and Einstein was wrong. But ultimately the theory was greatly strengthened by all this extra work. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPR_paradox Manned flight was developed very publicly. I assume the various people involved wanted the publicity to raise funds, apart from any egos involved. (I'm not sure the idea was generally considered ludicrous anyway.) And yes, Einstein initially frigged his equations because everyone assumed the universe was static. But once evidence of the predicted expansion was found he and nearly everyone else changed their minds. The only people who still cling to a static universe are a small group of hardcore Internet crackpots. You have been asked to support you claims, but have singularly failed/refused to do so. Agreed. If such a thing were found, then there would be a rush to investigate it. That is the sort of thing that new phsyics and Nobel Prizes are built on. Remember the excitement when it was thought that neutrinos had been measured going faster than light? But you have asserted your opinions as if they are fact. That would be very silly. I can't imagine anyone saying such a thing. Have you really heard people say that?

Sitting down is not a sport and those who Don't Play Golf should not be an Anti golf(Sport). When you turn Not Playing Golf into a sport you just created a hypocrisy.

Of course not. You have made general claims about (all/most) atheists. You made these statements as if they were facts. You have now admitted that they are just opinions based on a few people you have met. How many? 1? 20? Not a statistically significant sample anyway. But based on your personal experience, you think it is OK to tar all atheists with the same brush. This is not rational behaviour. Of course not. No one claimed that (so it is another strawman argument). Atheists are just people who don't believe in a god or gods. Apart from that they have nothing else in common, as a group. They may have many different reasons for not believing. They my or may not be arrogant, self-centred, or lacking knowledge of science. I see no reason why atheists should be any different from the general population in any of those things. No problem. But it would have been much better if you had said, "No that's not what I meant. What I am trying to say is ..." a couple of pages ago. Instead of trying to defend a position that you didn't really hold. Perhaps we could get back to evolution as the thread topic... But maybe your comment about scientists "engaged in a discussion that involves God" was about Creationism? But, every scientific argument I have seen about Creationism/ID says nothing about God. It just discusses the "scientific" claims and the evidence presented by Creationsists. That is the scientists area of expertise and so they have every right to comment on it. But actually, it doesn't require much scientific training; anyone with critical thinking skills and a small amount of knowledge of basic biology can see through most Creationist claims quite easily.

For example? For example? Until you have established that there is a problem, it seems unnecessary to invent solutions.

As this is a science forum, you might want to reconsider that for your current audience. I do think freedom of speech should be (and is always) limited. But that's OK because I am not American. And on a science forum, you should expect to get challenged on unsupported and, apparently, incorrect assertions. I assume because you and evobulgarevo are acting irrationally in response people questioning your assertions. If you aren't both strongly religious, you do a very good impression. So one person (who you may have made up) makes you judge all atheists to be irrational. Is that a rational position? Who said it was? Why are you indulging in a strawman argument? Is that rational? What evidence do you have for that claim? Why are you making up lies about the way atheists think and behave? Does your religion condone this sort of behaviour? It isn't. The only people who claim that atheism is a religion are religious people. (Perhaps because of your "low self esteem"? Or just because you can't imagine anyone can live without some sort of irrational belief?) On this forum, the moderators decide.

Wrong. There are three groups: 1) Those who are convinced that the universe is finite. They have no reason for this belief. It is irrational. 2) Those who are convinced that the universe is infinite. They have no reason for this belief. It is irrational. 3) Those who know the universe could be finite or infinite. They will wait for evidence. This is the only rational position. What logic? Perhaps you would care to share it. Note: stating that it is a "fact" or "obvious" is not logic. Neither is "well it must be". Nor is "you are too feeble to understand". These are simply statements of your faith. They have nothing to do with logic, evidence, rational thought or science.

Some do, some don't. Isn't that basically the question asked at the start of this thread. What arguments and evidence would you provide for your claim that numbers do not have an independent existence?

As you have no idea why people give a member negative points, you are just inventing these reasons. Whenever this has been discussed (because someone creates a thread to whine about their treatment) people always say that the main reason for giving negative points are things like irrational posts, refusing to answer questions, failures of logic, and generally failing to engage in a rational discussion. I can't remember if I have given evobulgarevo any negative votes or not, but if I have it would be for that reason. I can't imagine why I would feel angry or threatened by some unknown entity on the Internet. It's the Internet, for god's sake. I am mildly fascinated/amused that people can have such extraordinarily low levels of critical thinking skills. But mostly, chi se ne frega. Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn. Do you really think his arguments make any sense? Or are you just siding with the "underdog"?