$ jlc (10,317)

I agree with you in all of the points that you made, Timelord. I consider altruism (small "a" altruism, not the technical philosophy) to be voluntary and whimsical; the idea of 'the worship of man' is baffling to me - I am hoping that society will eventually get past the point where it needs to worship anything. If someone wants to worship a deity, that is their business, but I do not worship 'worship'.

Were a mystical deity self-evident, then a lot of us who meet the definition of 'self' would not have thought it obvious that such a critter was unnecessary. And I agree, in spades, that we are in the process of scientifically answering the questions that made the postulation of a creator-deity necessary to former ages. We do not have all of the answers yet, but we now know that the issues are knowable.

I pointed james464 back up because his reply politely stated his viewpoint.

Jan

But...but...Wm is right. We did not invent the concept of the "Laboratory Information System": We came up with the first LIS that used a graphic interface - which is an 'improvement to an existing product to make it more competitive'. (It had some innovative design elements in it too, based on my 17 years as a bench med tech.)

The 'newness' of our product was not that it invented a mousetrap, but that it invented a Better mousetrap. (No, the world did not beat a path to our door.) I have not observed any game-changing innovation in any of our competitors (they are now graphic too, but since we were the first, they can't take credit for that); many of them compete on the basis of having a good sales team to sell what is essentially 'the same thing everyone else has'.

Wm's remarks were not venomous, and he did not swear. This is a discussion.

Jan

I enjoyed watching and commenting on Queen of the Desert at the theater showing y'all put together (and one of my comments was that it would be neat to have an online way of rating the films that the AS production company was interested in). Unfortunately, my internet access at my home is not good enough to play the movies you have provided for screening. I can almost always get Netflix and I can play Youtube videos (under favorable conditions, such as 'Sunday morning') but when I try to play the movies through your screening utility, they are a stop-motion slideshow (and then they often freeze altogether). I do believe that this is a function of the utility that provides the films, since I had a similar experience trying to watch the initial episode of the Killjoys (via Fox).

I know that I am at the distal end of the Internet line; I often do have marginal or intermittent access, but since I can play Netflix, I thought it was worth mentioning in case you had some advice to offer.

Jan

+10 (if I could)..+1 in reality

I am always studying these people, my good and liberal friends, and trying to figure out why they behave as they do. (Giggle - they are probably doing the same to me!) I hope I can come up with some better solution than the one you have cited: Common sense sorts separately from IQ. I fear that I may not.

So, beginning from your theorem, do you think that this is genetic or environmental? Thought experiment: If everyone who voted had to serve in the military (a la Starship Troopers), would that make a difference? (I am not proposing this, just mentally playing with the variables.)

Jan

So, what it seems you are saying is that because 'people support it' (to sell new tech) they pay lip-service to it as if they believe it. That would mean that at least they accurately perceive reality...but they consider the buyer 'fair game'. This is not the sort of commercial transaction that I like, as I am a win-win person, but it makes it a question of commercial ethics rather than intelligent analysis of data.

This would not apply to the really intelligent liberals around me, however. I know them well and they are, to humanly varying degrees, ethical and honest. These people actually believe the party line.

I am obscurely heartened by the thought that some or the GW folks are simply feathering their own nests and understand that what is being said about GW is hype.

Jan

Perhaps. But right now what I observe is that people from different philosophical backgrounds are forced to present the same 'face' to the world in order to be electable candidates.

Jan

No, not really: Anytime at work when we want an important document to get somewhere on time, we ship it FedEx. Virtually all of my bills are now on autopay - I do not get bills in the mail any more.

Were the Post Office to close, the only things that would need to be sent to me in the mail would be things like my med tech license (annual), drivers license (every half dozen years), new credit cards (which could be FedExed as they are private parties), car registration stickers (just got some).

What I get in the mail is "ads". I walk directly from the mailbox to the recycle bin.

Jan

I am not particularly wise about politics, but isn't this a no-loose game for the Democrats? If a Republican Congress declares war and it does not go well, then the Dems can point blame on the Republicans. If it does 'go well' then the Democrats can show that they supported it.

From the Democratic perspective, what's not to like about this?

Jan

Damn. I thought I was going to get another great johnpe story out of that photo.

Your explanation of why the open-wheel design was used makes sense - putting the wheels further apart gives greater stability, but if you encased them you would increase the drag. I had to dodge some big tumbleweeds during the last windstorm, and I keep imagining what great tumbleweed-catchers those struts would make.

I am quite delighted to hear of these innovative designs. I think that there would be a ton of them on the market if the gov had not bailed GM out.

Jan

I paraphrase an old joke of Bob Hope and tell them that 'I am so conservative, all of the planes I fly on have two right wings'.

OK. OK. It is not as intellectual a response as the one you make, but I do enjoy watching their expressions.

Jan

db, this was the problem I encountered in dealing with the word 'altruism'. The meaning of the word in general use is different than its technical description. I was using 'altruism' as it is meant today (and was wrong in doing so in a philosophical conversation).

We currently lack examples of Liberal that is not Socialist and Conservative now means everyone-who-is-not-Liberal. I agree with much of what you say, above, but I do not agree that everyone who is termed Conservative is derived from the same philosophical foundation. It seems to me that there is some convergent evolution going on: wallabies and rabbits.

Jan

Good point Bethesda-gal. We have encountered this in other walks of life: biology, geology, medicine. If you get the granularity wrong, no analysis makes sense.

Jan

I like your answer, Mamaemma. I will sometimes call myself an Objectivist or a Randist when I am in the company of liberals, just to give them a handy label to tell 'where I am coming from'. But in this company, I think that 'individualist' is a better term. (That way, I don't trip over someone else's definitions.)

Jan

I started researching GW in about 2002 - with the purpose of 'being able to discuss it with some people I knew'. I assumed that GW was correct initially, but after about 2 hours of looking into the details I began to doubt it was so. After about 2 more days of research, it was obviously a fraud.

I have no inherent expertise (or even interest) in GW. Since it took so little of my life to research GW assertions and discover that they were fraudulent, why now, when there are the Climategate papers (which MichaelA may be referring to) and Bjorn's work on the scientific table as well, does anyone believe it? (I do not ask why people support it; different question.)

The link seems to be kaput WDB. Good thread, though.

Jan

you: In it? Built it?

Please tell more.

Jan

Neat little vehicle. I like to see people constructing something new.

I did not see an explanation of why the front wheels were on open struts like that...great for catching tumbleweeds...

Jan

When you look at 'traditions that most human societies have in common' it includes nice things like 'music' and 'dancing' but the list also has on it really atrocious customs. All of these customs (good and bad) are present in societies that are as far apart as can be found on Earth (ie African and Australian abo and S. American), which hints that they might have been present in archetypal human culture.

Like you, johnpe, I have trouble imagining why such customs are deeply rooted, but they do seem to be. Was it something that was actually significant to our lives 100K years ago? Was it just a whim of chance that these customs persisted? (Genetic studies provide paradigms for both types of persistence: functional and accidental.)

I don't know, I just observe. (John Campbell, of Analog magazine, had some theories on this, however.)

Jan

I agree.

Jan

There are some homeless people living in trailers or huts in the hills above me. They are generally drug users of some sort or other, but do not seem to make trouble; the exception is the Vietnam vet, who is kinda looked after by the neighborhood in general.

Jan

Interesting. Thanks for the story. Since you had the compassion to let him come home once and the resolve to not let him come home a second time, I have hope that one day he may wake up and smell his life burning - and chose to do something about it.

Jan

Is this even moot? Email has increasingly taken over the function of communication. Packages can be sent any-which-way.

What is left that needs to go through the mail?

Jan

If this refers to what I think it does, then Islam is not the only culture that does this: Indian (Hindu) traditional culture does this, as do several of the native African traditions. There is much in our human past that is less than impressive.

Jan

Agnostic.

I celebrate TDay, XMas, Easter, Memorial Day, Labor Day and all the other traditional holidays, and then I throw in a few pagan holidays to boot. Why Not? I do not care about whether there is a 'tainted origin' in these holidays - they are what I mean them to be.

Thank you (Gulch, not God) for being here and being informative and entertaining for the last several years. There: I have Given Thanks!

Jan, happily arrogant

Ha! Looking under the couch right now...no monsters there this AM, just woolybuggers.

Thanks for the explanation.

Jan

Uh, no. Tried an Internet search. I think you probably do not mean: "546 LED 120 Volt Color Changing Replacement Swimming Pool Light Bulb"

Jan, puzzled but listening