Saint John of The Cross 9-21-95

The fact that morphine works is the closest I can come to a proof.
(Ooh; and that something that comes out of a chook's arse and slices of
a smoked pig go so well together!)

 

Ahh; thank you Moike. I missed the cleverness of this first time around.

Humble apologies.

 

Arrgh... I remember that one but I can't remember who (or where).

MUST NOT GOOGLE

 

Gawd; Gerry's getting the full-service rub-and-tug gratification on this
thread isn't he?

So many posters on his hook at the same time!

 

Yep. often called apatheist

 

Oi! i resemble that remark!

 

*Cough*

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_burden_of_proof

note the example is similar to the "God" question - "Do Fairies Exist?"

 

Science is *absolutely f***ing full of conjecture, possibilities, and
probabilities.

 

Are you agnostic about Fairies, Goblins, Trolls, Dragons etc too?

 

Try it in a "balance of probabilities" hearing instead, you'll get further.

One can be fairly certain one is not pregnant. One can be wrong about that ;-)

Yes, i don't know. I'll even agree with you that we *Can't* know.

Proof, no. Evidence, yes. point me to just one of those that isn't logically sound.

Black holes are Conjecture. Hawking radiation is conjecture. The
bloody Higgs Boson is (currently) conjecture.

Until recently (2008) there was no scientifically acceptable evidence that
there was a supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way (and since,
several other galaxies). Does that make the work done by the scientists who
suspected that there was (with some evidence to support the idea) to prove
their theory, pseudoscience?

You seem to have a slightly optimistic view of science that doesn't quite
match up with reality. Science almost never "Proves" *anything*. it only
supports various theories to a greater or lesser extent, depending on the
weight of the evidence supporting the theory.

 

In aus.motorcycles on Mon, 19 Apr 2010 13:53:53 GMT

It's a story (meaning who knows if true) about a well known scientist
giving a lecture about astronomy and afterwards was accosted by a
little old lady who said he was all wrong, and the world was really
a plate supported by a giant turtle.

"So what is the turtle standing on?"

"Another turtle"

"And what is that turtle standing on?"

"YOu are very clever young man, but it's turtles all the way down"

(Pratchett had probably heard this story, hence A'Tuin is swimming,
not standing...)

Zebee

 

If the tooth fairy turns up on my doorstep, then yes, I'll believe in
her. Meantime, obviously no. I'll believe in the tooth fairy and Santa
Claus [1] as much as I'll believe in god(s), ie fuckall.

Kev

[1] On that note I had to email a bank manager at one of our Westpac
branches yesterday whose first name is Santa. Yes, I know it is an
ethnic name, but starting the email with "Dear Santa" just brought a
smile to my face. "Can I have a tricycle and Playstation and and and"

 

Which is why I don't believe in him/her. But that doesn't mean he/she
might not have popped off to the Andromeda galaxy for a short billion
year holiday and is just waiting for the volcano ash to settle before
tripping back here and deciding we've made a **** up off the place and
sending us all into detention. I wish those noisy pigs would stop
flying over my house in Tempe to land at Mascot as well.

Kev

 

From what I understood (and no, I can't be arsed googling it either)
it is based on an Indian religious belief that Pratchett hijacked. To
great effect

Kev

 

I first read it in Stephen Hawkins "Brief History of Time". He may
have got it from someone else.

Theo

 

It isn't fantasy actually, although it is speculation. You (further
down this post) say "of course there are lots of them".

If there are lots of them then logic would suggest that our universe is
very very unlikely to be the only one that supports life.

Nope. A universe is most definitely NOT the same thing as the Cosmic
All. Ask almost any cosmologist.

I'm not stirring actually, but no I don't actually think that our
universe was created but I can't prove it, you can't prove it and proof
is unlikely to come in our lifetime.

If we can't prove it then stating it is proved is misleading at best
Moike (seriously).


G-S

 

I looked it up Hawkins attributed it to Bertrand Russell.

Theo

 

An extra universal origin assumes an extra universal creation of the
universal creator.

If you're asking about who or what created the cosmic all then I don't
think that question is answerable by definition since we cannot know of
anything outside our own universe.

I admit it's a minority position amongst scientists

I admit it's not my position.

However as a hypothesis it isn't disprovable (at this point in time) and
as such has a mathematically non zero probability.

The laws may be constant, but the constants are not.

And multiple universes within the cosmic all with the randomness of
their early expansions (or otherwise) would likely 'freeze' different
universal constants.

NO! The cosmic all superset would be consistent, but with variations to
constant values in each universe.

Irrelevant. We are talking about the possible existence of a god (or
creator if you prefer that term), not about any possible current effects.

To what? I haven't changed my viewpoint, you've just asked me to expand
upon it.

So Copernican physics was a superset of Ptolomy?

You cannot (by definition) 'see' an event horizon, although astronomers
have observed (clearly) accretion disks surrounding them.

You said "conservation of mass/energy".

Is mass/energy conserved upon entering an event horizon?


G-S

 

Thank you, thank you very much.

And here was me spending the last couple of days thinking "Tough crowd!"


BTH

 

I didn't actually say "ignored", although I implied "did not or could
not interfere with the progress of".


G-S