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To sink or not to sink, that is the question in Richard White Games
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Tuesday, February 21 2006 08:31 Profile Homepage #15
If your implants are in right, you don't have to see to believe. You just know. You can feel the horrors of Galactic Core in your very soul without ever encountering it in a physical sense.

—Alorael, who can assure you that GC2 will run on every platform known to man, some that are not and should never be known to man, and may sometimes even spontaneously begin to run in your mind, where you will have no relief from the complete RW experience.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Eep! Christians! (Split from Christian Radio) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Tuesday, February 21 2006 08:24 Profile Homepage #114
quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

I did say exactly what I do mean, and said nothing at all about what that means we should or shouldn't do right now as a result. I stand by the opinion that disease is the result of the things I stated ultimately. The virus is an intermediate agent we have some ability to control or avoid. It itself is not The Cause.
I'm pretty sure that the virus is, in fact, the cause. There are a number of factors that affect the magnitude of the effect, but there cause is going to be a microbe.

Put another way, you can contract disease despite all your efforts if you come into contact with a virus or bacteria. In the absence of viruses or bacteria you cannot contract a disease. That's a fairly important and fundamental theory of medicine (and biology).

(That also omits genetic disorders, autoimmunity, and so on, but bear with me.)

quote:
[b]Our body's state of imbalance invites disease. And as I suggested elsewhere, in an environment where our bodies are prone to toxins and stress, the cold virus is our friend. Even "evil" things serve "good" purposes in the right context. But I'd rather just work toward being well enough to not need to get colds. When I do, I don't.
[/b]

There are ways to increase or decrease your chances of illness, as we've said many times. You can't reduce those chances to zero, and it's pretty hard to increase them to one. For the record, though, I'd like to see any evidence of the therapeutic effects of the common cold, which as far as I know is just another irritating and not particularly healthy virus.

—Alorael, who shouldn't encourage Synergy to squander his few remaining posts on medical debates. He just can't let this topic go, though.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Exit Strategy (Realized) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Tuesday, February 21 2006 08:15 Profile Homepage #40
You and your synful ways will be missed. And your titles. And your verbosity. Well, we must like you for something.

Of course, I predict at least a departure that doesn't happen at post 777. I don't think you can even finish responding to goodbyes that quickly, and you're too much of a New-Age-buzzword-out-of-pants-gentleman to let that happen.

Really, all you need to do is retire this account and appear in moderation with another one. Think of it as a clean break with a very rapid mending of fences.

—Alorael, who remembers the days when someone could be second in posting only to him. Oh, the humanity. And the Turing machines.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
David Irving Jailed in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Tuesday, February 21 2006 07:57 Profile Homepage #11
I understand why he was arrested and convicted, and I can accept why, but I disagree with it. The slope of denial of free speech to disaster is at least as slippery as the slope of denying the Holocaust to repeating it. More so, I'd say.

Still, I'm not sure Austria can get rid of its Holocaust laws. Doing so could easily turn into a political blunder as outsiders, particularly those who are very sensitive about the Holocaust, protest loudly.

—Alorael, who can understand denying lunar landings. It's nutty, but the evidence that is meaningful to non-scientists could be faked. Denying 9/11 is difficult, particularly because of the notable landmark of Ground Zero. Denying the Holocaust is easier more than half a century after the fact.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Physics, and a dumb teacher in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 19:52 Profile Homepage #53
Does that one class involve calculus or not? Physics only without calculus means everybody misses out on some parts. Physics with calculus means some people can't do it at all, but those who can get more of the picture.

—Alorael, who could imagine one class with optional calculus, but that might spark some resentment.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Eep! Christians! (Split from Christian Radio) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 19:49 Profile Homepage #106
Minor disagreement: some doctors are scientists. There's the whole "bench to bedside" theory of somehow being able to do everything for a patient, but there are also people with MDs who pursue science rather than specific treatments. You just don't need an MD to be a scientist

I'd say the difference between medical science and other theories of disease, wellness, and so on is that the scientists have been able to study and find evidence for their beliefs. Doctors don't think of viruses as mystical miasmas of unhealth, they think of them as complex protein systems. There is now understanding of how they do what they do and what that does to us. No, it's not complete understanding, but it's better than other theories. Believing otherwise is a rejection of science as a basis for understanding the world.

Quite simply, if you come into contact with a pathogen in the right way for that pathogen, you will contract a disease. Your body may fight it off immediately, or slowly, or not at all. What happens is a field of study in its own right, but it is not mystical.

—Alorael, who trusts medicine (but not always individual doctors, or even doctors as a group) because it advances its own understanding and because it is not closed to other understandings as long as they produce verifiable hypotheses. It just so happens that many of the hypotheses stubbornly fail to verify.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Hooray. in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 17:28 Profile Homepage #47
That was a reference to Bertrand Russell, who claimed to be able to prove anything from any false premise. I may have this only roughly correct, but here's the version I've seen. He was given 2+2=5 and told to prove he was the pope.

2 + 2 = 5
4 = 5
1 = 2

The Pope and Bertrand Russell are two people, so the Pope and Bertrand Russell are one person, so they are the same person, so Bertrand Russell is the pope.

—Alorael, who considers this firm evidence for the need to avoid false premises. One pope is enough.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Eep! Christians! (Split from Christian Radio) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 17:22 Profile Homepage #86
quote:
Originally written by Lenar Labs:

Why bother with Jesus if you can find a more reliable source in Allah or Buddah, et. al.?
Good question. The very same God is generally understood by Jews either to have no hell waiting or, at worst, a period of unpleasantness lasting no longer than one (lunar) year. You basically get to have your afterlife without fear of eternal fire.

—Alorael, who now has to question why God would send His only son to bring a new variation on the one true religion to the people and, incidentally, a whole lot of burning and damnation. People say the Old Testament God is vengeful, but He doesn't do anything quite like damning multitudes.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Presents some sites from Vietnam-Do you want to visit them? in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 17:09 Profile Homepage #3
I feel useful!

—Alorael, who can't say the same about the links.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
my world(would appreciate ideas) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 15:03 Profile Homepage #47
quote:
Originally written by arghhhhhhhhh:

quote:
If you have very different elves, fine
they are, they don't even have pointed ears
If they're elves without ears, I'm unimpressed. If they have neither ears nor the other hallmarks (earmarks?) of elves, why are you calling them elves?

quote:
Originally written by Ephesos
The fact that the life on the planet is doomed anyway kind of trivializes anything that happens before the apocalypse.
Earth won't be around forever, but I'm not terribly concerned with how my actions will effect anything billions of years in the future.

—Alorael, who will settle for making mere millenia of difference.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Upgrading from Avernum 4.0 to 4.0.1 in Tech Support
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 14:57 Profile Homepage #4
I was going to say that it's an academic distinction since all the Avernums are in v1.x.y, but that's no longer true.

—Alorael, whose opinino is true for A4 v4.0.0 to 4.0.1. Your results may differ if you one day try the same process for A1 v4.0.0 to 4.0.1.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Eep! Christians! (Split from Christian Radio) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 14:56 Profile Homepage #76
I stuck in the if because I'm not an atheist. For the purposes of this argument I'm atheist enough, though. I don't think God is going to treat us all differently based on how we act. I find this to be incredibly liberating and, yes, uplifting.

"Trying Christianity" fails if you don't get that special rapport with the son of God. If Ephesos really tried and it didn't work, who is to blame?

—Alorael, who was going for a Pliny between Elder and Younger. That would be Pliny the Middler, but Middler just lacks pizazz.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Ideas Refreshment in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 11:26 Profile Homepage #20
I'll take that under advisement, arghhhhhhhhh.

—Alorael, who took the idea that most conversation is made up of the same elements and tried to copyright all those elements so that he would make money from all written communication. He was turned down, and the rejection used no fewer than 17 of his copyrighted phrases.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Physics, and a dumb teacher in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 11:24 Profile Homepage #48
They could just be called, say, Physics 1, Physics 2, Physics 3, and so on, which wouldn't give any helpful references.

Energy makes sense qualitatively. So does work. Quantitatively I'd have no idea how to define or measure energy as "oomph" without trying to make it useful, which is what it is, which is why energy is a function of measurable quantities, more or less.

Basically, the concept of energy was created because it's so useful. The concept of, say, velocity wasn't so much created as given a scale.

—Alorael, who expressed himself very poorly. He should just give up before he confuses himself and switches positions.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Hooray. in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 11:18 Profile Homepage #42
The lemma is not used to prove anything, and it is both tautological and quite possibly based on a false premise! I demand rigorous proof!

—Alorael, who will continue ranting as he pleases. Semodius asked for thoughts, and on Spiderweb that is very dangerous request.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Eep! Christians! (Split from Christian Radio) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 11:14 Profile Homepage #70
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:

quote:
Originally written by The anti-POK:

If you can believe that the Bible is literally true, you're set.
That is so not true. You have to believe the Bible literally means what you think it means and is completely true. Only then are you set. :P

In all seriousness, there are parts of the Bible that simply were not intended to be literally true. There's that troublesome last book of the NT, for instance, which darn near calls itself a metaphor ("shows by signs," as Synergy and I have previously discussed). If you assume that the Bible is literally true, you still have to figure out what the blatant metaphors mean.
All you really need is any source of information you trust. Whether that's an interpretation of the Bible, your religious leader, or the aliens who speak through your facial hair, you're set.

1500 years ago not everyone knew the world was round, but most people were rather ignorant in general. The educated did know that the world was round. Our belief that their belief was that the world was flat is a rather new and false creation.

—Alorael, who could have a superior experience as an atheist. Imagine the absolute freedom of living your life how you want without some superior looking over your shoulder. No cosmic boss! Just you and what you want!
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
my world(would appreciate ideas) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 11:07 Profile Homepage #36
Tolkien didn't create the elf. He created the Tolkien-style elf, which spread widely through derivative fantasy. It also spread to Dungeons and Dragons, which only spread it even more.

There's nothing wrong with elves per se. The problem is that they're usually unoriginal. I don't want to read about another world that's Middle Earth with cosmetic differences. If you have very different elves, fine, but then I wonder why you're calling them elves and giving them pointy ears at all.

—Alorael, who wouldn't worry too much about a prophecy not due for fulfillment for the next two billion years. On the other hand, that means that some of the moons have very long lunar cycles.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Upgrading from Avernum 4.0 to 4.0.1 in Tech Support
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 11:03 Profile Homepage #1
That should work just fine.

—Alorael, who did that through all of the A4 betas and experienced no problems.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Hooray. in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 09:08 Profile Homepage #35
I take it as axiomatically true that one equals two. May I have a miter now?

—Alorael, who would suggest that practical considerations limit the utility of axioms. Assuming root beer to be good under all circumstances is actually reasonably reasonable. (Yes, this was just an excuse to write reasonably reasonable.)
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Ideas Refreshment in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 09:04 Profile Homepage #17
You cannot copyright anything that is mind-numbingly obvious.

In fact, you probably wouldn't get anywhere by emailing Jeff vague suggestions like "Use spawners!" or "More monster plagues!" Saying that Rentar-Ihrno should launch a plague of robotic chitrachs against the surface and General Baziron should get the party to retrieve the seventeen crystals of Thralni's stepdaughter would probably work, though, but it wouldn't prevent Commander Johnson from sending you out to retrieve the fourteen mystical leaves of Aydin's cousin to save the world from Rentar-Ihrno's plague of golem-hydras.

—Alorael, who speaks from bitter experience about copyrighting the obvious.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Physics, and a dumb teacher in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 08:59 Profile Homepage #39
Secondary school is high school in America, and a class could involve calculus or not. If the students are assumed not to know or understand calculus, trying to explain energy by reference to line integrals isn't useful.

—Alorael, who would at least hope that the book states that KE = 1/2*mv^2 by definition, and then handwave the fact that that isn't quite the right definition. As far as he can tell, energy doesn't have any obvious existence besides its overwhelming utility because of the formulas assigned to it.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Eep! Christians! (Split from Christian Radio) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 08:54 Profile Homepage #62
quote:
Originally written by Slartucker:

Synergy: You keep saying "God is" "God is" and "God is." I wish you would remember that you are talking about something disputed. According to your perception (or whatever you want to call it), that's what God is. But saying "God is" without any qualifiers is ridiculous, unless you want to claim that your knowledge of the universe is inherently superior to mine or anyone else's -- a claim which will surely make me stop paying attention to you. You said above "We’re impatient and unaware of many things out of our sight and knowing." Surely you understand that this applies to you, too.
Since this is more or less about believing in or not believing in a Judeo-Christian conception of God, I think it's fair to talk about what the Judeo-Christian God is with the understanding that this is only true as if God exists.

—Alorael, who still runs into the problem of Biblical literalism. If you can believe that the Bible is literally true, you're set. If you can't, you have no way to know the will of God. At that point trying to do God's will is a matter of deciding what you think God wants and then doing it.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
my world(would appreciate ideas) in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Monday, February 20 2006 08:42 Profile Homepage #31
Who says that created food has to have a duration? Mythology has plenty of times when magicky folks magic up various things without having to worry about them disappearing.

—Alorael, who has to consider this a step into the dangerous of alien ecology syndrome. Making a world completely alien unsurprisingly tends to alienate readers/players/participants. Ecology dependent on hand-wave magic is very alien.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00
Hooray. in General
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
 written Sunday, February 19 2006 20:20 Profile Homepage #33
quote:
Originally written by Dintiradan:

One does not have to prove that root beer is good, because the statement is an axiom, not a lemma.
That is not the same as the original statement in the thread, and it is not an axiom because it can be easily contradicted by people who dislike root beer. It can instead be a supposition.

—Alorael, who likes route bear moor.
Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00

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