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Heroic Knight
 
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Andy Raff (6/21/2006)
My question is; why do otherwise quite sane and sensible people insist on using fundamentally-broken IF/THEN statements? How can the embrace of broken IF/THEN statements be seen as a virtue by any sane person?I can think of 3 reasons 1) Hidden persuaders: http://skepdic.com/hiddenpersuaders.html 2) These people don't want to face lifes harsh reality and make up a fluffy 'feel good' beleif 3) people are plain Dumb
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I do talk a good fight
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What's wrong with not wanting to face life's harsh reality? Why do you think we do LRP? I bet you spend all your life watching the News and never enjoy fiction. :p
http://www.hyboriantales.com
PD: Ghostdance ("The most irritating curse I've ever encountered" -- NPC played by H.)
Riftworld: Rossar Kuug ("Clearly mad, because he thinks he's a Com-Trow Skirmisher" - Aela)
Hyborian Tales: Crew, cook, dogsbody, general labourer, toilet cleaner ("Dangerously overoptimistic ref" -- Tom Nowell)
Otherwise usually crew ("Quite spry & fit, & willing to wear a big costume & run around a lot" -- various event organisers)
"My other oversized foam weapon is THE LORD" -- Questionable Content
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Heroic Knight
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Ian Sturrock (6/22/2006)
What's wrong with not wanting to face life's harsh reality? Nothing, unless it becomes to dominate your views on things. Why do you think we do LRP? I dunno, different people have different motivations. Although personally its pure escapism! I bet you spend all your life watching the News and never enjoy fiction. :p Well, I do watch the news, but I am a big fiction fan. (George R R Martin at the mo!)
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Champion
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IF I'm a religious believer, THEN various scientific studies show that I'm more likely to be happy, healthy, and long-lived than IF I'm not.
Please post links to relavent papers/studies that have been peer-reviewed and published in respectable journals. I'd be very interested to read them.
Ias
Maelstrom: Then: Regimental Sergeant Major Mdjai, Havocstan Army
Now: "?"
DUTT: Then: Commander J.W. Cranstan, Durholme City Guard
Now: Justice
RL: Ias
I was going to run for parliament, because I want to make the world a better place, but I ran into some old friends and went out for a beer instead.
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I do talk a good fight
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New Scientist did a special on religion a few months back... I'll see if I can find the relevant issue in the online archive.
OK, these articles are the ones you want:
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/mg18925361.000.html
They're not peer-reviewed (it's a popular science mag, after all) but they do provide the references to the peer-reviewed articles IIRC. Can't access the full articles without a subscription, though. If you remind me on Thursday, I'll save the envelope from that issue, which will let me log in to the full online archive, and I'll try to find the source of the data.
http://www.hyboriantales.com
PD: Ghostdance ("The most irritating curse I've ever encountered" -- NPC played by H.)
Riftworld: Rossar Kuug ("Clearly mad, because he thinks he's a Com-Trow Skirmisher" - Aela)
Hyborian Tales: Crew, cook, dogsbody, general labourer, toilet cleaner ("Dangerously overoptimistic ref" -- Tom Nowell)
Otherwise usually crew ("Quite spry & fit, & willing to wear a big costume & run around a lot" -- various event organisers)
"My other oversized foam weapon is THE LORD" -- Questionable Content
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Champion
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Yah, I think I've got that old issue kicking around, and I read with interest Lawrence Krauss' Comment and Analysis article this week about pitting science against religion. He makes some good points, especially about the fallacy that the scientific method is akin to Aetheism - he says that the scientific method doesn't make belief in a god impossible (though I'd argue) but it allows you not to. I'm not sure I entirely agree with all his points (I tend to hang about at Richard Dawkins' end of this debate), but I found myself agreeing with him on a lot of things.
Thanks for the offer Ian, but I should be able to get most of the papers via subscriptions I get from Durham Uni.
Ias
Maelstrom: Then: Regimental Sergeant Major Mdjai, Havocstan Army
Now: "?"
DUTT: Then: Commander J.W. Cranstan, Durholme City Guard
Now: Justice
RL: Ias
I was going to run for parliament, because I want to make the world a better place, but I ran into some old friends and went out for a beer instead.
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I do talk a good fight
Group: System Moderators
Last Login: Today @ 2:15 PM
Posts: 1,860,
Visits: 5,736
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Yeah, it was a nice opinion piece, that one. I have always felt that cosmology (Big Bang, and anthropic principle, in particular), offer a potentially far better inspiration for the religious-minded to look for "God" in science than any "Intelligent Design" bollocks does. If "God" is an Intelligent Designer, why did he design my lungs to stop working in the presence of small quantities of house dust or cigarette smoke? Why hasn't he sorted my dodgy ankle out yet? Git.
But when you look at the whole "Just Six Numbers" business ( http://www.firstscience.com/site/articles/rees.asp -- I wish I could insert a hyperlink from the phrase "Just Six Numbers" but the crappy forum software doesn't work properly from Firefox) -- you have what COULD be argued to be a "evidence" of an intelligent creator. Still, whether one sees it as evidence or not says a lot more about one's own religious beliefs than about the cosmology involved.
It's all about how one recognizes patterns though -- if one isn't scientifically trained (which the vast majority of people aren't, and will never be), reading the above article will tend to make one think, "Hmm -- makes ya think, doesn't it? Maybe there is a God, or... something. Something more than science can tell us, anyway!" If one is scientifically trained, AND a "super-skeptic," one will tend to think, "There must be an explanation" and start delving into parallel universes. Arguably though, both those standpoints are religious convictions -- anyway... because the "super-skeptic" will really be thinking "There must be an explanation (OTHER THAN ALL THAT GOD NONSENSE)."
http://www.hyboriantales.com
PD: Ghostdance ("The most irritating curse I've ever encountered" -- NPC played by H.)
Riftworld: Rossar Kuug ("Clearly mad, because he thinks he's a Com-Trow Skirmisher" - Aela)
Hyborian Tales: Crew, cook, dogsbody, general labourer, toilet cleaner ("Dangerously overoptimistic ref" -- Tom Nowell)
Otherwise usually crew ("Quite spry & fit, & willing to wear a big costume & run around a lot" -- various event organisers)
"My other oversized foam weapon is THE LORD" -- Questionable Content
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Champion
Group: Basic Members
Last Login: Today @ 11:52 AM
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You make some good points. I think perhaps the problem (or at least one of them) is widespread 'abuse' of the scientific method by religious groups looking to in some way legitimise their beliefs, and also by some members of the scientific community, who do science no credit by publicly equating Science (big 'S') with Aetheism.
The whole point of the scientific method is that it gives one a structure with which to made deductions about the universe, based on empirical observation. The keep point is that any conclusion can only be said to be valid if it is supported by empirical evidence gained through repeatable experiment. It leads on to such things as the null hypothesis and the concept of a 'fair test' amongst other things. All the scientific method gives you is objecitivity, and that's exactly what those coming from a religious position lack - so they'll always be abusing science as long as they try to use it justify their faith.
I'll carry on later, Dr. Who is about to start 
Ias
Maelstrom: Then: Regimental Sergeant Major Mdjai, Havocstan Army
Now: "?"
DUTT: Then: Commander J.W. Cranstan, Durholme City Guard
Now: Justice
RL: Ias
I was going to run for parliament, because I want to make the world a better place, but I ran into some old friends and went out for a beer instead.
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