henry_bone

"And frankly, it's kind of offensive when Christians tell me I'm less-than-moral because I don't need their scripture to decide what's good or bad."

The moral argument isn't telling you that. You people (HN readers) seem intent on misunderstanding my initial statements.

It's not that atheists are not moral. Not even less moral than religious people.

The point I am trying, and failing, to express is that morality must come from a higher, non-human source. If it does not, then it is just a product of fallible human minds and is entirely meaningless. That's it.

You're missing the point. You're in good company though. I watched Christopher Hitchens make the same mistake in a similar discussion with Dennis Prager. A number of others in this thread are also doing it. The video link [1] below lays it out pretty well (also points out that A. C. Grayling had the same misunderstanding). Anyway ...

It's not that you need God to be moral. It's that you need an objective "higher power" as the source of that morality.

So I totally agree with what you wrote there, but you can't make a sound argument for a moral position without God or some objective higher power.

> "Belief in a higher power isn't required to give someone food."

So it's a moral duty to give a hungry person food. OK. I agree. Now we could have an exchange where you try to make a strong rational case for that, during which I will ask "why?" an annoying number of times until we get to the part where it's clear there is no basis for the moral duty absent a higher, non-human, source.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cp9Nl6OUEJ0

What I'm trying to get across is that a sense of morality is with us all. We have a generally shared understand of goodness, justice, etc. My point is that that morality is impossible to justify in a godless universe.

"People feel good when they help ...". No argument. But is morality just about the feels? No, it isn't.

Humans are nothing if not self interested. But that's beside the point here.

Why "kind and empathetic"? Who said that's how we should be?

If we are nothing more than an arbitrary arrangement of matter, formed according to arbitrary laws of physics, and only for a relative moment, then what is "kind" and "empathetic"?

In a godless universe, you are no more significant than a rock. The only sound position you can then take is that there is no such thing as morality.

No one needs religion to lead a moral life. That's not the argument.

But without the transcendent, without a higher power, we have no grounding for our morality. Everything becomes subjective and "post-modern". Actions then become "justifiable" - if there is such a thing - by whatever criteria suits us: the greater good, the good of the nation, whatever. But essentially self-interest takes over completely.

The more we move away from God the worse our societies will become.

"At the start of my book, Learning JavaScript Design Patterns, I say "good code is like a love letter to the next developer who will maintain it". It is an intimate correspondence, from one developer to another, spanning time and space."

Seriously?!

It's simple. It's a matter of respect, and treating others as you would like to be treated. It's no fun trying to figure out the "why?" of some code you've inherited responsibility for. It can be frustrating and time consuming.

So why would you put others through it. Make the code and the reasoning behind it as clear to the next dev as possible. Explain it with comments. Refer to issue links. Make it so that there's minimal - preferably zero - unnecessary digging for the next poor soul who'll work on it.

It's one thing to make an academic case in an online forum, that PFAS are not detrimental (at low levels) to human health. But when it gets down to it, would you rather avoid PFAS, or you just don't think they're a problem?

> Is the rule now if you wouldn't drink a glass of it you should never handle it in any way?

Some things are not safe at any level. Lead (Pb) for example. So what about PFAS? Does it accumulate in the body? What are the effects of long-term ingestion?

My question was intended to see just how serious people were, who were making the argument that PFAS weren't a thing to be concerned about.

So if you're handed a pint of water laced with PFAS, you're going to drink it without a care?

Seems like Conway's law applies:-

"Any organization that designs a system (defined broadly) will produce a design whose structure is a copy of the organization's communication structure." -- Melvin E. Conway

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law

Yep. You are right. Insurrection.

From Star Trek: First Contact: "When you build a machine to do a man's job, you take something away from the man."

You surrendered the need to think to the machine. You are lesser for it. I don't think these AIs are just removing drudgery, like, say, a calculator. They actually do the work. Or more correctly, they produce something that will pass for the work.

Wholesale embracing of this sort of technology is bad for us.

I can't speak intelligently about UK centre-right, but here in Aus our Liberal party (as in classical liberal, centre-right) are almost indistinguishable for our Labor (centre-left). Big spending, big government and so we are seeing many of the same problems you mentioned.

I think I've known this for years. When I was a kid I had a book entitled "How things work". In it was a large picture, spread across 2 pages, showing birds, land animals, people in cars, trains, aeroplanes etc, all moving from left to right as if in a race. Above each participant was a figure indicating something like Joules per gram. The "participants" in the "race" were ranked according to this figure, with the front-runners having the lowest associated values.

Waay out in front was a man on a bicycle. Add in the help of cumulative drag and sharing the load against the wind resistance, it makes sense.

Yep, that's the basic idea. Not suitable for me though as I am not an Apple user.

Thanks, shortwave does look interesting. I'm not really a gmail user though, but shortwave does appear to allow for more group or sender oriented presentation of messages.

I want my email organised by sender, not by message. I want a list of senders with unread messages when I open the client. I may want some way to indicate which senders are more important so that they are displayed more prominently in some way.

Maybe this has been tried and it's shit. I dunno, but I like the sound of it. I think it might be a good way to cut through the noise of the inbox. When I get snail mail I will quickly sort by sender (then read the tedious shite first :-) ).

I should try and write it for myself.

I bought a couple of SolidTeknics[1] wrought iron pans, and I love them. You have to season them first, which essentially involves blackening them by burning good cooking oils onto them. I used rice bran oil for that. It's a bit of a mission, but you only do it once.

They are great because you can get them really hot and they have excellent heat inertia. You can put them in the oven if needed. And cleanup is simple: just hot water & a brush. No chemicals. I've often got the pan clean and back in the cupboard while my protein is resting.

But if it's not protein that your cooking on your pan, but instead perhaps its an acidic sauce, then I would recommend a stainless steel pan for that.

For pots I would go with stainless also. Or copper if you can afford it.

[1] https://www.solidteknics.com/

You'd trust a government with that?

I wouldn't. It may be simplistic but I think that the judiciary applying firm measures designed to protect the public and the biosphere, is the best approach.

I am 49yo, male. I'm healthy, but mildly overweight. I was very fit prior to the lockdowns (Melbourne, Vic, Australia), but I lacked the disciplinary wherewithall to maintain that fitness over the past couple of years.

I have chosen not to receive any Covid19 vaccinations and so I am "unvaccinated". I thought it was never going to happen, but eventually I contracted covid19, over Easter period this year. I too experienced myalgia, a mild fever. I also had a sore throat for about 2 days. I didn't completely lose my sense of smell, but coffee (for example) didn't taste great. Same with wine. That anosmia, such as it was, persisted for a week or two.

But that's it really. It was all over in about 2.5 days. I would not describe what I experienced as "harsh". I've had Influenza, and that was harsh. Sat me on my arse for a solid week. But not this. By day 4, I was doing household chores and more or less back to normal (mild anosmia not withstanding).

So, YMMV. :-)

Could it be (& I am asking) that he can invalidate the current contract on the grounds that daily active users aren't what twitter said.

Then could they draft a new contract, complete with a new price and daily active users estimates?

I don't know anything, so I'm asking. If someone out there is a M&A lawyer and can shed light, that would be great.

I see the author's scepticism of the bots argument, but I don't think it's one that should be dismissed so easily. I don't know anything, but isn't the value of these big tech properties largely in the number of actual human daily active users?

When Facebook acquired whatsapp, I remember reading that it wasn't the tech per se that facebook really wanted. It was the daily active users. Whatsapp had (still has? dunno) a pretty big userbase. That was the where a lot of the value lay for facebook, or so I understand.

So, if daily active users are important to the value of the property, do we believe twitter's SEC filing estimates of <5% bots? Musk doesn't, or hasn't been convinced by what he has seen.

That really does seem like a legit reason to abort the deal. Twitter is representing <5% bots. Musk thinks that's a wildly optimistic estimate & is prepared to call bullshit. Seems fair to me.

A more cynical view might be that Musk is simply looking to lower the price. Exposure of Twitter's bot problems in a court might not be very good for the share price. Just having Musk pull out (9 kids, he never pulls out) probably dips the share price. So, isn't it all good leverage to bring the price down?

People should listen to Dr Robert Epstein [1] and never use a google product again. Google are an advertising company and master manipulators. They have unprecedented control over people very thoughts and opinions. They should be avoided at all costs by any thinking person.

Of course, none of this helps Firefox. If anything, it suggests that they are pretty much fucked.

[1] https://open.spotify.com/episode/4q0cNkAHQQMBTu4NmeNW7E

Did you read the article at the link I posted?

From the article: 'The report defines scientific "misinformation" as content which is presented as fact but counter to, or refuted by, the scientific consensus - and includes concepts such as ‘disinformation’ which relates to the deliberate sharing of misinformation content.'

They define misinformation in terms of a "scientific consensus". That alone seems problematic[0].

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2719747/

What misinformation? And was it Rogan's view or that of one of his guests? And is it actually misinformation, or just controversial? Or you (& others) just disagree?

I mean, a lot has been said on Rogan's podcast over the years. Not all of it is likely to be correct. Even if we restrict ourselves to considering topics related to the Sars-Cov-2 epidemic, Rogan has spoken to many people, about many aspects of the situation.

I for one, quite enjoy his podcast. He speaks to many, varied very interesting and intelligent people, on range of topics. Politicians, scientists, doctors, special operators, hunters, actors, comedians, philosophers, ethicists.

But Joni Mitchell & Neil Young want Spotify to remove him from Spotify, because they disagree with something (or things) that was said on his podcast? And everyone agrees that this is a sound and reasonable thing?

I can't read Hebrew or ancient Masoretic text, so I'm kind of buggered. My illiteracy in ancient languages means that I must base my theology on translations.

That said, before the other day when you raised the question, I've always just taken Genesis 6:3 to mean that God shortened human life expectancy, and I've never looked it up in a commentary.

Anyway, thanks for alerting me to the alternative. I don't think I can explore it further at this time, as attaining the required linguistic skills is a bit "out of scope" for me at this time.

Reading this, I'm reminded of Homer Simpson: "I'm kind of a goof-off. It takes me a long time to learn anything ..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG6w0IAoT4U

You may be correct, but I think not, for the reasons laid out in the following commentaries.

From https://www.bibleref.com/Genesis/6/Genesis-6-3.html#commenta...

This is another fascinating verse which has been interpreted through several different perspectives over the years. It falls in the middle of a paragraph describing how a group known as the "sons of God" took human wives who gave birth to a generation of famous "mighty men."

Taken in direct context, this verse seems to declare that God will not let humans continue to lead such long lives. Perhaps the children of the "sons of God" and human women would otherwise have gone on living an extraordinarily long time. Or perhaps God is merely saying that even the normal lifespan of humans was too long, given the evil that is taking place on the earth. Considering how much evil man is capable of with a lifetime of less than a century, the capacity for evil over many centuries is immense.

In either case, God says that He will not allow His Spirit to remain in man forever. God's Spirit, in this sense, seems to be His "breath of life." Humans cannot live without God's Spirit or life-force; we are dependent on God to continue to exist. Now God declares that He will place a natural limit of 120 years on that mortal existence. Looking at life spans for those born after the flood, this seems to be the case. While not a literal maximum, life spans after the flood rapidly decrease until few live longer than 100 years.

Some have offered an alternate explanation for this verse: that God is declaring His judgment will come on the earth 120 years from the time of this pronouncement. That could be. It is also true, though, that eventually human lifespans decreased to a maximum of approximately 120 years. Joseph, for instance, lives to be 110. Moses lives to be exactly 120 years old, while his brother Aaron lives to be 123.

--------------------

From https://biblehub.com/commentaries/genesis/6-3.htm:-

My spirit shall not always strive with man.—The meaning of this much-contested clause is really settled by the main purpose and context of the verse, which is the Divine determination to shorten human life. Whether, then, God’s spirit be the animating breath spoken of in Genesis 2:7; Genesis 7:22, whereby human life is sustained, or the spiritual part of man, his conscience and moral sense—God’s best gift to him—in opposition to his flesh, the struggle henceforward is not to be indefinitely prolonged. In the first case, the struggle spoken of is that between the elements of life and death in the body; in the second, it refers to the moral probation to which man is subject. The versions generally take the former meaning, and translate “shall not dwell,” or “abide “; but there is much in favour of the rendering “shall strive,” though the verb more exactly means to rule, preside over, sit as judge. Literally, then, it signifies that the Divine gift of life shall not rule in man “for ever;” that is, for a period so protracted as was antediluvian life.

“On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.”

― Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

Genesis 6:3 (KJV): And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.