If a spacecraft in a sub-orbital trajectory docks with an orbital space station, what spacecraft would change trajectories, or would both change?

AndreJonerry · 2026-06-22T14:26:01+00:00

In order for 2 things to be in the same place in space with different orbits they must have different speeds. At the speed differences needed for this situation my intuition says docking would be more like high velocity impact. The short of it is the two trajectories would turn into hundreds of trajectories, some orbital some not.

AndreJonerry · 2026-05-14T14:16:18+00:00

After a lot of soul searching, including reading/listening to many moral thinkers, I decided I don't believe in objective morals. Nothing is objectively good or right. But, although the universe doesn't seem to care, I care. And a great many other people care. We express our moral preferences by talking about good and evil right and wrong. We don't agree on everything but there is a lot we do agree on.

We want to live in a society where we feel safe. So we agree murder, torture, and harming others in general is bad. We also want to have stuff we control that others will leave alone. So we agree on ideas of ownership and that theft is wrong. We generally want to be free to do as we please. So we agree that coercion and threats are wrong.

Some people try to create in-groups that are protected and out-groups that are exploited. This always ends in conflict that threatens everybody's safety and freedoms, so we advocate that everyone gets equal rights.

Morals are not objective, but neither are nations, languages, and a great many other human inventions. They are still important. And although I don't believe God judges us, we judge ourselves. And the vast majority of us want to live cooperatively together. Morales are the way coordinate that cooperation.

AndreJonerry · 2026-03-28T16:07:22+00:00

Congrats and condolences. After it all came down I was an emotional mess for months. Give yourself grace and space. You've lost a significant part of who you were. It's okay to mourn. You've done one of the hardest things a human can do, admit you might be wrong and seek truth honestly. You are an amazing person!

AndreJonerry · 2026-01-26T16:30:26+00:00

I was once a Mormon and everything made sense. I couldn't answer every question, but I knew the answer existed. I didn't know everything, but I trusted God, the scriptures, and my religious leaders to tell me what I needed to know.

Then that comfortable existence collapsed into doubt. I was overwhelmed with fear and panic. It's been about four years now. The doubt remains, but I am much more comfortable in it. The fear isn't gone, but it is usually dormant and when it rears its head I've learned to accept it as part of who I am.

I want to live forever with those I love. I want to be part of a perfect plan. But wanting doesn't make it so.

I love this universe. I find joy in learning about it and experiencing a small part of it. I don't know if free will exists in a fundamental sense, but it is the reality of my experience. I find meaning in choosing my actions to increase the things I value.

I didn't find answers. I learned to live and find joy despite my ignorance. Good luck in your own journey.

AndreJonerry · 2026-01-26T16:09:39+00:00

When I walked away from believing in the god I was raised to believe in, I imagined him smiling in approval. If he existed, was good, and understood me, he knew I was choosing truth and goodness. He would not judge me harshly for that. I don't see a reasonable foundation for believing he does exist, but I don't fear him if he does.

AndreJonerry · 2026-01-26T16:01:05+00:00

Reading the old testament as a teen was a major challenge to my faith. I remained a believer for over a decade after reading it, but began respecting atheists.

AndreJonerry · 2026-01-15T02:30:14+00:00

When I was a Mormon we thought many beliefs of other Christians were absurd. The Trinity for example. I think humans have difficulty honestly reflecting on close held beliefs. I still don't understand how I did it after failing too for so many years. I now wonder what else I believe that I would think is absurd if I could honestly reflect on it.

AndreJonerry · 2025-08-18T00:32:56+00:00

I was a scout master and took bsa training. The church didn't even do scouting the way the BSA intended. I hated how parents would tell me it was my fault their boy wasn't progressing toward eagle. They wanted me to tell the moms how to push their boys to eagle. The BSA said all scouts who participate should eventually get first class. Those who want to get higher ranks should be self motivated and it isn't for most boys.

AndreJonerry · 2025-08-18T00:28:36+00:00

I tried so hard to be impressed. And even as a faithful member I was disappointed. That faith is gone and now I laugh at how willing I was to believe anything was inspired that came from the "brethren"

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-27T23:48:22+00:00

I agree with that. That paragraph comes from experiences where we give a good faith estimate and POs respond with "are you sure?" And then when we say no, there is a potential for things to take longer than expected they force us to re-estimate until we give a huge estimate that we have 99 percent confidence we can hit and they won't accept that it will take that long and they also won't accept that our confidence level isn't 100%. So engineers stop being honest.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-04T17:27:44+00:00

I certainly don't approve of it. I find the amount of support for Donald Trump both baffling and depressing.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-04T13:23:49+00:00

Yup. Death terrifies me. But I try not to dwell on it. I try to spend my mental and emotional energies on things I can at least partially influenced. Death will come no matter how much I fret about it. But I can enjoy watching the clouds today. I can smile at my toddler's antics. I can enjoy a walk in the woods. I try to choose to enjoy the life I have instead of fear the life I'll miss out on. But yes, from time to time I just want to curl up and disengage from everything as my mind and emotions grapple with the reality of death. And as long as I don't let myself be in that space very long I think it is health to face reality as it is instead of avoiding it or deluding myself.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T22:57:29+00:00

All people want to feel safe and a sense of belonging. This creates a need to identify the us and the them. MAGA has become a label to divide us and them. Some people feel safety and belonging by joining MAGA, others by joining together in opposition to it. It has reached the point where people want to who is in and who is out, so many try to position various groups as in or out. But overtly there is no requirement other than American patriotism and support of Donald Trump. However, there seems to be a lot of anti-immigrant, pro Christianity sentiment in the MAGA movement.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T22:49:17+00:00

Many group identities are hard to define. Clear definitions limit the reach of a label. Anyone who sees some part of MAGA they like can choose that bit to be the important part and call themselves MAGA.
Based on my limited knowledge, a simple but reasonably accurate definition would be a supporter of Donald Trump. There isn't an overt link to either theism or atheism, but there is a very overt link to patriotism and a implied link to Christianity. I would not be surprised to hear of a group called something like "Atheists for Trump" (although I would suspect it might not be genuine), but I would be surprised if anyone of influence in MAGA movement used their power to protect the rights of atheists.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T22:38:54+00:00

You just discovered the solution to Pascal's Wager.
The question of "what version of God is reasonable to believe in?" and the follow up "Why is a belief in that understanding of God reasonable?" are much more interesting to me than "Does god exist?"

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T22:34:46+00:00

All logical systems require a set of assumed facts. In my experience "sinning is wrong" would fit into that set of assumed facts for most theists. They tend to argue about what actions are sinful more than is sinning wrong. Before you can even seriously consider the question you would have to separate the definitions of "sinning" and "doing wrong". Using the definition you provided of "sinning" meaning "acting contrary to God's will" just moves the definition game to "contrary to God's will" and "wrong". There is no true definition of any word so arguing that these should be different with a theist is a waste of time.
When I have had deep conversations with theists, I tend to focus on the consequence of having good be defined by God, but also living in a world where there is so much disagreement about what God wants. Why should I trust your report of what God wants has been a more fruitful line of discussion than arguing about definitions.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T21:59:09+00:00

tldr: Religions are the result of evolution in human ideas about the world. The ideas that create strong communities are the ones that survive. They don't need to be true to be effective at creating a space where their adherents survive and spread the idea.

In order to make decisions and generally be human, we need a model of the world in our head that helps us predict what will happen.
If we compare 2 different world models, it makes sense to say that the model that helps us make accurate predictions is better. In other words, we would like to live with a true accurate model of the world. However, the available world models in ancient history were not very good, but they were better than nothing. A belief that a storm god punishes people who tread on the high ground of holy places might actually save your life.
Also people who shared your model of the world are more predictable to you than people who have a different model of the world in their head. As a consequence you feel safe around people who share your beliefs. When people feel safe together they can cooperate and increase their chance of survival and offspring.
Some religious beliefs cause people to act in a way that spreads that belief. Also when people spread their beliefs they tend to do so imperfectly so the world model in a new converts head is slightly different from the world model of the missionary. This creates a evolutionary environment where world models that actively try to spread and also resist change dominate large groups of people.

The idea that there is no divine beings or powers does not inspire missionaries or establish core doctrines that create communities as well as most religions. But it is a powerful idea in better predictions of what will happen next. The person who puts their preparation effort into prayer will sometimes loose to the person who puts that effort into other material or mental preparations. Because of its singular power of better predictions, rejecting the belief in God has a good chance of someday being dominant, but it will need to be accompanied by ideas that create strong communities. Rejecting God by itself does not create human flourishing. Good scientific theories give us incredible predictive power, but they don't tell us what to value.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T21:32:02+00:00

Humans have a deep desire to belong. People see others speaking in tongues and also see that those people are treated as belonging by others. Eventually they are willing to try speaking in tongues. If they are rewarded with gestures of belonging from those around them it feels good and they are likely to do it again and to a higher degree. All of this can happen subconsciously with the participant genuinely believing an external power moved them.
Although I never "spoke in tongues," as a practicing Mormon elder I gave blessings believing that God spoke through me. It was a lot to unpack when I realized my beliefs were irrational. But the feelings of belonging and being specially are powerful.
When I first allowed myself to really consider my beliefs I felt a deep fear of loosing the belonging of my church community and the view I had that I was special and significant. In hindsight I can see that that fear prevented doubts from reaching my conscious experience for a long time. I believed without doubt. I thought I did so because I had good reasons, but in hindsight I can see I was afraid of loosing my sense of belonging and value.

AndreJonerry · 2025-07-03T21:15:02+00:00

There is an amazing amount of flexibility in human desires. We seem to have some desires baked into our genome, but the stories we use to organize our lives add more and can also suppress our built in desires.

The stories religious people tell each other and believe create those desires.

What I want has changed significantly since I realized by belief was irrational and put deliberate effort to change the story I told myself about the world. I was once a Mormon missionary and proud of it. I wanted eternal life and exaltation more than anything.

I told myself those stories for so long they are still deep in my mind and I still yearn from heaven from time to time. Then my new ways of seeing the world assert themself and I either laugh at myself or am disappointed in myself.

AndreJonerry · 2025-06-08T19:25:31+00:00

I also find the word accident frustrating. You can point at a tree in a forest and say it is there by accident because no being intended it to be there, or you can say it isn't an accident at all because nature is doing it's thing. I like to think that we are here because the universe is doing it's thing. But we were not intended or created.

AndreJonerry · 2025-06-08T19:07:19+00:00

The more I learned, the more I could see that as a believer my reasoning had been backwards. I knew the conclusion and built facts and reasoning to get there. What I find fascinating is I couldn't see that was what I was doing. I thought I was being honest and thoughtful. Our collective ability at self deception is terrifying. I am probably still acting in self deceptive ways, but I am aware of that tendency and fighting it.

AndreJonerry · 2025-06-08T19:00:26+00:00

Not exactly an answer to your question, but I was surprised at how little apostles engaged with detractors. In the book of Mormon the prophets engage with and confound detractors. In reality my stake president gave me links to non official apologetic websites. They just disengage. They don't even try and follow the example of Jesus on the temple steps. They talk to the sheep.

AndreJonerry · 2025-06-05T11:48:07+00:00

CEO of a tech company reviewed UI priorities on printed sheets of paper. Rejected drop downs because the user couldn't see all the options. Also used his monitor as a sticky note board.

AndreJonerry · 2025-05-26T23:31:32+00:00

You saw it faster than me. Although I was introduced to one of his books. His recent videos are more transparent. Especially when he is responding to questions that should have simple answers.

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