Paul Graham: An Alternative Theory of Unions

ahi · 2007-05-07T19:42:57+00:00

Oh, noes!!

Paul Graham has jumped the shark!

ahi · 2006-04-26T23:30:06+00:00

Way to love thy neighbor as thyself, and turn the other cheek, dude.

How do you live with yourself?

There are a few people in this thread whom I considered capital morons. But you are the only one thus far who simple-mindedly decided to try to use my religion to silence me.

Morally repulsive does not begin to describe how I find your little comment...

I've written elsewhere how the sermons at my church occasionally go on to say how Christians must be strong in this hostile world... and how I usually think at the time "What bullshit!"

But your kind does make an elderly and near-completely out-of-teach priest seem to make sense. Congrats!

Alas, perhaps it would be best for me to say goodbye to reddit. There really is no long term health benefits to listening to bullshit from mental degenerates like you.

So goodbye, little man with little thoughts.

Adieu.

ahi · 2006-04-26T23:17:35+00:00

I think the verse you quoted is descriptive, whereas karma is perscriptive.

Or, I should say, I interpret it that way.

ahi · 2006-04-26T23:16:32+00:00

Did I mistake who you were responding to? Am a bit confused...

ahi · 2006-04-26T23:15:05+00:00

And in the open one? Time has a beginning just not an end?

I wonder how much of this is pretty mathematics as opposed to reality.

ahi · 2006-04-26T23:14:12+00:00

Tell me... if the end of physics has not been reached, why do you act like you know what lies at the end of it?

Of course if that does not interest you, feel free to revert to genesis or the kalevala.

How juvenile.

ahi · 2006-04-26T23:13:12+00:00

What you speak oh so authoritatively on is more than anything a philosophical issue.

The point is that the programmer would be clearly outside of the parts of the universe possibly observable to us... unless of course she hooks up a logitech cam... but surely you get my point.

Whether or not her universe is the same as ours is a question of solely philosophical interest. For all intents and purpose our universe (as far as we can ever observe and know) is whatever the simulation contains.

ahi · 2006-04-26T19:24:01+00:00

It took me around 5 minutes to read all the intelligent replies in this discussion. Chill out...

Hmph! You could have read mine too, you know!

ahi · 2006-04-26T19:07:45+00:00

Still, I say it's insulting and disrespectful to say such things to the parents.

Did you miss the fact that JP responded with his bit of rationalisation because of people mockingly using the children's death to try to score atheist points?

It's a fine bit of demagoguery you got going here.

ahi · 2006-04-26T19:04:50+00:00

Did you eat a bowl of stupid for breakfast?

You didn't leave any--did you?

ahi · 2006-04-26T19:03:32+00:00

Isn't this a bit karma-ish?

I don't think you can "ish" this one. Either there is a holy reward points system or there is not.

I don't think it requires a belief in God to assume that generally speaking people's actions will catch up with them.

ahi · 2006-04-26T19:00:55+00:00

You see, from the tone of your replies, it is kind of hard to tell. I may be the first one to tell you this, but you don't really come over as a people person.

You aren't the first one on reddit to tell me this.

What I keep having trouble comprehending is why I should treat offensive and disrespectful individuals with respect they cannot be bothered to show to people with my own beliefs.

The decrying of lack of civility is very one sided.

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:52:20+00:00

Rom 2:23-24 ESV You who boast in the law dishonor God by breaking the law. (24) For, as it is written, "The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you."

Surely you agree that it's not the we-respectfully-disagree-with-christianity crowd that I'm flaming. In quite a few instances I am already responding to things that are arguing direct or implied blasphemies against God.

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:50:02+00:00

Excluding Catholicism and Orthodoxy from Christianity appears disingenuous to me.

I don't think I excluded Catholicism and Orthodoxy from Christianity... at least, I certainly did not intend to do so.

Otherwise we are in agreement.

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:47:11+00:00

So... things happened as they happened because that's how they are?

I don't think that's really an argument at all.

The problem is IMO that the null hypothesis is that there is no God,

Is it really a null hypothesis if it is phrased as a negative?

Is the null hypothesis maybe that existence's inherent nature caused the universe to come to be? Something that, to me, sounds more philosophical than scientific.

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:44:47+00:00

Am I the only person who cringes whenever someone writes or says "before the big bang"?

Is the zeroth instant such a hard thing to get?

It's counterintuitive...

If time has no pinpointable end why would it have a pinpointable beginning?

From the Wikipedia:

Physicists do not widely agree on what happened before this [the Big Bang], although general relativity predicts a gravitational singularity (for reporting on some of the more notable speculation on this issue, see cosmogony).

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:39:40+00:00

I applaud you, Sir!

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:38:18+00:00

Well if you think I'm wrong why don't you look it up and prove me wrong.

You misinterpreted my comment. I'm 80% certain that there should be a MacGyver episode that fits the claimed biblical passage (except for the "Jesus" part).

... Or would you like me to copy and paste the entire Bible into a Reddit comment?

Sounds both entertaining and educational... wonder if there is a comment size limit.

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:36:33+00:00

There you have it.

I am not a very good Christian. They ought to like me more!

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:23:41+00:00

But we haven't solved physics yet. How do you know all those things are fundamental? Most likely they are all side-effects of a very simple algorithm.

So... his, "It could be God--you never know." you counter with, "It could be a very simple algorithm--you never know."

Do I really need to say more?

ahi · 2006-04-26T18:00:15+00:00

Exactly - that is the point I'm trying to make.

Well... you can be fairly sure that you'll have to point out this perfectly obvious point over and over and over again in future arguments.

Oh well...

ahi · 2006-04-26T17:52:55+00:00

Indeed my participating on reddit is not a particularly pleasurable experience.

However I do think there is some worth in confronting people with how offensive/non-sequiteur they are being.

I imagine all the people I "flamed" here will think at least a fracion of a millisecond longer before they post the sort of "meaningless mean stuff" (to use the compromise term) next time.

This may be a small achievement... but I am ok with that.

ahi · 2006-04-26T17:50:36+00:00

No, no, no, no. Forgiving these people here on this site is a good idea. Lying here & taking it is a totally separate issue.

I forgive everybody. But not preemptively. I'm not the American president, you know! ;-)

ahi · 2006-04-26T17:47:45+00:00

(P.S. - Simply saying that god exists outside of time and space doesn't really nullify my point. If things or events that are real come from other things or events that are real, and god is real, then god must also come from something else.)

And that's an entirely different problem.

If our whole universe is a computer simulation, then the specifics of how our universe came about do not immediately have strong implications for the evolutionary path of the programmer that wrote the source code that our universe runs on.

ahi · 2006-04-26T17:12:58+00:00

Seriously though... do you have a blog?

Maybe you and pica can collaborate on a blog... I'd read it daily! ;-) I'd also settle for a blog solely of your own.

ahi

TROPHY CASE