Archive through March 23, 2024
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Non-Game Discussions: Physics and Hard Science:
Archive through March 23, 2024
UFO video debunked?
https://youtu.be/qsEjV8DdSbs
You misunderstand me. I know we can unleash a fusion reaction.
This experiment is a net-gain fusion reactor. That’s the part I’m agnostic on.
You said 'Fusion has been reached'...
It's not that I didn't understand what you said; it's that you didn't accurately communicate what was actually notable.
I have been fascinated by wolves since taking a course in predation during college. (Engineers had to take one hard science course and I thought studying predators would be useful for my intended Army career.) I have read a lot and know a lot about them. I have spent time with wolves, fed them, brushed their fur, played fetch.
It has been an axiom of wolf science that you cannot use DNA to tell if an animal is a dog or a wolf. The DNA is the same.
Until now.
New studies have found a gene that allows you to digest plant-based food. Wolves have 2 copies of this gene while dogs have 25.
It gets better.
Neanderthals (not us but we all have 2% N-DNA) and those Cro-Magnons (us) more than 15,000 years old have only two or three copies of the equivalent gene and got most of their calories from meat. Modern humans have over 20. Curiously, Inuits/Eskimos and Tibettans have only five or six copies.
There's a tad more. We know from genetic studies that the human hunter-gatherers of Europe did not take up farming. Instead, they were out-competed and replaced by newly arriving populations which brought farming from somewhere else. The original H-G peoples of Europe died out or a few survivors got genetically absorbed into the arriving farmers. Those arriving farmers had the plant-digesting DNA that we modern humans have.
All posts prior to 2023 will be deleted June 27, 2023.
I saw the 'ring of fire' Saturday morning. It seemed strange that such massive astronomical bodies could line up and afford us a show worth talking about. All so small from a local perspective, yet the utter magnitude of the larger picture of the solar system, and universe beyond left me in an unexpected state of awe.
Then my father started croaking out Johnny Cash and my moment was over.
Jean, Albert, Steve Cole, and Leanna saw the Ring of Fire in Midland (four hours south). It was something of a fun all-day expedition, left my house at 7am and got back there at 6pm. I'm sure Jean and Al took the full 12 hours from their house (picking me up at mine).
Found this link in post on Trek-BBS: https://dinosaurpictures.org/
Garth L. Getgen
Love the dino link!
The most depressing/uplifting video ever (or why we should not be mad at Biden, Trump, Saddam, GWB etc etc etc etc)
https://youtu.be/zpU_e3jh_FY?si=N5ApiFxAca7H7Zvo
If you like science without the gobbledigook ^^
If you like science without the gobbledigook ^^
One thing it isn't, "Short and to the point"
I listened to the video, and I find it ironic. She claims there is no free will, and then claims there are different things to worry about.
It's ironic, because if there's no free will there's no point in worrying about anything at all. Because you can't do anything of your own will, period. Meaning all you do in life is simply experience your E-ticket ride and all future actions and experience are either a-priori determined, or if random, simply a sequence of events you experience where you have no choice in what occurs.
Honestly, her take on the science is not science, it's metaphysics, because she draws conclusions that cannot be directly supported by positivistic testing (empirical evidence). I also think her sophist conclusions are rather obviously wrong, simply by referring to common experience and observation.
Can you imagine the consequences if we *really* believed there was no free will? The two primary bases of the criminal law is to punish offenders for their actions so that they don't re-offend, or to deter others from offending - i.e., to try to control the behavior of others.
If there's no free will, then there's no point to the criminal law, because people's choices are predetermined.
If there's no free will, then people are simply machines. The consequences of THAT kind of thinking we see in the history of the Soviet Union.
I'll take a hard pass on this line of thinking. And if you disagree with me, don't worry about it - because my reaction to this video was not my choice, and neither was this post on the BBS. 
Quote:If you like science without the gobbledigook ^^
One thing it isn't, "Short and to the point"
Actually, a lot of it was gobbledigook. The presenter's logic reminds me of this logic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf71YotfykQ
A rather silly, and IMHO arrogantly short video on a richly interesting and complicated set of topics. Let's distill all of physics and metaphysics into a glib summary in 10 minutes. If you disagree with any of it, you are a science denier. Thanks!
--Mike
Ted, yeah it is a strange place we live in and are part of. Take such a thing that we have a sense of self despite our brains each consist tens of billions of neurons of which none are smarter than a brick. Which one of them is ME?
Mike, her later video where she re visit the subject is more polished. Maybe you like that one better.
"God knows everything, the past, the present, and the future. He knows what you are going to do before you had the thought to do it. He knew what you would do before you left the womb, and whether you would grow old or succumb to an accident. God knows what your fate will be. Thus God presents us with the illusion of free choice. In reality we have no choice." If we have no choice, the why do we have a devil to tempt us? God made Adam and Eve but knew that Eve would fall for the temptation of the apple (aided by the aforementioned Devil). Without free choice what was the point?
That humans have free choice is self-evident. Arguments otherwise therefore ultimately rely on bad logic or bad assumptions.
Regarding God's omniscience, there is a difference between knowledge and choice. The human will is still present and engaged in a choice, even if the path that will be chosen is known ahead of time. In other words, it's a logical fallacy to conclude that God's knowledge of our future choices (assumption) means that we actually had no choice to begin with.
Thinking on it - this topic is not really suitable for "physics and hard science". It's left the realm of positivism into metaphysics, philosophy, and religion.
Which I'm happy to talk about. However, it's not physics and hard science...
The action of staying on topic requires an equal and opposite reaction of getting off topic.
Ted, yes, agreed. So back to the topic. I was reading a comment in the Military thread about blaming Biden for Afghanistan and replied something cryptically that "there was no other(sic) way things could have turned out differently." I was thinking on how the foreign policy is shaped by actions and events in the past. How Biden, like Trump, is a product of the political system. How the military is built and shaped by those policies and political system. This was why observers thought "Here we go again" when GWB invaded Afghanistan. They saw a pattern repeat itself. Of course it would, since the government of the US had not changed much over time. It was all actually INEVITABLE, but not for commonly understood reasons. "Physics and hard science" show it is because existence is deterministic in nature. Causes has causes has causes. Everything are chains of interaction from the beginning of the universe to the end of it.
To sum it up; "•••• happens, and while you can do something about it that, too, is •••• that happens"
Joseph Jackson: Well said.
How's this for on-topic?
Discovery of The Most Massive Supercluster EVER.
https://youtu.be/ZBsZFhMSHCQ?si=MUKkVOlmOYBXKUnE
Deep in the dark recesses of my mind I find the enormity of the universe terrifying. It is there that the cosmos speaks to me and tells me that that's only the part you can 'see'.. kiddo, you ain't seen nothin yet!
I wonder, if the universe is expanding faster than light, could we not call that a 'natural' phenomenon? Thus, is it not just a matter of time before we begin to harness that as we have wind and water, the power of the atom, etc?
Deep in the dark recesses of my mind I find the enormity of the universe terrifying.
I find the size an example of how tiny and unimportant humans are.....
That with all the problems here on earth,
so many waste their lives trying to figure out something millions of light years away that occurred millions of years ago, while things get worse here.....
On the contrary, my good man, on the contrary.Rarity and difference define value. To our knowledge is there anything more different or rare in the universe than us? Only by science and the unsung faith of diving head first into the unknown can we ever discover and place a true value upon our existence.
The vastness of reality demands we (as you say) get over our selves and solve some of our many issues. Yet it also unambiguously implies that there is so much out there we must take that leap and leave the nest at some point or forever fail to realize out true potential.
That is the heart and core of 'hard science.' To find our place and potential in the universe, and maybe learn to not go scorched earth with each other along the way.
But, you know, I understand that opinions vary.