The Lounge

Outside of debates about what really constitutes an addiction or not, let's just assume that all forms of excessive usage of pleasure-inducers is addiction. In that case, which addictions do you think would be considered more unattractive than others? Is a sober chain-smoker less attractive than an alcoholic non-smoker or vice-versa? Is a healthy non-user sex addict (think Tiger Woods) more attractive than a smoking, drinking, drug-user who is faithfully committed to monogamy? Is food-addiction and obesity preferable in a partner to other forms of addiction? What about obsessive-compulsive cleaning or other work (OCD) addiction? should this topic be for the lou…

I find myself quite frequently using google all day every day with out exception, And it seems all information needed for everyday activities, issues, questions, thoughts, directions anything literly can be found using this search engine. To my understanding this is not the end of google as we know it but as the web continues to expand everyday the more content thats added the information appeares to be endless. Can this in turn help people learn faster? and can this have any possible negitive effects on people, society or anything?

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Sorry to bother you and gate crash in on your community. Although I realize I am new here and what I am asking may be a bit much, I hope you will get behind me in my attempt to obtain seeding funds. My name is Andrew James Latham, a current masters student from the University of Auckland and a budding cognitive neuroscientist. For my PHD I want to start up a research program dedicated to looking at the cognitive and neural correlates of religiosity, morality and most importantly the interaction between them. While this is huge area it is one that I want to carry on with and become (hope to, if optimism is too much) a world leader in. AMP is currently running 'Do …

There are all these jokes about how awesome Chuck Norris is and how strong he is even though Bruce Lee is way cooler. I decided to take a poll about what people really thought about the two. P.S. Please choose Bruce Lee

Okay, lately there's been a lot of fear-mongering going on here in Europe involving the religion Islam and of the people who follow this faith. I am wondering whether anybody here knows what's the best way to counteract Islamophobia in our modern western society? It's a serious problem here and it has sparked fear and caused people to act/behave violently towards minority groups. What can governments do to help stop it? Are they doing enough to stop it? Will Islamophobia ever stop? I feel as though there is too much fear-mongering going on in our Western society from global warming to Halal meat. Anybody got any ideas?

Which languages are predominantely taught in US highchools? In Australia, both in elementary and highschool, Chinese, Japanese, Indoesian, Italian, French are most commonly taught. In USA schools is it just Spanish and French which are prioritised?

Just curious. It's one of my major hobbies so most forums I go on I break the ice with this question

With the countless ways of how to die, and its the only sure thing we all will do one day sooner or later. Was wondering what is your preferred way? In your sleep? Going all out? best place? with loved ones? old?

Or is this all just some silly propaganda stuff?

Would someone be able to give me the name of (or link(s)) to mac software which allows the free downloading of music..

This is in regards to a great sock mystery, im sure everyone knows what im speaking of here. I buy socks all ten pairs of them and within a week im missing half! This has gone on forever! Any help in the location and wharabouts of these socks? Under the dryer possibly but none under mine. left on the beach hardly only sandles, nobody borrows my clothing so thats out. Anybody have the same issue here? Or is this just another conspericy?

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i'm eloissa cunningham. please feel free to check out my profile. thanks .

Hey, what do you SFN members do for fun? What are your hobbies? And how do you guys find the time to contribute so many posts on SFN?

How do you spend your time when you're not doing anything? In my spare time I always read books on history. What about you guys?

So today I was thinking about how over the last 30-40 years there have been a lot of musical groups and artists that have had the staying power to continue to tour and sell out large venues year after year. I mean think of all the big rock groups from the 70's and 80's who still tour or toured in the last few years even if they band wasn't the original members. My question is do you think there are any current groups that you think have this type of staying power? I really cannot think of any current musical acts that will. I mean I can't imagine in 20 to 30 years seeing Lady Gaga, Ke$ha, T-Pain, or most other artists still preforming to large audiences. What groups do…

A groundworker friend of mine found two of these objects about two metres down in the UK in a clay layer...any info on what they might be? It is 65mm long and 20mm at the wide end.

Following an earlier suggestion... Find your favourite quote from these forums!

What is your opinion of secret organizations that play roles in the overall system of reality? Personally I feel uncomfortable, there are many reasons for this. I have a strong connection to trust, I cannot follow something blindly without firstly sensing an element of it. I don't like when things are committed behind the scenes, although I'm unaware of it I still do not agree with it occurring, especially when I'm involved with it's result and origin. Do you think that there are groups of people out there who control what you are allowed to know, and input false information into media streams to confuse or deter you from truth?

Related to the + and - vote for posts on this Forum. I have seen well formulated posts from fellow members being negatively voted on a regular basis. There is no bad wording, no attacks, no insults. resulting in some members with astonishing negative reputation, although always polite. One may disagree with one's ideas but Why do you vote negative?

Consider the source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,483477,00.html Which of course Fox News Channel digests to mean the following: (sigh)

On the grand scale of things I believe it is fair to say that modern science is wasteful, and overall a hinderence to our (humanities) total life span. What we do have is an oppurtunity, to live eternally under the natural forces that helped us evolve. Most scientists are taking full advantage of the claimed 'resource' and are using it to create (be creators, make their mark on the universe); resulting ultimately in mass consumption of vital "living power", for profits. I don't want to misuse the term profit, but it comes in many forms; knowledge, reputation or monertary based are the most common types of 'profit'. An unintelligent human could survive without the kno…

http://www.the-scien...s/list/279.page http://archive.scien...feb99_page2.htm http://www.timeshigh...torycode=415643 http://archive.scien...feb99_page1.htm Look at the content of these 4 links. Especially the third link is shocking. In molecular biology, biochem and the like one cites a lot. Does this mean excessive time is spent just reading other people's research? I'm an aspiring scientist, and I want to spend as much time possible solving my own research, and not just making preparations for solving my own by reading other's works. I find that way the best to become a successful scientist. I also would like to avoid to the largest degree possible, teac…

I wanted to vent a little in response to events, some recent, some not, and some recurring, in light of my role as a moderator. This is not any kind of official declaration of the rules, merely my interpretation and approach to enforcing them. It just seems like I've been spending more effort lately, and getting a lot more pushback, from being a mod. Moderator actions are not personal. The role of the mods is to enforce the rules and keep discussions reasonably on-track (which is a bit redundant, because staying on-topic is one of the rules). And the reason for having the rules is that IMO unmoderated forums pretty much suck — when there is no law, discussions dev…