Phi for All

Hey, are we done with this conversation? You're repeating yourself.

It would be hypocritical of me to call Christians out on that, seeing as I don't believe any of it. Telling zealots that they're interpreting scripture incorrectly, has that ever worked? In my experience, no. Once he's in jail, we're going to spend a few more years powering-washing racist stains off our country, we're going to call out this bigotry for what it is, and these maggots are going to fade back under the rocks where they belong. And hopefully their kids will be able to move forward and not be the embarrassments to democracy their parents were.

The church owns 177M acres of land across the globe, dwarfed only by the British Royal Family at 6.6B acres. King Charles owns 1/6 of the surface of the Earth. None of these organizations are about to start bitching about wealthy people. Are you somehow expecting modern Christian leadership to actually practice the teachings of Jesus? I'm not sure if the Church has ever been much interested in attracting worshipers through example.

"Having money" isn't the same as being a millionaire or a billionaire, is it? There are plenty of stories in the Bible about fair business transactions. Being "rich" is mentioned as bad, and being a moneylender was also bad. I don't think just having some money was thought to be evil.

The Christian god's son thought it might be easier to thread a needle with a camel than for a rich person to get into Heaven. Can't see how a "Christian" feels good about amassing enormous personal wealth while fellow people starve.

I just heard someone do the math to show that the average McDonald's employee would have to work for 3000 years to earn what the McDonald's CEO made in 2017.

PatrickStar and MichaelLewis have been banned as sockpuppets trying to manipulate discussion for personal gain.

! Moderator Note Pretty shady. You're also the OP, so that makes you intellectually dishonest on top of ignorant. If you need a sockpuppet to sell your idea, maybe it's not good. Closed and trashed, no more views here, whore.

I hope this isn't the general sentiment. It isn't possible to be a billionaire (US) without unethically exploiting many aspects of the free market. You've probably heard the math by now. We pretend your "position" pays you $1 every second you're alive. That's $60 a minute, $3600 an hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. At that rate it takes a little more than 11 days for you to become a millionaire. At the same rate, it takes just short of 32 years to become a billionaire. If you have multiple billions of dollars, you have it at the expense of many, many people. You've used your money to do things nobody should be allowed to use their money to do, you avoided paying your fair share of taxes, and underpaid those who actually did the work you got paid so much for.

It's ironic that your attitude about cars and driving in general, including all the complaints, are often the very source of heavy traffic, the thing that makes most of us hate driving. Meta-studies have shown that the cause of traffic is simple: brake lights. Stepping on your brakes takes energy out of the system and signals others who see you to do the same. Who causes more people to step on their brakes? People who focus on their own needs and comforts while driving, rather than reading the road conditions and cooperating with the drivers around them. Driving such a mass of metal at high speeds is dangerous if you're inconsiderate. If driving were dancing, it shouldn't be break dancing or disco, it should be ballroom dancing, where you need to cooperate and make it easy for others to enjoy doing what you're also doing right next to them. Your dream car sounds like you favor competition over cooperation. My CIVIC helps my society. Make sure your BARROW doesn't put you in an early grave.

There are only a couple of things on that list that are objective, that don't rely on your personal preferences (which interest me NOT AT ALL). Some of them seem downright dumb, like being "neatly constructed". You mention Tucker in the title, then apparently change your mind and just start listing things you like. One of the few objective listings is "American-built", but I'm guessing you're an anti-union person, so I can also guess you want this car dirt cheap and don't care if the workers aren't paid well, as long as the car is practical and quiet and roomy and good-looking enough for you. Your dream is basically my 1997 Honda Civic, built here in the US.

Sensei is purposely confusing judgement with enforcing established rules. He didn't like something I wrote in another thread, and seems to be hyperfixating. I wouldn't worry about it. On the whole, the Abrahamic religions want us to view the father as infallible and all powerful, while the rest of us are stacked up against our weaknesses and judged accordingly. And since this god is unobservable, all the earthly judgement is dispensed by humans. A flawed process for judging flawed people.

Observing what goes on in the universe isn't inspiring for everyone, I get it. With a god, you get to make it up, so it can be as deeply meaningful as you want. Very deep, very meaningful. Infinitely so, if you choose.

Smart means a LOT when it comes to personal beliefs. It seems like the ones most closely held are the most fragile and sacred, unable to withstand the light of scrutiny. Those types of beliefs don't seem smart at all to me. They wither when challenged, and are only fed by unquestioning faith. I think Einstein was too smart to believe in miracles. The cosmos itself is so incredibly awe-inspiring that just being part of it naturally is enough, and we don't need supernatural entities to explain anything.

Dave has been on holiday, and today he's back and will have a chance to take a look at this, see if we can't make it right.

! Moderator Note The problem isn't that we can't understand it. The problem is that you can't explain it using existing physics. You can't persuade anyone that your idea is valid. It makes sense only to you. It's not science. There are plenty of places on the web that don't require the rigor that we do when speculating. Why don't you go to one of those places? We're always going to ask you to give more support to your ideas than you seem willing to. Do this again and you lose access to your account. You've been warned many times, and never learn. Change is good.

Ah, OK. Cheap dig, then. Got it. Thanks for the generalizations. You so great.

And some can do both. Curb your prejudice, please.

Does your model say this, or do you? A good model is based on reliable observations and should SHOW how the explanation is formulated with as little assumption as possible. I don't think you can model something from before our observational abilities begin. You aren't modeling, you're guessing.

On the whole, this has been my experience. The vertical morality bothers me a great deal as well, judging others to place yourself above them.

! Moderator Note If you want to post this again in Speculations, feel free but know that we'll need supporting evidence, not this "one way to think about it" approach. We need more rigor in the mainstream sections. Also this: ! Moderator Note If you're looping time travel and God and evil into this, you need some extra evidence in support. As is, this can't stay in Classical Physics.

It seems clear now that he didn't expect to win. He was counting on losing to Clinton, so he and Steve Bannon could start their own media empire based on the outrage of a stolen election. He and his people knew nothing about protecting the nation. His son-in-law asked the outgoing Obama administration how many of them would be staying on. They had zero clues about how difficult the job was, and how the process requires knowledgeable people at every level. And it sounds like Project 2025 favors loyalty over capabilities, so no real changes there. Dismantling a democracy takes time, even if you have a good portion of the country helping you with all the hate.

! Moderator Note Let's not do this ever again, making threads about members. We have a process in place. Report posts that break the rules or inhibit the spirit of discussion.

On a science discussion forum, an extraordinary claim needs some extraordinary evidence to support it, so I'd definitely ask you for some.

Is that the point? I usually reject the premise that you hold all the philosophical answers and we're simply asking you the wrong questions.