Severian

You think Cameron doesn't have someone to clean his toilet?

That is not true. It isn't even true in our current theories. If you imagine a Z boson decaying to a quark antiquark pair (for example), the time of decay is not predictable. It is quantum mechanical and therefore random. The day has no cause. Even worse, the choice of particle to decay into (e.g. quark or lepton flavour) is also random. The beginning of existence of the quark has no cause.

No. Your use of science outlined in your post is not using it to answer moral questions (the question in the thread title). Your use of science is only to determine whether or not particular physical criteria have been fulfilled (or how to best go about fulfilling these criteria). The interpretation of these criteria as 'moral' is entirely subjective and outside of science. For example, you might want to use science to try and determine whether or not fish feel pain when caught by anglers. That is a fair enough scientific question. But the statement that anglers should not catch fish because they feel pain, is a moral statement and has nothing to do with science. To say that science can answer moral questions, is akin to saying that my keyboard replied to your post.

I think your point demonstrates the view that science cannot answer moral questions. I would hold that morality has nothing whatsoever to do with happiness. And unless you can prove (to 95% confidence) that it does, science can answer no moral questions.

Most just regard one parameter at a time. My paper was actually suggesting a way to quantify fine tuning with respect to multiple parameters.

There have been plenty of calculations done and papers written. In fact, I wrote one myself (published in Physical Review). Here are a few examples.

Its an absolute disaster, in my opinion. I was hoping for a labour-Liberal coalition which would, when combined, hold a majority. But we don't even have that. It looks like the only way we can have a coalition with a majority would be for the Liberals to join the Conservatives, and I am not convinced that would work. I am very disappointed by the Liberal Democrat's result. Once again, our electorate have chickened out of going for real change. They say one thing in public, but when they get into the booth, their tiny minds get scared and they vote the same way they always have, for the two big parties. I suppose that is the problem with democracy - stupid people get a say in the running of the country. I am also horrified by the voting irregularities. It is outrageous that people who got to the polling station before it closed were not able to vote because of the huge queues. But even worse is the stories that students who wanted to vote were segregated into a different line, and the 'normal' residents were given preferential treatment. That is downright election fraud, since it removes (or at least dilutes) the votes of a particular demographic. I hope we will see the official who ordered that publicly prosecuted and sent to jail. On a personal note, I am in a seat which had a small Labour majority in the last election with the Liberals second, and I was really really hoping that the Liberals would win. They didn't, so we are saddled with the same Labour MP who has been completely invisible to the consistency for the last 5 years. The Liberal candidate was local, visible and had already been working to make things better in our area. But the electorate vote, once again, for their traditional party. I maintain my tradition of never having voted for a party which subsequently formed the government, and (I think) never having voted for a candidate who won their seat. I do feel rather deflated and disenfranchised. Really, what is the point of voting in this sham of a democracy? It is also very sad that Evan Harris, who was one of the few friends of science in parliament, has lost his seat

As Nick Clegg said afterwards, we have all said similar things after talking to someone we disagree with. His only crime was getting caught. Who cares?

There are only two ways to become very rich (i.e. not just well-off). Either you are extremely lucky (e.g. win the lottery, or are born into wealth) or you steal it (morally speaking if not legally). No-one becomes very rich by working hard and being a nice guy.

I think there are two additional factors which will come into play in this election. Firstly, there has been a lot of emphasis in the press on share of the vote. The press now seem to regard a large share of the vote as a mandate from the people even if it is not transferred into seats. So the Lib Dems would become more influential with an increase in the percentage of people who vote for them. Therefore no vote for the Lib Dems is "wasted", even if it is in a seat they can't win, since it will increase their percentage and therefore influence. Secondly, I think a lot of people will vote for them simply in order to bring in PR. For example, imagine someone who would normally vote green. Even if they don't particularly like Lid Dem policies in general, it is advantageous to them to vote Lib Dem simply because a Lib Dem dominated government will introduce PR. We would never see a Green Party MP with first-past-the-post, so voting Lib Dem now is the only way to get a Green Party MP five years down the line through an election with PR.

Anyone can stand in the UK election. All they have to do is put up a 'deposit', which is £500, and have 10 people (eligible voters) to nominate them. It is just that the electorate tend to only vote for candidates supported by one of the big parties and the parties are obviously selective on who they choose.

In the UK Election campaign, electoral reform is becoming a big issue. At the moment we have a first-past-the-post system, where each individual seat has a restricted voter pool (by geographic area) and the candidate with the most votes wins the seat. This can lead to situations where a party with just 30% of the vote but voters concentrated in a fixed number of constituencies, can win the election, in preference to a party with 40% whose voters are all spread out. The Labour party is suggesting an "Alternative Vote" system, while the Lib Dems would prefer a Single Transferable Vote system, or as a compromise, the AV+ system. The conservatives want no change. You can find details on different forms of PR at the Wikipedia page, but I think this page is better. I am interested in both your opinions on different voting systems and your experiences with these systems where you live. Which one do you think the UK should adopt?

I am curious. Why would you, personally, object to being sexually 'molested' while in a coma? If you had no recollection of it and no physical consequences afterwards, you don't lose anything but the 'molester' gains pleasure. From a humanist perspective, isn't that a desirable outcome?

The actual equation is [math]E^2= m^2c^4 +p^2c^2[/math]. Your version is for a particle at rest, when [math]p=0[/math]. The photon has no rest frame - it is never at rest, so [math]E=mc^2[/math] does not apply. The energy of a photon comes entirely from its momentum. Since it has no mass [math]m=0[/math] and so [math]E=pc[/math].

Detection of the "antiphoton" was surprisingly straightforward. All I had to do was open my eyes. The photon (and the antiphoton, which is of course the same thing, since the photon is its own antiparticle) has zero mass, to the accuracy of our measurements.

We have measured it. It's definitely positive.

Our Science minister does have a PhD in robotics, but generally, the cabinet are pretty clueless.

The shadow Science minister said, in an interview with the Evening Standard "Right now, our country is virtually bankrupt, so major science budget cuts are inevitable." Science in the UK still hasn't recovered from the last Tory government. We certainly don't want a repeat performance: In this letter to the Independent, 22 distinguished scientists explicitly voice their concern over the possibility of a Tory government decimating UK science.

Do you think it should? Do you think industry would be willing to spend money to find out if the Higgs mechanism is correct, or what Dark Matter (or Dark Energy) are? Would they pay for the Planck satellite or the Diamond synchrotron? What about fission research? Once they have money to spend I assume they would give tax breaks to the rich. After all, it is the rich who will vote for them. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedHere is the Lib dem's latest party political broadcast, if anyone is interested.

More properly, anti-particles look like negative energy particle states propagating backwards in time. This is known as the Feynman-Stueckelberg Interpretation.

But even better would be: [math]X_c^2 = \frac{5T_R}{\sigma_B} \Rightarrow -T_R = -\frac{1}{5} X_c^2 \sigma_B[/math] So we have limitless energy, with the only drawback being the world would overflow with custard.

If the conservatives get in, they plan on seriously cutting funding for fundamental science research. So British science would be screwed.

Ozymandias. Or maybe Betty.

For those of you wondering what the Lib Dems stand for, you may find this interview useful. Actually, after listening to it just now, I am slightly reassured about voting for them. I do agree with them that giving all our children the best education and best chances possible from an early age, is the best way to improve our society. I am curious to hear that the Americans think of Nick Clegg. The interview isn't very slick or politically skilled, but he comes over as honest and decent, which is a refreshing change I think.

If I voted for them and they actually did get in, then I would feel a little bit responsible for inflicting their crap policies on everyone. Having said that, I will probably still vote Lib Dem since: 1. I still don't think they will get in. 2. Their policies may be crap, but they are probably less crap than labour or the tories. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged At the moment, they are polling 30% of the vote, so I think they have a large base of support.