Prometheus

10 minutes ago, exchemist said:

I guess one can argue the toss about whether they still qualify as "assumptions" or not, in those circumstances, but they are at least not "just" assumptions now: they are assumptions that are a good fit to reality.

All models are wrong, but some are useful.

23 minutes ago, exchemist said:

Rather interestingly, it seems that, to Einstein and Spinoza, this order effectively is what we commonly call "God".

It's also much closer to the Chinese concept of 'dao' than just about any Western concept of God - Spinoza excepted.

12 minutes ago, Implications said:

It is a matter of fact that every single one of us is going to suffer, and this is ample evidence that Richard Dawkins is wrong.

Dawkins is arguing that we are lucky to be alive, hence we should be grateful. How does the fact of suffering make this false? And why are you talking about evidence, it's a value judgement. He could have said we are unlucky to be alive so let's just end it now. All the evidence in the world doesn't make someone's attitude true or false (maybe good or bad, but that's a different discussion).

17 minutes ago, Implications said:

What explaining the rainbow does do , is prove that the Rainbow is not inherently beautiful, and is merely instrumental. What it proves is that beauty is merely an aesthetic.

I've come across many people with similar views, but can't agree.

First, understanding a thing adds beauty, not detracts. A friend of mine once said that learning to write fiction took the magic out of reading for him, because he found himself dissecting everything he read. I do the same now, but the magic of stories has simply moved from reading to writing.

Second, there is so much complexity in the world that we have no idea how close we are to understanding it all. If ideas like Wolfram's computational irreducibility hold, then we'll never know it all.

26 minutes ago, Implications said:

The nature of life is much like this. I argue, that science shows there is no spiritual, transcendent or philisophical quality to the universeand thet existence of life does not have value. What science shows is that there is an objective universe. Choosing to make life "what you make it" is idealistic and unrealistic, becuase you cannot make something true just by believing it.

I propose that the correct response to this unspecial nature of the universe, is something resembling stoicism or philisophical Buddhism. We must accept that suffering exists and respond compassionately to others and ourselves. We must be careful to not panic in the face of suffering, or else we will make it worse.

We must destroy the myth that things other than welfare have value.

I don't agree science shows there is no such thing as spirituality. Just because as we dissect the universe we find no fragment that is 'spiritual', does not mean it does not exist. Rather it's an emergent property of human (and perhaps other) societies. It would be like arguing economics doesn't exist because we have observed no economic atoms. Otherwise agree.

15 minutes ago, Hans de Vries said:

It is not hard to be rich if you're sitting on largest oil reserves in the world. 

I'll remind Venezuela.

1 hour ago, Goude said:

Dr. moody published and was fired in 1975, over 40 years ago. I can't think of a reason that would be documented for all time.

I ask because sacking someone for writing a fanciful book sounds illegal. Either there's been a miscarriage of justice, which i would have thought the author would have addresses, or something else is going on.  It's not mentioned on his wikipedia entry either.

1 hour ago, Goude said:

If you wish to believe in elves seen during drug trips that is fine with me.

Phi addressed this point. Obviously you've still not followed the link i gave regarding DMT - while admonishing others for doing the same for yours - otherwise you'd know that DMT elves have also been well documented by many medical doctors researching this drug. I know of one doctor, personally, who believes in DMT elves. Psychiatrists are a weird bunch.

1 hour ago, Goude said:

If you really believe NDEs are just "made up" then they have nothing to offer you.

I've nursed maybe hundreds of people through and from death, so i'm well aware of the value of these experiences. I agree the experience of death is something most societies avoid thinking and talking about to their detriment. But the issue you have raised is using them as evidence of an afterlife, which is a different question to value.

1 hour ago, Goude said:

"I saw a Wood Sprite
dancing on a leaf.
The more I looked at her
She looked right back at me.

She danced up and down the leaf
a dance I’d never seen.
Then quickly as she came
she disappeared again."

There's so much wonder and beauty in this universe, yet people still want to make up something even more wondrous, like they can't see what's before them.

The Wood Sprite doesn't need to literally exist for it to imbue our world with magic.

27 minutes ago, Goude said:

When the hospital senior management found out about the book,they fired Dr. Moody.

Is this true? I couldn't find any documentation.

Explain to me why if these subjective experiences are to be considered serious evidence of life after death we can't also take seriously people who report the existence of DMT elves (a real community of people, not one i've just made up).

26 minutes ago, MarkE said:

But isn't the opposite of 'random' something like 'directed', or even 'intentionally/knowingly'? Doesn't 'total randomness' mean machine-like, robot-like, factory-like, a clockwork-universe? 

Why would you think the opposite of random be intention? 

I don't know what you mean that total randomness is a clock-work universe. What even is total-randomness? 

21 minutes ago, MarkE said:

When I asked the question  what this non-random factor is, you replied with: "the laws of physics and the biochemical laws". So you're not making a distinction between the two, then. But the way I see is that there must be a distinction, because entropy predicts chaos and disorder. On the other hand, life forms, and especially humans, do the exact opposite, by creating order. 

The distinction i made between them was that one emerges from the other.

I'm no physicist but entropy doesn't predict disorder, but measures it. And chaos is an entirely different phenomenon again (i.e. non-linear dynamics). I think by throwing around these terms you are only confusing yourself.

37 minutes ago, MarkE said:

If the exact same laws of physics can cause both order, or (naturally) disorder, then what's the difference between the two? Aren't there 2 different paths one can take within 1 set of laws of physics? What's the difference between the atoms in innate and living matter? Because living organism are made of the exact same atoms compared to innate matter, but there's obviously a difference between the two. What's the difference, if it's not a different law of physics? 

We have regions of high entropy and regions of low entropy. Why would you think you need two laws of physics for this to be? By analogy you might say because there are diabetics and non-diabetics there must be two completely different laws of biology. No, diabetes and its absence occurs as a continuum in a single system.

11 minutes ago, MarkE said:

what’s the non-random factor directing this evolution, then?

The laws of physics and the biochemical laws that emerge from them.

Randomness is just one part of the evolutionary process. You also need some kind of self-replication and selection process. Evolution has never been understood as a 'completely' random process.

Another factor the above quotes seem to ignore is that evolution is a cumulative process. Those probabilities refer to typing out a book from scratch. The chances would be considerably shorter if you can keep intermediary stages - so once you have the first word 'correct' you keep it (as does evolution - each new species doesn't have to go through the entire evolutionary process starting from abiogenesis, just the preceding species).  The analogy between writing books and evolution breaks down here as one might ask how do we know what the 'correct' first word, or species, is. In the former case 'correct' is defined by some external criterion, but for evolution correct simply means it survives to reproduce.

1 hour ago, Duda Jarek said:

Bitcoin energy consumption below from https://cbeci.org/, nearly exactly 2x growth per year - in 6 years should grow for 1% to ~60% of world energy production.

Why would we expect exponential growth to continue? Sounds like a mistake in extrapolation. Much more likely is logistic growth.

7 hours ago, Goude said:

We need to discuss the video.

It's a bit disingenuous to ask people to click your link when it's clear you haven't read the linked article for the counter argument.

Especially when your 'evidence' is a youtube video, and the evidence you ignore is a peer reviewed academic paper in a psychology journal.

30 minutes ago, Goude said:

I know drugs can make you feel good, but they do nothing to change your belief system. NDEs are more than feel good, they teach you things unknown.

People's reported experiences with DMT, and other psychedelics, are every bit as profound as as those reported during NDEs. Read the link i provided above if you're interested.

7 minutes ago, Goude said:

I try to give them hope, 30-40 years ago NDEs were taught in college and to groups of suicidal people with some good results. There is a large amount of material. Too bad about its status today. It could help many find hope and meaning in life.

The same effect can be achieved with DMT. The way clinical trials are proceeding it shouldn't be too long before it is available for a number of conditions, including depression.

1 minute ago, Paimon said:

Quoting some scientists is not an issue here. The issue is not giving equal weighting on both sides of the story and not sufficiently quoting the scientists who argue for investigation on China. It's the bias of the "scientific journal".

If multiple scientists would argue for investigation on China and try to submit their work in Nature, do you think Nature will publish it? 

If you read the article you will see it quotes the scientist who published a letter in Science (the journal) arguing that 'the idea of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 leaking from a lab in China must be explored more deeply'. That's the very letter that has created this round of media attention, and likely ultimately led to your current scutinity.

So yes, Nature would publish it. Science certainly did.

Are you going to answer me as to which of 'we should not debate the lab leak hypothesis because it annoys China and we need China at all costs?' or 'we should not try to hold China accountable for anything, including possible crimes against humanity?' do you think that sentence supports? Or should i stop asking? Can i just conclude it was politically motivated hyperbole?

10 minutes ago, Paimon said:

"Allegations that COVID escaped from a Chinese lab make it harder for nations to collaborate on ending the pandemic — and fuel online bullying, some scientists say". What would you make out of that sentence? It's direct quote from that Nature article.

So the quote comes from some scientists. A scientific journal reporting on what some scientists say in the news section of that journal seems reasonable. 

Which of 'we should not debate the lab leak hypothesis because it annoys China and we need China at all costs?' or 'we should not try to hold China accountable for anything, including possible crimes against humanity?' do you suppose that sentence infers?

23 minutes ago, Paimon said:

It says that we should not debate the lab leak hypothesis of coronavirus because that annoys China and we need China at all costs (e.g. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01383-3). In the aforementioned link, Nature implies that we need China's cooperation so we should not investigate China or try to hold it accountable for anything (including possible crime against humanity). 

Where in that article does it state that we should not debate the lab leak hypothesis because it annoys China and we need China at all costs?

Where in that article, or any other Nature article, does it imply we should not try to hold China accountable for anything, including possible crimes against humanity?

13 hours ago, beecee said:

Pretty sure Krauss in one of the other interview Q+A videos, mentions that the seemingly good side of religion, as per the 10 commandments for example, does not have a monopoly on those qualities and ethics, rather that those qualities and ethics are more endowed with science in fact, as science and the scientific method is based on truth and reality, and how democracy would not be able to function without the basis of scientific pronciples and fact, rather then the myth portrayed in a mythical book written by peasents during the Iron age

Science and morality are different disciplines - one is what we observe in the universe, the other is what we bring to it.  Morality is not so straight-forward that we can afford to discard the millennia of thinking that has shaped our cultures. Instead we should be building upon that base, taking what is useful from our mythologies, and creating new ones in the shape of our aspirations.

13 hours ago, beecee said:

...and the logical succint replies to some of those questions, against real Idiots, as per the first video and Brian Cox and the stupid stupidity he needed to slap down.

If they are such idiots why give them credence by engaging with them? Such people have the same mentality that has people believing in a flat earth and lizard people ruling the world. No one believing it will be reasoned out of it and it just raises their profile by putting them on the same platform as respected voices in science.

It would be better to give a platform to reasonable people of religious leanings (yes they exist), so we can more quickly transform our mythologies and incorporate our scientific understandings. This is why i believe Sagan was the greatest communicator of science - he didn't just tear down old ideas, he offered a tangible basis for new ideas. And that basis is the same one that can be found in all spiritual traditions: wonder.

I think socio economic status is the larger factor here. Poor white people are just as uncomfortable in rich white mens meetings or business environments. There's a reason only 4% of UK doctors are from a working class background.

Personally, i have far, far less in common with the likes of Boris Johnson than i do my Pakistani friends i went to school with and lived next door to, despite there being some real cultural differences between us.

Maybe the experience is different in the US?

It's perhaps a different thing if we are talking about someone migrating to a new country. If i migrated to China, India or Nigeria i would expect some pretty jarring cultural differences in the workplace that would likely impede my progression.

49 minutes ago, SusheelMacherla said:

Why it has to be that humans the super evolved organism is so vulnerable compared to even the most primitive beings like bacteria or fungus? Fungus has better chance of survival than humans then why it did evolve into something more useless?

Fungi constitute ~2% of all biomass on Earth, humans 0.01%. Not quite useless.

Cryptocurrency is not beholden to national boundaries: it can be mined anywhere. Iceland has seen a huge influx of server farms making use of their hydrothermal power supply to produce coin relatively green and cheap.

As sub-orbital flights start to, er, take off, a more accurate estimate of the commercial safety profile can start to build. It's not fixed, as with aviation safety will likely improve with time.

How much risk to tolerate is a personal choice. I imagine there will be an initial wave of intrepid tourists willing to take the risks, and as price goes down and safety increases more and more people will consider it an option (i guess it will remain the domain of the wealthy for a few decades though).

I imagine the fledgling space tourism companies will understand how bad any fatalities will hurt their PR and so take it very seriously.

With the New Shepherd starting to take tourists this summer we won't have long to see how the industry approaches things.

23 minutes ago, DeepSeaBase said:

Awesome, I actually did not know this but now I do! Makes me wonder why we didn't just pay ULA to do it any differently? I mean decades ago...now that boat has kind of sailed.

I think it was a political move to keep ex-Soviet scientists from taking their expertise to places like North Korea and Iran. They're going to China now by the look of it.

23 minutes ago, DeepSeaBase said:

If SpaceX can bring the cost down to like ... $40,000 per seat for a meaningful visit (few days, a week?) I'd probably be more supportive of the tourism program myself.

Currently I'm probably just miffed that I'm getting older, a lot older, and all the cool stuff to do is being done by rich people who never worked a day in their life. Even the engineers building SpaceX rockets aren't the ones getting space-rides. And they are the reason that space-rides will even exist. Get my drift?

I'm very bitter at the idea of corporate effort // private gain.

If it takes 400,000 people to send one person into space, then the one person going into space better be the best person, not the richest person.

Fair enough. Blue Origin will send their first passengers up this July - one ticket is up for auction, the other three tickets are gone to unknown people. Hopefully it will be some of the development team. 

Another way to think about this inspiration. In a world of war, famine and pandemics having a prominent person dreaming of going to Mars can help people look up and dream big. I know dreams can't power rockets or feed a family, but i think it is sorely under-valued - we can never achieve more than our dreams, so dream big, work hard and see where it takes us.

4 minutes ago, DeepSeaBase said:

I don't think we have a russian made rocket supply chain? None of that makes sense. ULA and a few others are American based.

Why does the USAF need to give money to someone else to do what ULA is already doing?

ULA launch the Atlas rockets, which are the workhorse for American launches after the shuttle - including military payloads. They use Russian made RD-180 engines which cost about ~$10 million per launch and are non-reusable. 

ULA have been trying to get away from buying these engines from the Russian company NPO Energomash since at least 2014 but for whatever reasons have been unable. ULA also approached Blue Origin about developing new engines but have nothing serviceable yet. I guess the USAF are getting impatient with ULA on this so are looking elsewhere.

In this context the ~$80 million the USAF gave SpaceX in an attempt to move away from reliance on Russian companies seems money well spent. I raise this because government money going to SpaceX was generally characterised as being a frivolous waste going on some eccentric billionaire's pipedream of going to Mars. Government agencies are getting tangible benefits for their investments. 

33 minutes ago, DeepSeaBase said:

Why would space tourism be $23 Billion per year 9 years from now when Mount Everest Tourism isn't even $300 million a year? https://www.ucf.edu/pegasus/too-many-tourists/

My napkin math also says that at $50million per seat (that's what I saw for that Ohio billionaire going to ISS in 9months) to reach 23 billion per year means 460 seats per year.

There's 52 weeks in a year. We'd have to maintain a population on the ISS of +8 per week being cycled through like a cruise ship just to meet those quotas at current prices.

And if you lower the price you'll need even more people.

I'm not an economist, but that estimate comes from UBS research, part of a Swiss investment bank that perform economist forecasts. I couldn't find a break down of how that figure was derived.

They wouldn't go to the ISS long-term, it's only got 4-8 more years left. SpaceX plan to launch tourists with the Starship currently being developed. Axiom, another company, plan to build a commercial space station starting in 2022 which will take tourists, amongst other revenues (e.g. research).

Then there are sub-orbital flights which can cut 15 hour flights to less than an hour, in addition to any 'pure' tourism value.

43 minutes ago, DeepSeaBase said:

And frankly you're one accident away from killing 10+ scientists/mission specialists and 10+ tourists. 20 people blowing-up in space doesn't sound like good publicity. If you think that's far-fetched: https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-1997-06-26-1997177014-story.html#:~:text=The bus-sized craft missed,itself%2C damaging an external radiator.

We almost blew-up the Mir with a docking accident.

Although one might argue it was intentional to get rid of the American module Spektr lol - I love conspiracy theories.

Death in space tourism is inevitable and I don't think anyone has figured out how to handle the PR of that inevitability. Since pretty much only billionaires can go into space, it is inevitable that billionaires will die there in an accident. And that will be a lot of powerful estate money to sue the hell out of you.

Yes, the first commercial disaster will be something. But i think people willing to launch into space won't be the timid type, so i'm not sure how much it will impact the industry long-term.

You can get tickets to space for $250k with Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin - accessible to millionaires.

52 minutes ago, DeepSeaBase said:

I side with Ken Fabian who is quoted as saying SpaceX is unrealistic hype. But so is Axios and a few others as evidenced from this quote:

Like i said, that quote was from quite a reputable economic forecaster, independent of space industry. If you know of other reputable forecasts i'm interested in seeing them.

I understand people get annoyed at Musk's cheerleaders, but i think it's possible to go the other way and paint his ambitions as nothing but hot air. The truth, as usual, probably lies somewhere in between.

Maybe check the original bitcoin paper. Satoshi Nakamoto is a pseudonym for the still unknown creator of the most famous blockchain - having no credentials didn't seem to hurt so you should OK if your idea has substance.

6 hours ago, Ken Fabian said:

I don't think is possible to compartmentalise any company's finances like that - too opaque and too much overlap. Direct funding for Starship? Offhand I only recall "just" $80M to assist testing rocket engines that appears directly related. The $2.9M moon lander funding has apparently been suspended.

Apparently the US Air Force gave SpaceX $40 - 85 million to help develop the raptor engine. It's not money to prop up speculative adventure - the US air force wants something tangible out of it. In this case they want an American supply chain so they can stop relying on Russian made rockets. Sounds sensible for an Air Force. 

6 hours ago, Ken Fabian said:

I don't have a special issue with companies bidding for government contracts - which by their nature will include profitability for the contractor - but with misrepresenting it as a private enterprise industry and private industry ambition that stands on it's own feet.

I think we're using a different definition of private company so i had to look it up. I got this: The private sector is the part of the economy that is run by individuals and companies for profit and is not state controlled. Therefore, it encompasses all for-profit businesses that are not owned or operated by the government. It doesn't mention whether government is a customer or not (which makes sense to me, else every pharmaceutical company in the UK is not private industry either as the NHS is by far their biggest customer. By this, or another definition you know, is SpaceX misrepresented as a private company?

6 hours ago, Ken Fabian said:

I don't believe space tourism can prop it up and make it commercially viable - something of tangible value has to flow back to Earth.

What numbers are looking at to make you think this? Just US tourism (pre-pandemic) trade was worth $2.9 trillion per year. If space tourism can nab just a fraction of that they'd be doing OK. What's flowing back to the US in this case, other than tourists? By tangible do you mean raw or processed goods?

This article speculates that the space tourism industry will be worth $23 billion a year by 2030 - most of that from disrupting the long-haul flight market. 

Unless it's hard sci-fi (which it doesn't sound like) i don't think readers will question a spaceship surviving 5000 years. Unless you need it to remain functional and /or in good condition?