Sometimes very active discussions about peripheral issues overwhelm a thread, so this is a permanent home for those conversations.
I’ve opened a new “Sandbox” thread as a post as the new “ignore commenter” plug-in only works on threads started as posts.
This stuff has been discussed to death here at TSZ: Nobody except you sees any conflict in using the senses and brain you’ve got and relying on the assumption that this will give you the correct info most of the time. It seems amply justified by the fact that it works out fine in everyday life.
Your revelations sound awfully rational BTW. I first got the impression you were aware of information being transmitted: probably not “ATTENTION, THIS IS GOD SPEAKING” booming in your head, but at least involving a clear sense of communication. Are you aware of revelations occurring or did you conclude information was revealed to you by the type of reasoning you display above?
And he was fired for writing a blog post opposing the scientific consensus?
No he was denied tenure because he expressed an opinion that was unorthodox on his own time.
That is why it’s important to think deeply. Lots of things seem justified till you ponder them.
I am aware of revelations occuring because of the type of reasoning above. God reveals stuff through my senses and reasoning.
All of life is essentially a communication with the divine
peace
Ah, good to have that cleared up. Thanks.
fifthmonarchyman,
Are you sure – really sure, God-revealed-it-to-me sure – that this was not due to his unsuitability for tenure for academic reasons?
I heard the suggestion he was spending too much time writing a popular book and not enough time training Ph D students and working on grant proposals. I confess I only read this somewhere. I’m not in the revelation loop.
A possible way if it is logically possible given a finite mind.
Earlier:
If revelation does not exist, no conclusion could come in conflict.The senses and reasoning could lead to correct conclusions. That would be another possible way.
Without revelation as an absolute verification tool , I think that is a case by case determination.
And that fact is it based on reasoning that the only possible reason he did not gain tenure was his support of ID or that a possible reason for not gaining tenure was his support for ID?
With the proviso that your ponderings don’t come in conflict with revelation.
If He can do it in a way you cannot be mistaken why use a way the is known for its unreliability?
Be that as it may be, any more reasoning forthcoming on your fact of why tenure was not granted?
Everything is a nail if all you have is a Birmingham screwdriver.
peace
Does anyone still say that? It was a Brummagem screwdriver when I were a lad and came in handy for any delicate job.
Nobody round here ever did. Still, it paints a picture.
Is this an example of divine revelation?
If so it is horribly mistaken. Apparently knowledge of the facts in the denial of tenure have been chosen not to be revealed to you by your god and instead he/she/it has decided to mislead you with false information. It appears that your god can (and does) lie if he/she/it wishes to deceive.
I finally watched the movie Fountainhead which was inspired by Ayn Rand who wrote a novel by the same title. She wrote the screen play, so at least on that basis, it should have been reasonably close to the novel.
Rand is forgotten atheist thinker, but I can see why her views resonated with libertarians and why it didn’t catch on much in academia.
There is an idealism in individualism that isn’t practical. On a very simple level, major scientific discoveries take cooperation, and major experiments and papers involve co-authors. There are also many partnerships and corporate where complete individuality is counter-productive.
What Rand did was rightly point out the enslavement by the state against the individual which portended developments in socialist countries like North Korea, Venezuela, Cambodia, China during the cultural revolution, Islamic states.
She rightly pointed out, like Milton Friedman, that the USA is one of the greatest experiments of FREEDOM in the history of mankind, and it is one of the greatest examples of technological advance and standard of living.
Beyond that, the movie, as a story as an excursion away from reality was very compelling. I thought Gary Cooper and Patricia Neal played their roles powerfully. I would be willing watch it again since it was a cultural icon once upon a time.
https://www.aynrand.org/
Though this conflicts on many levels with the Christian world view, what I value is the value placed on freedom of thought and ability to follow one’s conscience. It is through this process I feel truth has the best chance of matriculating through a culture. And as Jesus said, “the truth will set you free!”
Former head of environmental group, GreenPeace Canada rips Alexandria-Ocasio Cortez. 3-minute video:
https://www.facebook.com/FoxNews/videos/2048521012113803/
Unfortunately, the most fundamental solution to the problem of the environment and being able to effect conservation is reduction of the global population from 7-8 billion down to what? 100 million.
The planet and civilization are dying. There is too much of a biological and psychological imperative to do what we need to save ourselves — reduce our population.
Even modest population growth rates, in 500-1000 years the global population would be 1 trillion people — assuming there is still a civilization.
It’s hard to be optimistic.
His name is Patrick Moore:
During March 2015 in an interview by French investigative journalist Paul Moreira, which was first broadcast on French television station Canal+ in September 2014, Moore was asked about the safety of the herbicide glyphosate. Moore told Paul Moreira that one “could drink a whole quart of it” without any harm. When Moore was challenged to drink a glass of the weedkiller, he refused, saying “I’m not an idiot” and “I’m not stupid” before ending the interview. Monsanto, primary producers of glyphosate weedkillers under the Roundup brand, denied having retained Moore or his PR agency.The interview came shortly after the release of a World Health Organization (WHO) report adding glyphosate to a list of probable carcinogens
newton,
See also Greenpeace Statement on Patrick Moore.
He’s a paid corporate shill.
I’m not that sure. It’s just a conclusion based on evidence mostly from my senses and reason. I think the only one who could possibly know for sure in the person who cast the deciding vote.
The important thing for this conversation is that we agree that if you taught at his university none of you would have felt compelled to sign a statement emphasizing that the faculty of your university does not share Allen’s unorthodox nonscientific position because he talked about it in the classroom or on his own time.
peace
let not your heart be troubled
peace
Have you considered the evidence of him not bringing in grant money equivalent to that of his peers in the dept. during his 7 year probationary period? Or his only mentoring a single graduate student to the completion of his/her Ph.D.? Or how about his lack of publishing any significant research during his tenure probationary period? Or the amount of telescope time that he was able to garner for research (kinda important for someone in astrophysics/astronomy field) during his tenure probationary period at ISU? Did you consider his complete lack of first author publications during his 7 year probationary period at ISU?
I’ve worked for more than a few tenure=track associate professors. If any of them had his track record they also would have been out on their ear and rightly so. Grant money, graduate students, original research, and publications are not suggestions for tenure-track employees but are things that are expected of them as a requirement of obtaining tenure. If you don’t make the grade you shouldn’t be surprised when you are asked to leave your position to make room for another prospect. They all start out as promising hires and it is up to them to demonstrate their worthiness for being granted tenure.
Bottom line he failed miserably and did not deserve to be granted tenure.
there was nothing in the statement the faculty signed that mentioned him at all. He , apparently, thought he was above the basic requirements for being granted tenure then whined about it when he was not granted tenure. Even if he had been able to get his book as being considered as being a scholarly publication that would have allowed his peers in the department to review it critically. I doubt that would have turned out well for him either.
Awful book. Awful movie. Awful person. Recently read that she went on welfare herself at one point. The biopic about her is gossipy fun, though.
Exactly, the awful movie is better than the awful book.
Yep
I appreciate your opinion.
I like delta Blues.
If Alan’s unorthodox ideas became popular with the unwashed I would not expect a statement like that to mention him either.
It would probably just say that the faculty was fully committed to the modern science of cosmology and very against unscientific ideas that would ignore the mountain of evidence for the consensus of science.
It would also probably point out and nothing in science should upset folks who wish to cling to their outdated unsupported science denying ideas because lots of folks who hold to science don’t actually think they are a BB.
peace
You seem to be of the opinion that he was unfairly denied tenure. Is that the case? If so what evidence do you think supports the conclusion that he be granted tenure?
I have no idea. Like I said the only way to know for sure is to read the mind of person who cast the deciding vote
What exactly would it take to get you to move on? It was years ago. Life is too short.
I don’t much like whiners but folks who constantly relive past battles can be sad.
My mention of Gonzalez was a silly throwaway line and only because he like Alan questioned the prevailing science orthodoxy.
I did not expect to get such a knee jerk defense of his treatment from you all despite the fact that none of you was in the room when the decision was made.
It’s almost like you are trying to convince someone of something.
The only positive evidence I have in his favor is that he seems to be an acceptable professor at Ball state and he writes well.
peace
In that case you should follow your own ‘advice’ and not bring up topics you don’t want discussed.
Many of us have some familiarity of the tenure process and what a candidate needs to accomplish to be successful in that endeavor.
Are you aware of the admonishments of his merit-review committee that he was not living up to the expectations for someone in his position? That he ignored their advice and assessments is more of a black mark on him than anyone else. The merit-review committees want the candidate to succeed but there isn’t much they can do if the candidate chooses to ignore their advice instead of addressing the deficiencies that were pointed out to him.
No not really. More an attempt to get you to discuss why his performance at ISU should merit a tenure faculty position.
So you would agree then that his performance during his probationary period at ISU was less than stellar as well as agreeing that any tenure-track candidate in a similar position would be denied as tenure as well.
Your senses and reason have been heavily influenced by your peer group and worldview, of course. We all do it. Odd that you think it’s a singleton deciding vote though. If 12 people are for something and 13 against, no one person casts a ‘deciding vote’.
It’s Allan. Have you flipped to Behe now? That doesn’t sound like the Gonzalez case any more.
I think we can all rest easy on that score.
If you exist, in whatever form, they are right.
Trump Tweets on indirectly on 737s:
The older style planes, in terms of stability, were a little more stable. That is to say, when the pilot let’s go of the controls and if the electronics go haywire, the plane could somewhat fly itself rather than go right toward the ground. In general terms on one end of the spectrum are dynamically stable planes (like say glider) and dynamically unstable planes (like the F-16 fighter).
There are advantages from fuel economy, etc. with dymamically unstable planes. Also fly-by-wire has advantages, whereby the pilot controls the airplane via computer. But — given all the times I’ve seen the blue screen of death on a computer, I can’t say I’m thrilled by it. I don’t even like anti-lock brakes because in the back of my mind, the electronics can fail.
Like in so many cases, trade offs have to be considered. So, I don’t know except to say, I don’t feel THAT comfortable with the direction of adding more complexity to passenger planes.
I was never a commercial or airline pilot, but I can say, when I was doing spin training, it was reassuring that a Cessna 172 had nice spin recovery characteristics. When I put the plane into a spin, all I had to do was to level my ailerons, full opposite rudder, elevator forward and in some cases let the plane head straight toward the ground and gain airspeed.
You’ll see a cockpit view of this procedure at about 1:00 in the video. It’s not too bad:
I did this again in a more aerobatic airplane, every thing go so blurry from the speed of the spin I couldn’t tell what I was looking at, couldn’t tell how far from the ground I was. It was just a blurr! Freaking scary.
In some other airplanes, if you go into a spin, you just say your prayers and get ready to meet you Creator. YIKES!
Admissions cheating scandal:
https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/felicity-huffman-lori-loughlin-mocked-by-fellow-celebrities-over-college-admissions-cheating-scandal
I hope the kids will get a little leniency, but the parents? I don’t know what is a just punishment. Will jail be the right thing? How about some fines and civil penalties to be used as scholarship money. I don’t know, but there could be conspiracy and wire fraud involved. Serious time.
I don’t know. I’m a little softer on white collar crime resulting in jail time. If it’s a financial crime and there could be recovery, I think returning money and damages is a better solution. I don’t know…..
I would think all the kids who were denied admission because of the fraud might be less forgiving, they might feel they suffered actual harm.
newton,
What I meant was that just throwing someone in jail but then not fixing the damage done to the victim is limited. If the victims, like those denied admission, can be finanacial compensated, that would be good.
That might of course mean that the kids of these cheating parents would have to be expelled to and the kids denined admission should be contacted and at least made an offer or sent some money if they’re already at another school.
Punishing the perpetrators need to be done, but if recovery to the victims can be effected, that would be better — at the expense of the perpetrators, of course. Make them feel some pain.
The punishment should be comensurate with the crime and restitution to victims, IF possible should be priority.
TRUMP just grounded the 737s in the USA. I guess some pilots talked to him. I’ve been hearing some grumbling from pilots. I think they know what the score is.
Apologies
No I’m just speaking in general
peace
I’m wondering if this result is relevant to what I understand is KN’s notion that human social interaction is key in epistemology?
https://futurism.com/quantum-physics-experiment-reality-objective
I would think that the reaility of two people having correct but contradictory observations would throw a monkey wrench into that idea.
peace
I doubt it, but maybe I should wait for KN to comment.
From the linked article:
I don’t find anything surprising about that, except that in my opinion they are misusing the word “correct”.
Note that this is from a thought experiment, not an actual experiment.
No it’s an actual experiment now. very interesting stuff.
Here is the paper fresh off the presses
https://arxiv.org/abs/1902.05080
What word would you use for a verified experimental result?
peace
Just omit mention of “correct”.
under the right conditions, two people can observe the same event, see two different things happen
, and both be correct.So there is not a correct answer anymore? Or is one correct and the other not correct?
peace
Truth (correctness) is a property of sentences. It is not a property of reality.
Using “correct” in that statement makes truth a matter of subjective determination. And that’s not what we normally expect, so I see it as a mistake.
In any case, we should take observations as neither true nor false. Observations cannot be tested. If I repeat an observation, that’s a new observation. It isn’t a test of the original observation.
It could be a test of the expectation that observations of a phenomenon will be consistent.
Reminds me of one of those bar jokes, with the punchline, “Rewind the tape, and this time double or nothing.”
Very interesting. Aren’t observations (ie sense experiences) a large part of the basis for knowledge in Non-Christian worldviews?
Apparently observations can be entirely consistent for one observer while contradicting what another person observes with an equal consistency.
Now that we have experimental verification for “no objective reality” at quantum scales the next step will be to scale it up to more familiar territory.
That should be pretty easy at this point.
Something like Schrodinger’s cat where one observer knows empirically that the kitty is dead while another knows empirically that the same cat is still in superposition (neither dead nor alive).
Peace
That would be about right for empiricism, as in the philosophical literature. I’m a kind of empiricist in the broad sense, but I very much disagree with what’s in the literature.
There isn’t anything wrong with observations, but there is no useful standard of truth for them as far as I can tell.
This gets back to your earlier complaint that perception is unreliable. And I disagree with that. Observation is unreliable, but perception is mostly reliable.
The difference is that the perceptual system appears to scrutinize observations for being reasonable, and to use multiple observations where necessary.
By analogy: The IP protocol on the Internet is an unreliable datagram transport system. The TCP protocol is a reliable stream transport system built on top of the unreliable IP protocol. In a vaguely analogous manner, perception is reliable though built upon unreliable observations.
I’m not too interested in the “literature”. I’m interested in what people actually believe
We are in agreement there sans God.
“mostly reliable” is like sorta pregnant
Different observations by a single observer are subject to error because our senses can’t be trusted.
The new experiment shows that observations by different observers can be incompatible even if we could trust our senses.
peace
Neither the transport system nor the protocol constitute knowledge. So I don’t follow the analogy.
A computer is roughly analogous to a mind but computers don’t know jack
peace
As long as we understand that in this experiment there are no human observers.
but they are the ‘observers’ in this experiment. At least they are the system which records in memory what the sensors detect.
no people were involved in this experiment outside of those who designed and implemented it.
fifth:
Nah. For instance, a test with an accuracy of 98% is mostly reliable, and there’s nothing oxymoronic about that. It’s not completely reliable, but it is mostly reliable.
Yep mostly reliable is just a little unreliable. LOL
peace
Are you sure?
I read it as Alice and Bob are the observers and Alice and Bob’s friends are computers.
As witnessed by the decision to perform a Bell-state measurement and establish her (his) own fact, or remove the BS to to infer the fact recorded by their respective friend;
peace
Dude,
Do you ever wonder why God refuses to reveal even some of the simplest things to you, like the fact that “mostly reliable” is not an oxymoron?
And if God won’t reveal it to you, why don’t you at least Google it? You’ll find plenty of examples of people using “mostly reliable” in perfectly sensible ways.
For example, continuing with the Internet theme:
That quote makes perfect sense, and there are plenty more where that came from.