There are 3 things that can change a person: Love, Pain and Age.
I made that one up a few years ago. It’s a pathetic attempt at being witty. Well, maybe it catches on and becomes well-known like some quote from Oscar Wilde or Voltaire (“A witty saying proves nothing.”)
A very interesting article on which I just have one comment. It concludes by stating that God cannot be proved or disproved by this research and he is right. However, if we are able to create such emotions on our own, it would show that it isn’t God who provokes these feelings.
Sam Harris, a famous critic of religion wrote an essay about what he thinks are the problems when calling oneself an atheist. I think it is a great read and points out many interesting things worth reflecting about.
Slashdot | German Police Arrest Admin of Tor Anonymity Server
I do not find the article that interesting especially because a poster pointed out that the whole thing is not such a big deal, but I think the discussion below is very interesting. Some of these posts (I have my threshold on +3, so I only read comments that are at or above +3) sum up my thoughts about Germany quite nicely. I do think that in Germany, people trade essential liberties for temporary security (“They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.” ~Benjamin Franklin).
I also like this post. I do not necessarily agree with his opinion that “Germany is one of the finest countries on earth, it was liberated from
a facist dictatorship and is now an excellent example of what democracy
can achieve given the opportunity”, his points are valid, however, and the characteristics he ascribes to German people are probably exactly what I dislike about the Germans.
Diluting the scientific method: Ars looks at homeopathy
This article provides a good overview about why scientists do not consider homeopathy a science and why it is completely legitimate not to do so. It cites articles from the pseudo-science journal “Homeopathy” and explains how many of the claims made in favor of homeopathy have no basis in reality and how studies that supposedly proof its effectiveness are flawed from a scientific point of view.
I hope it convinces some of the readers that homeopathic practices are questionable at best.
Physorg.com article
This is an Interesting discovery, I hope they can make use of it in the near future.
Finally a study that demystifies the out of body experiences that are often claimed to have religious backgrounds.
I think it is quite interesting, actually. I’d love to experience the sensation that is created in this study.
As I said in this post I’m lookin forward to a new Soldier of Fortune game. As luck will have it, Activision yesterday confirmed the development of a sequel. Unfortunately, it is not developed by Ravensoft but by a budget title developer. I hope they put real effort behind the title so that it can rightfully stand next to the old SoF titles and new FPS games like Crysis.
Copyright
I’m sure most of the people are aware about copyright infringement over the internet. The MPAA and RIAA fight back ineffectively employing DRM measures and try to stop P2P by suing users as well as providers of such services.
In my opinion, the movie and recording industries are wrong about copyright and filesharing in multiple ways:
First of all, their business model is obsolete. Record companies are no longer needed. The internet provides a convenient and cheap way for artists to get music to their fans and to collect the money without a man in the middle that has to be paid a substantial part of the income. More and more artists should start selling their music themselves instead of relying on companies.
Moreover, even if _nobody_ would buy their music although they are popular because of P2P, they still could make a living by playing their music live. P2P does not make people stop going to concerts, after all.
Supporting this point is the fact that nobody should be entitled to make money long after the work is already done. At the moment, artists make a record in a few days, maybe weeks and they get money for the sales long after they finished the record. Naturally, their income increases with time. They make a CD, sell it, make a new CD, sell it and they still get money for their first CD then they make a third CD and get money for their third, second and first CD (although the money they get for the first two will be less). It’s basically “fire and forget”. You get money but you do not have to work for it. Furthermore, famous artists get a substantial amount of money from advertising deals. Spreading their music freely over the internet should only increase their popularity and therefore their income from such deals.
Artists won’t stop making music when they don’t get money for it. Humans will always make music as they always have, long before recording music was even thought of. I suppose the quality of the music would increase when nobody would have to pay for it. Only passionate musicians would write and perform songs and therefore there would be less junk that only serves to collect a quick buck.
The RIAA and the MPAA probably recognize that they are not needed and now they abuse the government as life support. I think we should unplug the machines that artificially lengthen their lives although their death is long overdue.
The strongest argument against copyright I can provide, however, is probably this:
We are living in a democracy. The idea is that the people can decide. Obviously, taking into account the popularity of file sharing, we could state that a whole lot more than 50% of the population do not support copyright or at least do not consider copyright infringement a crime. The majority of people are pro file sharing. The majority does not condemn copyright infringement. In my opinion, in a democracy it should therefore not be illegal.
The people have spoken!
Theists often say that the universe and everything that developed in it could not have originated from nothing. In their opinion, there has to be a God that started things because everything has to have a cause and nothing can arise from nothing.
So I continue along this line of reasoning: What caused God, then? Surely, God has to be created, too? You have to apply the same rules here, don’t you?
You cannot argue that God simply was there forever, period. This argument could also be applied to the universe. It always was there, period. Or it arose from the Big Bang, period.
Too many people simply stop asking questions when it comes to God. Their logic does not apply to God, because he is supposed to be transcendent. Every question asked in reference to God can conveniently be discarded with his transcendence. Questioning God is therefore effectively canceled. They replace things that are illogical in their minds with things that are illogical but must not be questioned.
To me, theist religions are a sect like every other sect out there. Thoughts and questions are absurd by their standards or are made a sin.
