Sentrovasi @ Sentrovasi @kbin.social

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2 yr. ago

This is really strange in two ways.

One, you're not describing science but existence. Science is nothing if not a framework of knowledge based on the scientific method. To somehow come up with a definition of science that separates it from the scientific method actually removes all qualities of knowledge from science (do you think religious people also don't define their knowledge as "what is"?) On the whole, basing your definition of "Science" as how laymen define science seems to be a strange way to try to make a supposedly mathematical argument - from imprecision and abstraction?

Two, to conflate Science with existence essentially is concocting a truism - like when someone asks you to solve for x you've chosen to define x as whatever you want then solve it. Science as the sum of empirical human knowledge is an approximation of x, and as a mathematician I'm sure you understand the significance of how an approximation of something is a world apart from the thing itself. You cannot say that science is truth, therefore science is true - that is a pointless statement that completely drops all the reasons why science is more truthful than religious knowledge or any other form of knowledge.

"If the story of Adam and Eve wasn't true and correct, then there wouldn't be any humans."

You have a very binary understanding of what is necessary for something to be true that is almost dogmatic.

The rules of chemistry need not be true and correct for formulas to succeed. People were doing correct things for the wrong reasons, even scientifically, for centuries, if not millennia. Think about things like surgeons not washing hands, inefficient gunpowder, bloodletting, or the attempts at a unified theory of Physics - we know that not everything is correct, yet the formulas don't fail at small enough scales/slow enough scales/within certain observational parameters.

You're right that science aims for truth, but that doesn't mean it can attain anything more than our closest approximation of the truth (limited by human perspectives and resources). We believe in it because it is what works, for now. And the beauty of this is that if one day some incontrovertible proof for a higher being does come up, we will recalibrate all our theories to account for it (presumably after very, very stringent checks.)

Now if your whole point is Science has done very many good things all around us, that is 100% true! But that says nothing about the truth value of Science, beyond that there is a lot of evidence of it working that one time (which is not what you seem to be claiming when you say it exists regardless of belief).

If all it takes to make science truth is to provide quotes of famous people calling it truth, then religion is probably truth a thousand times over.

A lot of the arguments and evidence you bring to the table are circular and only true from the reference point of whatever internal logic you've decided to assemble for yourself. Does this mean you're surrounded by Chinese shills? Probably not, but that is also apparently the truth you've decided to believe in, evidence be damned.

What people are trying to make you see is that epistemologically, absolute truth is a ridiculous bar that, if you set as the hurdle for science to meet, is only going to disappoint you time and again.

Scientific knowledge does not have any special status or truth value conferred on it beyond the very educated guesswork of scientists and the time and effort and money that goes into verification. It's an endeavour that relies entirely on empiricism and the flaws that come with having limited human perceptions.

Does this mean that science is exactly the same as religion when it comes to reliability? Of course not, because the things that you choose to believe in when you believe in science are different, more accurate and reproducible.

To claim that science has some ineffable attribute that puts it above any other belief, on the other hand, is discounting and discrediting the effort and very nature of scientific knowledge, and ascribing to it the kind of mystic quality that is exactly what makes religious knowledge so ridiculous.

Sega Saturn controller. Unplugged while my Uncle played Sonic and told me I was Tails.

I'm thinking about the games I played in my childhood that influenced what I like to play now, so it might be only halfway relevant to the question.

First monster collector: Pokemon Blue. Digimon World 1 was also one of my favourites, because of how real it felt, like a real monster. The one other monster game I really got into as a child was Dragon Warrior Monsters 2, I think I played Cobi's journey. It helped that a lot of my friends were playing it.

First builder: Simcity 3000. Started my lifelong love for city builders, even though I'm not great at them per se.

Theme Hospital and Dungeon Keeper 2 were my introduction to management sims and also my favourites for a long time.

As a kid I absolutely loved this RTS called Warbreeds because of the ability to graft any weapon onto any unit. Nowadays though I just find such mechanics fiddly, but as a kid it felt so sci-fi. In terms of time spent playing, though, the standout RTS was probably Starcraft.

I also played on a lot of MUDs as a kid. Wheel of Time (but had never read the books), Discworld (but had also never read the books), Aardwolf and I think one or two others. I was amazed at how it felt like I could do so much (even though most of the "free" actions were just emotes.

My first graphical MMO was I think Maplestory, which was a huge part of my social life as a kid. I think I miss the feeling of being part of a big community than the MMO experience itself, honestly. Nowadays when I try getting into MMOs it feels like that feeling of being a part of a giant community of people is gone.

There's a difference between conservatism and regressivism, and as you yourself keep saying, the Republicans you see on the internet (your source, apparently) are not just being conservative.

Which again, begs the question of why you think you're qualified to claim that this is some "truth".

And again, I'm completely sympathetic to the idea that uncritical hatred and demonising of "the other side" leads to uncritical and one-sided ideas of the "truth".

What I think you're missing is the nuance that someone can consider both sides and still consider that one side is indefensible. The disqualification of the modern Republican from being "good people" does not mean that someone has not carefully thought through their stand.

Now about how you react to bad people: you can give them a chance to be good - the benefit of the doubt that they may not actually be standing for everything that being a modern Republican involves. But like I said previously, it might be a good time for those people to re-evaluate whether they actually are Republicans (an archaic term that has no real meaning today beyond a party affiliation) or feel like maybe it's time to recognise something has gone deeply wrong.

If this God exists outside time, it would make sense since we may be unable to perceive these perturbations in time - it will just always have been that way.

Then that leads to the even bigger question of how you know that not all Republicans - at least, its uniquely American construction - are bad?

(If you mean to say that in your country, republican is a beautiful-smelling flower, then the answer to that is that in common internet discourse, it has come to mean the American GOP, and people who may be taking the hyperbolic stance that all Republicans are bad are talking specifically about those Republicans. Just FYI.)

And don't get me wrong, I'm a huge supporter of the idea that increased polarisation and demonisation of the other side is only going to push people towards extreme positions and alienate those who only support a small number out of the basket of things that are in that box: things that may be necessary for their continued survival or way of life.

Nonetheless, given what the Republican party has begun to stand for more and more, with its wilful ignorance and inexplicable support for Trump, it is becoming increasingly indefensible to believe that people who will vote for that particular team, regardless of the consequences, are not basically complicit in evil.

I personally don't think all Republicans are bad. But even the good ones have had years to consider if maybe they were the baddies. And if they recognise that there are deplorables among them, then maybe they shouldn't take criticism towards the loudest of them so personally either. And consider moving away from the Republican brand.

Wait, if you're a Republican and you're admitting that Republican politicians don't have critical thinking ability, then why are you still voting for having them run a country and affecting the livelihoods of millions (billions) of people?

If the only Republican policies you're supporting are benign ones (as a non-American, I don't know which those are), are they worth all the ones that oppress and take away the rights of others?

And if you're a Republican but not a fan or voter of the Republican party as it stands, then maybe you need to reconsider what your definition of a Republican is, because Republicans themselves today are defining themselves in ever-bolder terms.

I think the older generation got used to the stereotype that if people were posting with emojis, they would naturally be making more immature posts (being younger). There are a lot more people from the older generation on the Fediverse.

For an example of this generational gap: you mention that "On Reddit people use emojis a lot" - that genuinely is not the experience on Reddit I had: when I still used Reddit frequently, emojis were treated with the same level of disdain (which both explains and is explained by the condescension around the Emoji Movie).

So you're signalling that you're from a certain generation and looking to appeal to people who are similarly from that generation of people who like to use emojis to express themselves. That's going to attract some people and also going to rub others the wrong way. And that's fine! Keep using your emojis. You just might want to remember that a lot of the people who hated new Reddit and a lot of the people who left Reddit for Lemmy the first time are/were going to be old-timers (by internet standards), so you might find fewer like-minded people here.

As a last note, your saying you "miss emojis" makes me feel extra old (and I don't think I'm old at all!): it suggests that the time of emojis has not only eclipsed the internet culture I'm familiar with but has died out also. That's two eras. It's fortunate that at this current point in time, it seems like digital cultural eras can pass in weeks.

To be fair if the goal is understanding why, then even things like goods not being substitutable are useful for understanding. The OP wanted to know why, not know how to predict them accurately. The original suggestion to learn economics would teach them that.

I (charitably) think the fact is that they may also have misunderstood Cyberpunk to be more about hacking than it actually is, and are using "spy" despite a lot of CP2077 not being necessarily about remote hacking cameras at all.

Fucks Pez!

Feels like you're conflating all the Israel-Hamas issues together. None of that is relevant to what I said (maybe the first sentence is?) and I agree with most of it.

Sorry to be replying so late, (original poster of the post that generated all these comments here) but I think you're missing the forest for the trees. You're right that entire families disappearing probably will get more people to sympathise. That was my original point. Hamas wants innocent Palestinians dead just as much as Israel does. Whether they'll fudge numbers to move that needle up or not is not really important at that point: some people just feel like in the face of that political reality, is it really so unlikely that they'll do so?

At first I thought I was an Angel, then I realised it was ChANGELing.

The sad thing to me is that I don't think either government genuinely cares about the 195 deaths except as political leverage on Hamas's side and 195 fewer problems in Netanyahu's way.

I just went to check and it looks like they were banned for asking somebody to kill themselves...? Feels like maybe they shouldn't be doing that, regardless of whether or not they were on their fifth account.

Their original comment used the same word "downline", so I'm sure you can figure out from context that they're asking if you want to help them do the same thing they're already doing.