The philosophy thread
- Thread starter New Age United
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Padawanbater2
Well-Known Member
No, I don't believe in any kind of sentient intelligence directing the course of the universe. However, I do believe that the universe can figure itself out, that's exactly what we are and as far as I'm concerned, what we're here to do..
New Age United
Well-Known Member
"The universe can figure itself out" sounds conscious. Are you saying that we are the universe and we are conscious therefore the universe is conscious?No, I don't believe in any kind of sentient intelligence directing the course of the universe. However, I do believe that the universe can figure itself out, that's exactly what we are and as far as I'm concerned, what we're here to do..
Padawanbater2
Well-Known Member
That's exactly what I'm saying, so I guess to a certain degree, the universe is 'conscious'
pothead4life810
Well-Known Member
Any Sam Harris or Christopher Hitchens fans??
Padawanbater2
Well-Known Member
Big fan of both. I just watched an old debate with both of them, all jokes aside, Hitchens is a master debater. I like how they tend to compliment each other, reminds me of a good cop/bad cop scenario when they go up against people
reddan1981
Well-Known Member
My friends, had we had this discussion last week I could attempt to explain my view on this subject. I have had a nightmare two weeks, my wife and I have been implicated in a devastatingly serious crime and have had our children taken from us. I am in a fragile state and can't really gather my thoughts, I am glad I have had this chance to converse with you all but I think this might be the last opportunity I get to visit this site. Having already served a ten year sentence and being on life licence my hopes are bleak, but I do have hope as my wife and I are innocent. I will report back with any developments in my case if I get the opportunity. As idiotic as it maybe to do this, my email is [email protected] My Facebook; Daniel smith I attended Meadway school, U.K.
I am part of a team attempting to make people aware of the lies that are being taught. We have experimental proof of our claims and everything I have attempted to argue here is TRUTH. I can not condense my proof to you in this setting however. Do any of you understand the Doppler effect? If you do you will know that sound has a maximum speed, we supposedly spin FASTER than the speed of sound. If you can understand the implications of this premise you will understand....
I am part of a team attempting to make people aware of the lies that are being taught. We have experimental proof of our claims and everything I have attempted to argue here is TRUTH. I can not condense my proof to you in this setting however. Do any of you understand the Doppler effect? If you do you will know that sound has a maximum speed, we supposedly spin FASTER than the speed of sound. If you can understand the implications of this premise you will understand....
New Age United
Well-Known Member
We wish you all the best Daniel if you are innocent then just have faith that justice will prevail.
I'll keep in touch I'll try to send you an email some time today.
New Age United
Well-Known Member
@Heisenberg @tyler.durden @Padawanbater2 @reddan1981
I hope you are all watching this thread this is the last time I'll tag you unless I have a good reason.
What are your thoughts on the way society presents itself in the media? It seems to me that in the 50s and 60s society was trying to present itself as being more innocent than what it was, nowadays we focus on all the bad and it seems to have gone to the extreme and now we project in the media a society that is more evil, I honestly think that society is now more innocent than is projected in the media. Is the media an accurate portrayal of real world human beings? Or is it just a little too dramatic?
I hope you are all watching this thread this is the last time I'll tag you unless I have a good reason.
What are your thoughts on the way society presents itself in the media? It seems to me that in the 50s and 60s society was trying to present itself as being more innocent than what it was, nowadays we focus on all the bad and it seems to have gone to the extreme and now we project in the media a society that is more evil, I honestly think that society is now more innocent than is projected in the media. Is the media an accurate portrayal of real world human beings? Or is it just a little too dramatic?
Padawanbater2
Well-Known Member
I would say the media has full control over that, and the way they tend to portray society at large is only to push their own agenda. For example, I just saw a clip of Rep. Alan Grayson talking to an anchor on Fox News about the republican strategy of shutting down the government, the anchor was very clearly only interested in pushing why Grayson's plan goes against the constitution and "fundamental rights of democracy" and other such retarded nonsense. When it was clear to the producers she was losing the discussion, all of a sudden they didn't have any more time, the grin on Grayson's face at the end of the clip says exactly that.
I think as a society, we should stop looking towards the propaganda machine that tries to scare and divide everybody into buying whatever it is they're selling. I think progress is being made on that front, but people need to be more consciously aware of the biases they're exposed to every day and if you have one conversation with your average conservative, it's very clear a lot of them don't employ the same kind of criticisms to the things that tell them what they want to hear..
Heisenberg
Well-Known Member
Remember the media is a general term. There are some good outlets out there, particularly foreign ones. But yes the vast majority of media outlets have numerous problems. Part of the problem is that marketers are smarter than ever. Whether it's to sell a product or an idea, they have been researching the ways to influence the human mind for decades and decades now, and some of their tactics utilize the media. Even worse, the news itself it now marketed towards demographics, essentially selling a product in the form of an echo chamber. All this taints the integrity of the information we are getting.
The 24hr news cycle is relativity new, and get's blamed for a lot of the problems. News outlets must compete for ratings, which drives them to sensationalism. Now that online and social media have come along, there is a perfect storm fostering the return of yellow journalism.
I also have a personal hypothesis that many people, at least in America, are too easily swayed and satisfied with pretentious cosmetics. It only has to quack like a duck, and no one cares to check and see if it really is a duck. We have a vapid generation that was never taught to strive for anything deep, because there are no losers. Everyone who plays gets a trophy. Every test answer gets partial credit, because at least they tried. They grew up with Nike telling them "just do it" and and BK saying "have it your way", and watching people like Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole be celebrated for nothing more than being vacuous. They go to colleges where they were recruited by predatory advertisements making superficial promises for the purpose of filling seats and securing loan money. They sit and pretend to learn, the teachers pretend to teach, and then they get a pretend degree so they can go out into the world and pretend to do a job. The worst part is that they are completely satisfied with the pretending; pretending they have a career, that they are loved, that they have informed opinions, and that they understand the world. They do this all the way up until the end when they pretend they're not really dying, but going somewhere else.
You can see this manifest in the current PC movement and in the form of social justice warriors. They have no problem pretending that something they've read/heard/seen is offensive, sexist, racist, classist, ect. They do not have the ability to think deeply, and so if you object to their accusations in any way, they wont be able to follow you, and decide you are offensive as well. It looks like a duck, so it must be a duck. They are unable to understand hypocrisy, so censorship somehow becomes freedom of speech. If you are not aware of the recent spat of speakers being uninvited to colleges, comedians being shammed off of Facebook and Twitter, or do not participate in arguments on social media, it may sound as if I am being cynical. Perhaps I am.
The 24hr news cycle is relativity new, and get's blamed for a lot of the problems. News outlets must compete for ratings, which drives them to sensationalism. Now that online and social media have come along, there is a perfect storm fostering the return of yellow journalism.
I also have a personal hypothesis that many people, at least in America, are too easily swayed and satisfied with pretentious cosmetics. It only has to quack like a duck, and no one cares to check and see if it really is a duck. We have a vapid generation that was never taught to strive for anything deep, because there are no losers. Everyone who plays gets a trophy. Every test answer gets partial credit, because at least they tried. They grew up with Nike telling them "just do it" and and BK saying "have it your way", and watching people like Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole be celebrated for nothing more than being vacuous. They go to colleges where they were recruited by predatory advertisements making superficial promises for the purpose of filling seats and securing loan money. They sit and pretend to learn, the teachers pretend to teach, and then they get a pretend degree so they can go out into the world and pretend to do a job. The worst part is that they are completely satisfied with the pretending; pretending they have a career, that they are loved, that they have informed opinions, and that they understand the world. They do this all the way up until the end when they pretend they're not really dying, but going somewhere else.
You can see this manifest in the current PC movement and in the form of social justice warriors. They have no problem pretending that something they've read/heard/seen is offensive, sexist, racist, classist, ect. They do not have the ability to think deeply, and so if you object to their accusations in any way, they wont be able to follow you, and decide you are offensive as well. It looks like a duck, so it must be a duck. They are unable to understand hypocrisy, so censorship somehow becomes freedom of speech. If you are not aware of the recent spat of speakers being uninvited to colleges, comedians being shammed off of Facebook and Twitter, or do not participate in arguments on social media, it may sound as if I am being cynical. Perhaps I am.
Heisenberg
Well-Known Member
Anyway here is an example of someone who is pretending to do her job. This woman calls herself an investigative journalist. Notice that she actually does no investigation at all.
Notice that her investigation was nothing more than an exercise in confirmation bias. She started with the conclusion that we are seeing alien spacecraft, and then haphazardly attempts to rule out other explanations. True investigation requires the attempt to disprove the explanation itself, not merely shoot down competing ones. She took her camera down to the location, but rather than trying to verify that what they were filming is truly an anomaly, she simply captures more of the same. She essentially uses the very same data that led to the hypothesis to test the hypothesis (aka the sharpshooter fallacy). She could have easily put a white sheet at some distance from the camera covering half the field of vision so we could see if the object was really close or far away. She could have set up a second and third camera to catch the same object from different angles. Instead, her efforts were put towards hype and sensationalism, because she doesn't conceive the difference between pretense and reality. After all, it looks like a duck.
This clip is mostly more of the same, but if you skip to the end (4:30) you can hear her confused indignation at being criticized. She doesn't understand why her journalistic integrity is being questioned. She defends herself by saying she has done many serious stories, not realizing that those serious stories are where journalistic skill and integrity are needed most. It makes her pretentiousness more concerning, not less.
Notice that her investigation was nothing more than an exercise in confirmation bias. She started with the conclusion that we are seeing alien spacecraft, and then haphazardly attempts to rule out other explanations. True investigation requires the attempt to disprove the explanation itself, not merely shoot down competing ones. She took her camera down to the location, but rather than trying to verify that what they were filming is truly an anomaly, she simply captures more of the same. She essentially uses the very same data that led to the hypothesis to test the hypothesis (aka the sharpshooter fallacy). She could have easily put a white sheet at some distance from the camera covering half the field of vision so we could see if the object was really close or far away. She could have set up a second and third camera to catch the same object from different angles. Instead, her efforts were put towards hype and sensationalism, because she doesn't conceive the difference between pretense and reality. After all, it looks like a duck.
This clip is mostly more of the same, but if you skip to the end (4:30) you can hear her confused indignation at being criticized. She doesn't understand why her journalistic integrity is being questioned. She defends herself by saying she has done many serious stories, not realizing that those serious stories are where journalistic skill and integrity are needed most. It makes her pretentiousness more concerning, not less.
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Heisenberg
Well-Known Member
New Age United
Well-Known Member
Ya there definitely should be a dislike button that's what I like about yahoo answers you have a thumbs up and a thumbs down it's really a more accurate way of determining popular consensus.
New Age United
Well-Known Member
@tyler.durden isn't it possible that the sheer amount of the universe that is uninhabitable is a part of the grand design, as if the universe had to be so big in order for the miniscule chance of life to come? And just as a vehicle is designed iintelligently can you not get a lemon? And can you explain how DNA communicates the information it contains? Is the DNA code intelligent?