Messages

1

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: Today at 03:02:43 PM »

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You mean the report into the bold faced lie that Obama made about what happened, and that the media did its best to cover up?  Funny, I read the report of the Republican led committee that actually looked at the decisions that were made, and as I recall it expressly supported the President's actual decisions that were made about what actions to take.  Imagine that, a Republican led committee that didn't take an opportunity to lie about what happened.
...

Why did the committee have authority to investigate? What legislative reason did they have to spend 3+ years on the investigation and subpoena all of Clinton's records? Whatever the legislative purpose its a lot more vague than we want to understand all the ways Trump tried to subvert democracy so we can write better legislation than the electoral count act.

2

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: Today at 02:30:53 PM »

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And I see no signs that the two Republicans have been muffled or relegated to insignificant roles.

So what?  This theme keeps repeating.  We each pick our political party, what we pick and what we stand for are not always the same thing.  Liz Cheney is doing here level best to destroy the party she claims to be part of.  Her self-labelling as a Republican is useful for the propaganda effort but has no real meaning when she doesn't represent any actual Republican interests.

Liz Cheney is doing her level best to destroy Trump and Trumpism and save the f-ing Republican party. Before she crossed Trump she was in the house leadership and her Republican credentials are solid, she just isn't personal loyalty to Trump. So calling her a "self-labeled" Republican like she just switched parties for the street cred as part of this investigation is disingenuous on your part.

3

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: Today at 01:53:36 PM »

And if this special nature is a goal of creation, why is so much of the universe absolutely hostile to biological life?

The earth is pretty comfy. We live here, not in space.

Why not a Mars that is twice as massive that kept a magnetic field and atmosphere that is hospitable to biological life? Why not a Venus that started with a thinner atmosphere that could be cool enough to support life? This stuff is relevant. If your argument is that an all powerful deity created the universe with the purpose of the specialty of human nature in mind. They did a lot of creating for one tiny pocket of humanity.

I think you imagine it was work for God to create the cosmos; that it would have been less labor to build something less large. That's not the case.

Looking at the universe as a giant experiment, grand design, whatever you wish to call it, biological life is absolutely an afterthought in such a design.

It doesn't appear that way to me at all.

If you wanted better conditions for life, you would subtlety tweak the laws of physics so that red dwarf stars that burn for trillions of years would be more magnetically stable so they wouldn't occasionally irradiate everything around them. All of this is relevant if you want to look out at the vastness of the cosmos and claim there is a creator who thinks biological life is special. Even within the vastness of our own solar system biological life seems very rare. With very minor tweaks in the formation of our solar system there could be 3 habitable planets. Venus is at the very close end of a possible habitable zone and Mars is on the other side. Small tweaks the right aspects of their mass, core, atmosphere and composition could make both conducive to life.

Yeah, and the earth could be an infinite plane. Or we could all have 10 higher IQ points. Or we could breath underwater. Or cheetahs could run 10 MPH faster.

It is the case that God made limited creatures that are less perfect than him. That is fitting and isn't an argument against his existence.
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I'm not making an argument about should human's have been designed better. I'm making the argument that the cosmos are mostly hostile to biological life of any kind. And very, very, minor tweaks to physical laws could make dwarf stars that last trillions instead of billions of years an ideal place for biological life. And with only slight variances in Venus and Mars they could be hospitable for life as well. So did "God" design the universe for life to be exceedingly rare? If so, why? You've posited that human rationality is one of the special purposes of creation. If so why not a cosmos that is hospitable to life. Why not a society on Mars we could debate meta-physics with? If you're going with both grand design and humans/rational beings are special then why will humans exist for such a small portion of the length of time of the cosmos? Absent colonizing other stars we have at best (assuming we don't kill each other off first) a couple billion years before the Earth isn't so nice any more. So all time/space and everything exists for rational life to float around an average star for a short period of time in the grand scheme? What's the simple explanation for that? More space and time are easy to create so God said why not?

4

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: Today at 01:39:30 PM »

Human nature and life is special. Is human nature that much more special than other highly intelligent mammals or birds?

Yes. It is much worse to kill your neighbor than it is to kill your neighbor's dog. Human's rational minds makes us more special and valuable than animals. Rationality isn't necessarily exclusive to humans, although it appears that way on earth.
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Define what you mean by rationality here. Other animals problem solve, communicate, form relationships, and have emotions. We do it with a slightly greater degree of complexity. What's the essential uniqueness of humans? That we do all of these with a larger degree of complexity than our ape cousins?

5

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: Today at 01:30:32 PM »

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I'll may get back to the other stuff later. But I think we're going to just talk in circles. I concede stuff is. At that level of meta physics you need to start asking what time is. There are explanations of GR that remove time (see Godel). So maybe there is no before, no after. That before/after and time are just human's imperfect perception of reality. Things always were and always will be. Either way: the universe just was or "god" just was. I don't find the latter any logical than the former.

None of the theories that remove time from physical equations have made much headway, and none of them can account for our subjective experience of moving through time.

Given our knowledge of the big bang, it seems much more scientific and reasonable to believe the universe had a beginning. In addition, there are real problems with positing that something which is complex has always existed; when two things are put together the question naturally is begged: why are those things put together? God is perfectly simple; his essence is his existence; so his existence doesn't beg this question.

Why can you ascribe this perfect simplicity with God and not the matter/energy of the universe? The matter/energy of the universe exists. I know it exists because we live in this universe. I don't know about God's existence or essence because God doesn't exist (to an observer) within our universe.

A God absolutely begs the question of how? where? what? why? Just as the existence of the universe begs those questions. You're just abstracting up one layer, saying God did it all like that actually answers any of those fundamental questions.

6

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: Today at 09:29:17 AM »

What if Trump was not in "The Beast" when the event occurred? Does that change anything as being possible then?
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They shouldn't have had her testify to this second hand story unless they had the secret service agent willing to testify to it after. Because it doesn't really matter if he reached for the steering wheel or just screamed at his secret service agents about going to the capital. We know Trump wanted to go, we know he felt a lot of love for the crowd chanting to hang Mike Pence. Now the right has their "OMG" he might not have actually grabbed the steering wheel, the entire committee is a lie argument.

7

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: Today at 09:23:10 AM »

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As we have said before this is not a court (other than court of public opinion). Trump and McCarthy had their chance and threw it away.

Don't lie to yourself.  This is a court, specifically a banana court.  There is no legitimate Congressional purpose to this committee.

Congress doesn't have a purpose to investigate how they came about being attacked by a mob being egged on by the President? Your idea of what congress can investigate must be very limited.

In what way is this a "court"? Other than they have people testify under oath. No one is on trial, no one is charged with a crime, no one is going to jail at the end of the hearings.

It is not propaganda. I think all of the witnesses (or at least a vast majority) have been life long Republicans who have been disgusted by the actions of Trump and his cronies.

It's complete and total propaganda.  That you can think a curated, one-side presentation without cross examination is anything but propaganda is incredibly disturbing.

Flip it around, if Trump supporters had put together a congressional committee with no meaningful Democratic buy in, would you be on here claiming that it was somehow not propaganda?  The reality is you would "know" it was propaganda from the start, there is no difference here.
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Trump and his supporters have had two years, 250 million dollars, and control of many state governments to show evidence of voter fraud. Your claim that its impossible to identify after the fact is shown to be false, just a couple months ago a Republican vote harvester in Pennsylvania was identified. And that was something like 20 votes. Yet you claim the Democrats are so clever and organized they can run organizations that handle 20,000+ votes without being identified.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: July 04, 2022, 05:42:32 PM »

I’m curious if you think every police and grand jury investigation is propaganda because the defense and the accused aren’t part of the police investigation and questioning of witnesses?

No one was denied due process, courts reviewed subpoenas, people were allowed to plead the 5th. Just because Trump’s coconspirators weren’t in on the investigation it’s propaganda? I think it might be intimidating to testify to Jim Jordan’s crimes if he’s the investigator. Republicans rejected the concept of a full bipartisan commission. And I see no signs that the two Republicans have been muffled or relegated to insignificant roles.

9

General Comments / Re: We gotta talk about Uncle Joe

« on: June 29, 2022, 06:23:45 AM »

Biden let his politics and personality issues get in the way of progress.

Usually someone like that would get accused of talking one way and acting another, but Biden talks one way and then talks another way too. He's nonsensical. And small minded, petty, along with grudging too. No better than the last guy and in most ways a whole lot worse.

Did not getting invited to the White House really hurt Tesla,  musk, or do anything to hamper progress? Also 2021??? For a minor snub of an unpredictable billionaire? Guess the right wing media is searching hard to talk about anything but Trump assaulting his secret service personnel so he could go watch people riot for him at the capital.

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General Comments / Re: Thoughts and Prayers - Again...

« on: June 24, 2022, 01:43:59 PM »

Time for those who wanted reform to recognize they have lost and to let it go...

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I don't think that is an option.

The only option for gun restrictions is probably expanding the court. Any legislation that is likely to be effective is going to be struck down by this SC. Not sure what the options are. Its just bad. Work your ass off for 10 years to raise the age from 18 to 21 or ban expanded capacity magazines. Then have the SC strike it down and expand gun rights 10 months later. Sounds depressing.

11

General Comments / Re: Thoughts and Prayers - Again...

« on: June 24, 2022, 01:13:39 PM »

Supreme Court ruling expands US gun rights https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-61915237
US Senate passes first gun control bill in decades https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-61919752

Do we laugh or cry?

My feeling is that the Supreme Court ruling ends the matter, at least for the next 20+ years. There will be no reform
Time for those who wanted reform to recognize they have lost and to let it go and focus mental health aspects which the right won't want to pay for.... unless it comes with guns.   

I am not optimistic for the future.

Wonder how far the court would go? Do 16 year old's have the right to purchase and carry a gun? Can they carry it to school? Can we only stop and arrest them after they've started shooting people?

Can I carry an AR-15 with an expanded magazine into the supreme court building? I'm guessing the answer to this last question will remain No. Not sure about the rest.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 24, 2022, 01:06:37 PM »

Seeing more and more interviews with liberal progresses who are angry with Biden and won't be voting for him and that means down the ticket.
A year from now they will be wondering why they keep losing at the State and local level of government let along at the Supreme Court and blaming anyone but themselves.

And the truth is for 90% of them is doesn't matter if they show up to vote or not. They likely don't live in a swing district or swing state with a Senate race on the ballot. They can show up and vote for someone who will win easily or for a hopeless candidate. They just need the 10% of their fellow progressives who live somewhere it matters to go vote. So at least we have Speaker Pelosi instead of Speaker KissTrumpsAss. Getting 10% of what you want is better than nation wide abortion bans, gay marriage bans, dirty air, water, tax breaks for Elon Musk, tax hikes for wal-mart workers, Trump and the end of democracy in America. So vote, before you can't.

13

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 24, 2022, 12:35:32 PM »

DOJ is saying they investigated claims of fraud and said they did not find any. Trump did not like those answers so he claims they were not doing enough.

Who said that?
...

The senior officials at the DoJ under Trump testified that they investigated all the claims and found no evidence to support any of them. Jeffery Clark (environmental law) also investigated found no evidence but was willing to call the election corrupt anyway. In front of the January 6th committee he didn't tell his side of the story he pled the 5th the entire time. Why would he do that if he had all this great evidence of fraud? Why would he do that if everything he did was honest and lawful?

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 24, 2022, 12:30:23 PM »

I guess I keep hoping that the further out there that the GOP nutbags go, at some point the non-crazy conservatives will hit the limit of their patience and get things under control. Through primaries of course, they'd rather have a lunatic Trumper than a sane Socialist, apparently.

I was hoping that as well. But the house keeps getting more gerrymandered. I think the most recent analysis I saw said around 30 swing districts out of 435. The majority of the non-crazies don't vote on primary day so ... they end up voting for Greene, Gatze, or Bobart anyway. The Senate favors the small rural red states, so hard for Democrats to keep pace there.  There just aren't enough middle of the road districts to make the GOP pay a price for nominating Trump sycophants. Maybe we can get some more Joe Machin's elected. But its hard for people like that to join the Democratic party, make it through a primary, and have enough name recognition to attract cross over voters.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 24, 2022, 12:14:18 PM »

I love that wm is still peddling the water main story. There isn't one actual fact that they got correct, and Trump and his minions continue to cackle about it. I mean, they have video tape of the actual water leak, the cleanup, and the ballot handling as well as the statements of observers that they weren't told to leave, they just went home when the work was done. The situation was originally reported by AJC as a "burst pipe" - which I don't know how you get from that to "water main" which isn't typically inside a building. I wonder if maintaining that level of cognitive dissonance takes a lot of energy.

Or very little. Close yourself off to any information that doesn't fit the Trump narrative.

Watching Klepper show clips of the Jan 6 committee testimony to Trump supporters is simultaneously hilarious and terrifying.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNIJH5gufaQ

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General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: June 23, 2022, 10:32:20 AM »

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If I were to concede (for the sake of a different argument) of such an entity. We can also debate the "goodness" of your God. I see no reason why we think such an entity would care about biological life more than they would care about the supermassive blackhole at the center of galaxies. Most (roughly 2/3rds) of the milky way is hostile to biological life. Too many supernovas nearby, not enough heavy elements, too close to the center of the galaxy. The universe as a whole, counting the space between galaxies is extraordinarily hostile to biological life. At the very best such an entity ("God") thinks of biological life as an afterthought or curiosity to their grand structure of creation. Looking out at the universe and the scarcity of intelligent life, no SETI signals, no signs of multi star civilizations. Biological life absolutely isn't the purpose of creation. Maybe a complete afterthought if anything.

We could debate that, but if we can't even agree that God is necessary and fully actual, there's no point talking about why I believe he has intellect, will, perfection, or goodness.

The rest of your stuff here has nothing to do with anything. We don't live in the center of the galaxy; we live on earth, and earth is perfectly hospitable to us. The fact that the universe is physically big doesn't change anything about how human nature is special.

Human nature and life is special. Is human nature that much more special than other highly intelligent mammals or birds? And if this special nature is a goal of creation, why is so much of the universe absolutely hostile to biological life? Why not other little pockets of humanity scattered throughout the cosmos? Why not a Mars that is twice as massive that kept a magnetic field and atmosphere that is hospitable to biological life? Why not a Venus that started with a thinner atmosphere that could be cool enough to support life? This stuff is relevant. If your argument is that an all powerful deity created the universe with the purpose of the specialty of human nature in mind. They did a lot of creating for one tiny pocket of humanity. Looking at the universe as a giant experiment, grand design, whatever you wish to call it, biological life is absolutely an afterthought in such a design. If you wanted better conditions for life, you would subtlety tweak the laws of physics so that red dwarf stars that burn for trillions of years would be more magnetically stable so they wouldn't occasionally irradiate everything around them. All of this is relevant if you want to look out at the vastness of the cosmos and claim there is a creator who thinks biological life is special. Even within the vastness of our own solar system biological life seems very rare. With very minor tweaks in the formation of our solar system there could be 3 habitable planets. Venus is at the very close end of a possible habitable zone and Mars is on the other side. Small tweaks the right aspects of their mass, core, atmosphere and composition could make both conducive to life.

I'll may get back to the other stuff later. But I think we're going to just talk in circles. I concede stuff is. At that level of meta physics you need to start asking what time is. There are explanations of GR that remove time (see Godel). So maybe there is no before, no after. That before/after and time are just human's imperfect perception of reality. Things always were and always will be. Either way: the universe just was or "god" just was. I don't find the latter any logical than the former.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 23, 2022, 07:25:15 AM »

...1) Trump’s repeated statement about more votes than voters that has shown to be false.

At the time he mentioned yhem they were more than conjecture. The only reason he didn't push for fuller investigations was because the fix was in and he knew it. Here are wha=t was going on, up until the enf of December:
 …

Or maybe not deceptive and misleading at all, but dead on, but without an honest investigation.

Trump brought it up again in his pdf diatribe about the January 6th committee. You do realize most of that 36% of being off was by a single vote and none off by more than 10. Small clerical or counting errors. Not evidence of massive fraud. Trump didn’t give up investigating because “the fix was in” it’s because there was nothing to investigate. So bringing this up again last week out of context, without specifying where and how many votes they were off by is misleading. Trump had 250+ million of his donors money to investigate and show the evidence of fraud to the American people. Instead he paid his daughter in law $60,000 to give a 2 minute speech. Why not pay an investigator, mathematician, or statistician that money to write a report detailing such obvious fraud? Unless he knows there is no there there.

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General Comments / Re: GOP nutbag of the week

« on: June 22, 2022, 09:19:40 PM »

I guess I am a target now since Wm and his ilk all call me a RINO.I guess it is open season on me.

No, I doubt anyone will target you. Most who can read you see the false positions and don't take it seriously. If you were real, …

Way to reassure a real person the right isn’t planning violence to get their way.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 22, 2022, 08:40:47 PM »

Perhaps this list is the "short list" that Yossarian asked about.

No you asked what was misleading about trump’s screed. Tom said we had given you a few items. Primary:

1) Trump’s repeated statement about more votes than voters that has shown to be false.
2) The fact this is an investigation, not a criminal trial. So all this hoopla about cross examination and confronting your accusers is a misdirection. You’ve clearly bought into this narrative pretty hard.

These are two examples where maybe Trump’s statements were not outright lies but are deceptive and misleading.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 22, 2022, 05:43:55 PM »

It is for a criminal trial, but you seem to forget this is not a criminal trial.

And Trump and his supporters can show up and testify under oath, just like all of the others. But they will not.

Why do you keep bring up criminal trial things?  This is not a trial.  It is an investigation. What are Trump and his cronnies hidding?

No. It is not a criminal trial. It is also not an investigation. It is a kangaroo court, an imitation court to make disinformational accusations in order to create a felonious crime to charge Trump,  to keep him off of future ballots. It is also sheer stupidity. The Democrats have crossed lines never contemplated before, unafraid of future reciprocity using the same tactics they now say is "good to go." They know that Trump is not constrained by comity. If someone crosses any line to unfairly attack him, he has always responded right back at them,  but twice as hard. Thery are stupid for doing this. Are they idiots?

Glad you see part of trump for who he is. Just wish it scared you that instead of public testimony that trump will go for secret trials. Strike back, twice as hard, end democracy and freedom.

21

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: June 22, 2022, 10:37:37 AM »

Sorry to cut through your artful philosophical language. But want to see if I can grasp your key concept here. Stuff exists, because stuff doesn't come from nowhere, stuff came from "God." Where did "God" come from or is "God" simply the property of the existence of the universe? Your getting pretty close to the tautology and reduction of the nature of "God" that by "God" you are only asserting the creation and continued existence of the universe.

No apology necessary. It's good to understand things directly and not let unfamiliar language obfuscate the ideas. You missed a few key points in the argument, so let me try to restate it in the same language you used:

1.There are reason for why things happen and why stuff exists.

If stuff didn't exist we wouldn't be around to question its existence or not. The only universe in which we can ask questions is a universe that exists, I don't see the necessity for a God to make such things exist.

2. If there were not reasons, then science and philosophy wouldn't work. But they do work.

Science requires consistency. We ascribe laws or reasons to that consistency based on our understanding of the processes at the time. Its why our understanding of orbits (gravity) has changed from ancient times to Newton to Einstein. Based on the current open questions in physics its likely to change again, either soon or maybe in another 400 years. But consistency is the key here not reasons. Consistency can be a property of reality that doesn't require a creator, which the more loaded term reasons implies intent.

3. As a matter of logic, either the reasons for stuff is found:
  a. in some other stuff
  b. in the thing itself, that is to say, the thing is self-explaining.
4. Stuff exists. That requires explanation, because stuff isn't self-explaining.
5. The existence of all of the stuff we see can be explained by external causes (as in 3a) but, of course, then those other things all also require explanation.

Best scientific argument for stuff is the big bang. Somehow there was a lot of matter/anti-matter/energy that was and somehow the matter/anti-matter wasn't quite in symmetry. Matter was greater than anti-matter by about 1 part per billion. Hence a matter universe. Do we know the reason for the big bang, not really. Are we the event horizon of a 4d black hole, maybe. Are we part of some infinite multiverse, possibly. Are we one of many universe bubbles that pops into existence and ours just happened to have the right properties to exist for quite a while. Big bang/God. I see no argument for intelligence there either way something just existed/happened and we're living in the after effects.

6. Either there's an infinite chain of causes for existence like that, or it terminates in something that has the property imagined in 3b.
7. An infinite chain of contingent causes doesn't make any sense; I can't copy a textbook infinitely without there being an original textbook that provides the text to be copied.
8. Therefore, there must be at least one thing which is self-explaining, and which provides existence to all of the other stuff we see (either directly or through a chain of things).

Still at its root you come back to stuff exists. Why is there a universe instead of complete nothingness and no time or space or God or anything? We'll probably never be able to fully answer that. Saying I don't know why things exist or that things are consistent (post big bang) doesn't mean that there was some intelligent all powerful entity ("God") that somehow had the power and energy to instantly create the entire universe.

If I were to concede (for the sake of a different argument) of such an entity. We can also debate the "goodness" of your God. I see no reason why we think such an entity would care about biological life more than they would care about the supermassive blackhole at the center of galaxies. Most (roughly 2/3rds) of the milky way is hostile to biological life. Too many supernovas nearby, not enough heavy elements, too close to the center of the galaxy. The universe as a whole, counting the space between galaxies is extraordinarily hostile to biological life. At the very best such an entity ("God") thinks of biological life as an afterthought or curiosity to their grand structure of creation. Looking out at the universe and the scarcity of intelligent life, no SETI signals, no signs of multi star civilizations. Biological life absolutely isn't the purpose of creation. Maybe a complete afterthought if anything.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 22, 2022, 09:54:04 AM »

Conservative commentator on Fox.  Trump "unfit for office."

https://currently.att.yahoo.com/att/even-fox-news-conservative-analysts-233216501.html?.tsrc=daily_mail&uh_test=1_11

Hope he has his resume up to date. Fox commentator is probably no longer a gig for him.

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General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 21, 2022, 02:50:22 PM »

Oh sure a lot of RINOs who don't have the guts to be held in contempt. They won't let Jim Jordan speak, though, he could show the committee proof that the election was stolen!
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Jim Jordan could speak to the committee all he wanted if he agreed to testify under oath. He refused that offer and is ignoring that subpoena. The party of "Law and Order."

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General Comments / Re: GOP nutbag of the week

« on: June 21, 2022, 02:24:03 PM »

"Today, we're going RINO hunting," Greitens, a Republican, said with a smile as he slid the action on his shotgun in the 38-second ad. RINO stands for "Republican in name only."

Greitens and a team of men outfitted in military gear are then shown bursting into a home, guns raised.

"The RINO feeds on corruption and is marked by the stripes of cowardice," said Greitens. "Get a RINO hunting permit. There's no bagging limit, no tagging limit, and it doesn't expire until we save our country."

Missouri doesn't want to be left out.

This guy should be in prison but the GOP want's to send him to the Senate. Google his blackmail kidnapping of his ex mistress. He can join Walker from Georgia. The party of "family values", if the women won't listen tie her up or put a gun to her head. Can't believe the GOP can't find better people to run. Guess most of the good people are too turned off by kissing Trump's ass.

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General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: June 21, 2022, 10:03:32 AM »

Is it just that, at some early point in the existence of the universe, we're asserting that some entity must have done something in order for everything else to be possible? If so, let's just assume that entity was destroyed shortly thereafter. If not, why not?

Because God is fully actual, which means he has no potential, which means he does not have the potential to be destroyed (or to destroy himself).

Or, if you reject the property of fully actual (you'll have to articulate why so we can talk about it) then we have shown that God necessarily exists, and that which necessarily exists cannot cease to exist.

Sorry to cut through your artful philosophical language. But want to see if I can grasp your key concept here. Stuff exists, because stuff doesn't come from nowhere, stuff came from "God." Where did "God" come from or is "God" simply the property of the existence of the universe? Your getting pretty close to the tautology and reduction of the nature of "God" that by "God" you are only asserting the creation and continued existence of the universe.

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General Comments / Re: Election Results

« on: June 21, 2022, 08:13:55 AM »

Kudos WM. You successfully changed the topic from Trump to Alinksy. Much easier to beat up on the old monsters than to defend Trump's words and actions. Or to show how the 2000 mules documentary got people arrested 18 months before it debuted. Or to explain why Bill Barr called all of the fraud claims bull*censored*. Or to explain why Trump included a discredited more votes than voters line in his screed. All that crap is indefensible. So choose a new topic. Let's talk about a political activist who died in the 70's and is still controlling the Democrats from the grave. About as useful as Hugo Chavez stealing the election from Trump.

You like to claim how right you always are and have always been. How did that CIA raid of servers in Germany go? Did it show how the election was stolen? Or did they "kill" all those people (who actually died in a helicopter crash) for nothing?

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General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 21, 2022, 07:57:09 AM »

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/21/1105815143/cryptocurrency-bitcoin-blockchain-security-tampering-darpa

Another example in the report of this kind of concentration is the fact that 60% of Bitcoin traffic is handled by just three internet service providers.

"Let's say somebody with great top-down control of the internet in their country starts to interfere with that network," Guido says. By slowing down or stopping legitimate blockchain traffic, an attacker could become the "majority" voice in the consensus of what's written to a blockchain at that moment.

"They can rewrite history. They can censor transactions. They can make it so that you can't spend your Bitcoin," says Guido. "It's definitely something people would want to do if they want to 'grief' the network."

The notion of this kind of attack isn't new, but what the Trail of Bits report does is compile research into different kinds of "unintended centralities" to better understand the technology's overall vulnerability.

Some of the findings are "eyebrow-raising," says Josh Baron, project manager of the unit at DARPA that commissioned the report.

"For example, the idea that 21 percent of Bitcoin nodes are running an old version of the Bitcoin core client that's known to be vulnerable," Baron says, referring to the basic software running that blockchain. That means all those computer are open to the same kind of hack — a big first step for an attacker trying to dominate a blockchain network, sometimes called a "51 percent attack."

Crypto's boom will be its crash. Enough money in the space for shorts and sophisticated attacks. The end result is loss of confidence and we've discussed once confidence is gone, crypto is going to zero.

28

General Comments / Re: GOP nutbag of the week

« on: June 21, 2022, 07:54:01 AM »

President Biden is the "acting" president because he didn't win legally; Texans should vote on seceding; the Voting Rights Act of 1965 should be repealed; any gun control is a rights violation: this is the world as seen by the Republican Party of Texas, according to its newly adopted party platform.

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/20/1106229988/texas-gops-new-platform-says-biden-didnt-really-win-it-also-calls-for-secession

Texan's can't let Georgia have all the fun.

29

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 20, 2022, 09:26:27 PM »

Oh sure a lot of RINOs who don't have the guts to be held in contempt. They won't let Jim Jordan speak, though, he could show the committee proof that the election was stolen! Seriously, I wonder what kind of exculpatory evidence we're missing out on? Calling Dinesh to the stand to play his 2000 mules into the public record so that the entire committee can have a big belly laugh? Or is some star witness going to reveal that Trump's people were not trying to overturn the election, when that was their stated goal?

He wouldn’t want to license it to them. How else could he get his cut of the big lie grift?

30

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 17, 2022, 09:31:33 PM »

...Obviously, mail in ballots take longer than the millions they counted from in-person voting. Does he even know how ballots work? It's not like you can just run off ballots at kinko's. It is completely detached from reality.

No. Many states count the mail-in ballots before election day, and as they come in, so they can be counted quickly. Some refuse to do so.

Pennsylvania refused to do so. Election officials asked the republican controlled legislature to change the law and they refused to do so. Everyone who cared knew this and knew Pennsylvania would take a long time. But Trump uses that time lag to claim fraud that doesn’t exist. And he makes the same argument in his paper, it’s “factual” how many days Pennsylvania took. But claiming the time had anything to do with democrats or fraud is, in the words of Barr, bull*censored*.

31

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 17, 2022, 12:17:16 PM »

Any one who does not agree with Trump is a RINO and part of the deep state.
Trump is now like the flat earthers and young earth people. No amount of proof will change his mind since his whole sense of self is now based on the election being stolen from him, not him losing.  If he lost, then it was his fault. If it was stolen, it was not his fault. He has to maintain this to have any chance in any lawsuits.

Screw every senate Republican who voted to acquit him. He's a cancer on our society and banning him from the ballot would have at least removed him from that part of public life. Now we may have to put up with him running again. After an election cycle where its clear his endorsement is only contingent on people kissing his ass and spreading his lies. What happens when calls the next secretary of state of Florida asking for 10,000 votes?

32

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 17, 2022, 11:54:07 AM »

Some areas are reported to have had more votes than voters! That raises some questions.

Highlight from Trump's statement that is very misleading but maybe not a lie. Some areas were reported to have had more votes than voters. But all those stories have been shown to be false. Which is why its stated that way, it was reported. It did raise questions. They were answered and shown to be absolutely untrue. That's why Trump didn't say, x precinct in y county had more votes than voters. Because there was no place where this happened.

33

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 17, 2022, 11:49:46 AM »

...
What I found hilarious is that Barr was a pariah who was castigated by his new friends in 2019 and 2020 - but now is considered a paragon of virtue. Trump's 12-page paper responded to the committee: https://thehill.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/06/Statement-by-Trump-1.pdf. Is there anything there that is not completely accurate?

Since the Unselect Committee refuses to allow their political opponents to participate in the hearings, the public likely won’t hear from the many patriots who contradict the lies being broadcast – at least not in these hearings. This is all a ridiculous and treasonous attempt to cover up the fact that Democrats rigged the Election and are siphoning Americans’ freedoms and power for their own benefit.

So Bill Barr, Liz Cheney, Trump's family, and Mike Pence's legal team are now all Democrats? Most of the people testifying worked for Trump. John Eastman's testimony was just claiming the 5th. Mark Meadows and others have refused to testify. Why? They can't articulate their story if they don't have a friendly questioner?

Also Trump had $250+ million in donors money to contest the election. Seems like he should be able to prove some of the fraud. Or put out more than a rambling statement that appeals to emotion.

Trump's statement avoids statements of facts or at least facts in context. It's the typical Trump statement that appeals to emotion, is misleading with what facts he provides, and makes hyperbolic claims that are non-factual. The whole thing is a steaming pile of demagoguery crap but I know it hits all your confirmation biases and smells like a bed of roses to you.

34

General Comments / Re: Trump looses again

« on: June 17, 2022, 08:59:33 AM »

...Thank you, you've found one person who inappropriately collected ballots. You have 4 inappropriately collected ballots for a primary from someone on the ballot. No allegations the ballots were fraudulent. She was more likely doing this for herself, not for Joe Biden. That's a long way to go to get to 10,000. Keep updating me on actual indictments.

No, There have been many, but I just did your work for you on one to prove myself and show you for what you are.
...

Guillermina Fuentes, 66, and a second woman were indicted in December 2020 on one count of ballot abuse,

But looking closer you actually didn't show anything true about your 2000 mules claim that people are being indicted from their data. The women were indicted in December 2020. So hard to claim 2000 mules had anything to do with their arrest. And if you look back at what I've written about election fraud in the past this is exactly the type of race it happens, small local elections that can be decided by a couple dozen votes. Her motivation was most likely cheating for herself. Also the indictment was only about the primary. So you still haven't found a democratic vote harvester for the general election. One Republican got caught in Pennsylvania.

So I'll ask again who has been indicted and arrested as a result of 2000 mules?

35

General Comments / Re: Trump looses again

« on: June 16, 2022, 04:36:50 PM »

...

Just for the record. One AZ Mule is written up here: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/05/watch-az-state-senate-candidate-gary-snyder-yuma-county-school-board-member-set-plead-guilty-2020-election-ballot-trafficking-crimes-exposed-2000-mules-hearing-june-2nd/

There have been several Mules who plead guilty, and a supplier of scammed ballots has also plead.
...

Thank you, you've found one person who inappropriately collected ballots. You have 4 inappropriately collected ballots for a primary from someone on the ballot. No allegations the ballots were fraudulent. She was more likely doing this for herself, not for Joe Biden. That's a long way to go to get to 10,000. Keep updating me on actual indictments.

36

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: June 15, 2022, 02:24:38 PM »

If the estimated matter to dark matter ratio (6 dark matter to 1 regular matter) were reversed I would agree. But the evidence for extra gravity coming from a distribution of "stuff" we can't see is pretty vast at this point. The universe is big with a lot of stuff, but that's one massive accounting error.

One thing not being accounted for is spacetime itself. What is it? It can't be actually nothing, even though aether theory was discarded in the early 20th century. The accelerating expansion of the universe requires an explanation, and thus far none is even being entertained as a mainstream idea. Part of the behavior of macro systems (galactic or supercluster level) is going to ride on the nature of the medium the matter inhabits. But that's just one theory. It can have to do with entanglement; it can have to do with quantum effects we haven't measured yet; it can have to do with the vacuum catastrophe. It can be anything really.

I agree it can be almost anything. But it has to be something or requires another GR level breakthrough of physical understanding. I guess none of those were what I thought you meant when you said accounting error.

37

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: June 15, 2022, 01:06:30 PM »

Dark matter? Maybe? If we ever figure out what that stuff is and what its potential interactions with forces are.

Personally I think dark matter will end up just being an accounting mistake, but never mind that...

If the estimated matter to dark matter ratio (6 dark matter to 1 regular matter) were reversed I would agree. But the evidence for extra gravity coming from a distribution of "stuff" we can't see is pretty vast at this point. The universe is big with a lot of stuff, but that's one massive accounting error.

Crazier but more plausible idea: It could be a misunderstanding how gravity spreads out over huge distances. Maybe the inverse square law is great until something on the order of a couple hundred light years but past that distance gravity doesn't spread out on the surface of a sphere but somehow follows a different contour. Or some other reinterpretation of how gravity works. Or even crazier ideas from the quantum world. Or the regular dark matter idea that there is some particle that emits gravity but doesn't like playing with the other forces.

38

General Comments / Re: God Exists

« on: June 15, 2022, 12:24:35 PM »

Why can't that just be a property of matter? Is there any matter we've ever observed that isn't affected by force?

Dark matter? Maybe? If we ever figure out what that stuff is and what its potential interactions with forces are.

39

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 14, 2022, 02:36:11 PM »

Cielo Waste Solutions CMC.V

They had, at least, good press about their tech last year but I missed the retail trading peak and have been holding an increasingly empty bag.

Waste to energy. Interesting tech, tough engineering. Wood waste to diesel could be profitable with the current diesel prices if they could get operational. I can see other organic material working, grass clippings/yard waste, but not more general trash. Could be a nice profitable niche industry if they can get it going at scale and are able to broaden beyond wood. Could be an interesting long shot stock. But I'm not doing much trading/long shooting these days.

40

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 14, 2022, 10:00:33 AM »

I have to admit to not knowing as much about the utility of cryptocurrencies as I should, but supposedly those are the ones to look for when investing. I've read articles about some of them but I still don't totally get it. By the Buffett school of investing that means stay away. But those are the questions to ask. What is the utility of this? What problem does it solve? What does it make easier?

Many seem to be built around bitcoin and making bitcoin transactions smoother. Some may be trying to serve the purpose of saving electricity or speeding up processes.
...

Hope you'll listen to Buffet and yourself. You don't understand their utility because they are deliberately vague in describing it because they have almost none. And if their entire utility is to facilitate bitcoin. Then ask those same questions about bitcoin. If your answer at the end of the day is I see no utility in alternative currencies, then pick another investment. There are strong arguments to be made around monetary policy and currency availability. But crypto that isn't backed by a major economy probably isn't the answer.

41

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 14, 2022, 09:14:12 AM »

An excerpt of Bill Barr's sworn testimony. For WM because I know it won't get airtime on Fox or OAN or infowars.

First quote on election fraud in general.

And I told him that the stuff that his people were shoveling out to the public were bull — was b*******. I mean that the claims of fraud were b******* And, you know, he was indignant about that. And I reiterated that they've wasted a whole month on these claims — on the Dominion voting machines and they were idiotic claims.

Clipped a bit until he started talking about 2,000 mules.

Well, I mean, just in a nutshell, you know, I just think that the GBI was unimpressed with it and I was similarly unimpressed with it because I think if you — because I was holding my fire on that to see what the photographic evidence was because I thought, well, hell, if they have a lot of photographs of the same person dumping a lot of ballots in different boxes, you know, that's hard to explain.

So I wanted to see what the photographic evidence was, but the cell phone data is singularly unimpressive. I mean it basically, if you take 2 million cell phones and — and figure out where they are physically in a big city like Atlanta or wherever, just by definition you're going to find many hundreds of them have passed by and spent time in the vicinity of these boxes.
...
So I — but then when the movie came out, you know, I think the photographic evidence and it was completely black — I mean it was — there was a little bit of it, but it was lacking.

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/13/1104690690/heres-every-word-of-the-second-jan-6-committee-hearing-on-its-investigation

42

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 13, 2022, 03:26:42 PM »

...

When you look at our own banking and monetary system, and go behind the curtain, you see some things that don't inspire a lot of confidence either with some people saying the same thing about fractional reserve banking being another type of Ponzi scheme and our government minting currency, trillions of dollars out of thin air the way Luna was minting trillions of coins out of nothing. And then you factor in the even worse monetary policies of a lot of other countries like with Venezuela's hyperinflation and crypto doesn't seem like it's necessarily the worst Ponzi scheme out there anymore. If you're in Venezuela and you bought bitcoin at the high you're still probably better off now than if you'd kept your money in bolivars.
...

Fractional reserve banking works. Maybe an argument could be made that inflation should be controlled by raising banks reserve requirements instead of raising interest rates. The effect on inflation is the same, less lending and spending. The impacts on regular people may differ. There probably would be a way to slowly wind down fractional reserve banking but it would require printing a crap ton of more money to keep the economic wheels greased. Otherwise all the money ends up sitting idle in a bank somewhere and there isn't enough to circulate.

At the end of the day a country's currency is backed by the country's economy. If the economy tanks then currency takes a hit. Crypto has no economy backing it, therefore, its just a product whose only value what confidence it may inspire. The whole thing is confidence, it maybe a stretch to call them cons, because the people selling them may believe in it. But individuals trying to create their own currency when nothing of value is produced by producing the currency and no economy is backing the currency seems doomed to failure. Crypto had a much longer and stronger run than I thought it ever could. And maybe bitcoin and one or two others can avoid dropping to zero. But they are likely to decline in value and go back to their primary customers being shady.

As to Venezuela or Zimbabwe, the economies tanked and they had foreign denominated debt. Any country that doesn't have that combination of issues is exceedingly unlikely to experience hyper inflation (or a currency collapse).

Currency is supposed to be a placeholder for value (goods or service) so economics can take place without barter. So ask yourself what real value is created by any new or existing cryptocurrency. If the answer is none or simply an alternative currency, ask yourself why we need an alternative currency and what is supporting that currency? If you don't have really good answers to those questions then maybe invest in something else. Let Elon play his games of pumping (and maybe dumping?) new cryptocurrencies but try not to be the person he's dumping too.

43

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 13, 2022, 03:00:42 PM »

I agree to a large extent that the U.S. is in a much better position than most countries but if we'd stayed crazy with dollar printing we could still join the club. It looks like we're finally going to bite the bullet now and give the printing presses a rest for a little while. It's going to be painful but much better than if we'd kept ignoring the problem and hoping it would go away on its own.

We're experiencing energy and supply chain inflation. We should have been doing more with renewables (and nuclear) and electric cars over the past 20 years. But the only Republican energy policy is more drilling, tax breaks for fossil fuels, and increased taxes and regulations on renewable energies. Therefore when Trump cuts a deal with Saudi to cut production for a couple years, domestic production takes a hit because of reduced demand from a pandemic, and the world tries to quit buying from Russia overnight then oil prices go way up. Factor that in with pent up demand and supply chain issues from the pandemic. Monetary policy is 4th or below on the list of things driving inflation. Otherwise we would be seeing inflation in the US greatly outpacing inflation overseas, but Europe and other comparable economies are seeing similar inflation with different monetary policies.

Hard for me to say since I don't track EU monetary policy country by country. However I would be very surprised to learn that they haven't been injecting money into the supply, especially during covid. Do you have data on the various monetary policies in, say, Germany, the UK, maybe Turkey, just for a bit of variety?
...

The EUs monetary policy was generally tighter than the Feds. The EU has inflation roughly inline with the US. The UK has inflation equal to ours but with their own monetary policy, which I think was more inline with Europe than the US. Turkey is a bad example because Erdogan has been taking them towards a theocratically aligned dictatorship. The policies have strained business ties with Europe and the Turkish economy and Turkey has had very high inflation for years now. Australia has inflation ranging in the 5% range as well.

44

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 13, 2022, 12:59:03 PM »

I agree to a large extent that the U.S. is in a much better position than most countries but if we'd stayed crazy with dollar printing we could still join the club. It looks like we're finally going to bite the bullet now and give the printing presses a rest for a little while. It's going to be painful but much better than if we'd kept ignoring the problem and hoping it would go away on its own.

We're experiencing energy and supply chain inflation. We should have been doing more with renewables (and nuclear) and electric cars over the past 20 years. But the only Republican energy policy is more drilling, tax breaks for fossil fuels, and increased taxes and regulations on renewable energies. Therefore when Trump cuts a deal with Saudi to cut production for a couple years, domestic production takes a hit because of reduced demand from a pandemic, and the world tries to quit buying from Russia overnight then oil prices go way up. Factor that in with pent up demand and supply chain issues from the pandemic. Monetary policy is 4th or below on the list of things driving inflation. Otherwise we would be seeing inflation in the US greatly outpacing inflation overseas, but Europe and other comparable economies are seeing similar inflation with different monetary policies.

Energy is the name of the game right now. And it takes time to increase supplies (of any kind) and shift demand from gasoline to electric, or to more fuel efficient cars. We've had gas price spikes about every 5 years starting with Katrina. Its a pattern, then they drop enough for people to quit caring about conservation then boom another spike. The oil market is tight enough and dependent on enough unstable or unsavory countries that this pattern will continue until oil isn't the driver of our economy.

45

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 13, 2022, 12:26:28 PM »

It's a question of trust really, the same as with fiat currencies.
...

Not really. The US dollar is valuable because of US taxes and the strength of the US economy. Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Germany post WW1; hyper inflation (or currency collapse) all have commonalities. Tanking economies and debt denominated in foreign currencies. You can't print your currency to pay large foreign debts in another currency, you completely destroy the currency exchange rates very quickly. Particularly if it coincides with a period of a very weak domestic economy, so that there is limited domestic production of value. Without those two factors coinciding I'm not aware of any currency collapses. A crypto collapse only requires a loss of confidence.

46

General Comments / Re: Inflation, Gas Prices, and what have you.

« on: June 13, 2022, 08:43:11 AM »

Yeah I agree with you about the very wealthy and apologize for not putting in the asterisk referring to the fine print that stipulated this evening of wealth inequality doesn't apply so much to the very wealthy as it does to the mid-range wealthy, the hard working normal Americans who have a few hundred thousand to a little over a million saved up for their retirements. ...

You realize that it isn't the people who have worked 30 years with about $1,000,000 net worth that have anything to do with wealth inequality in this country. Its the tens of thousands of the most wealthy who control 10's of thousands more than the person who had a good job and lived wisely for their working lifetime. Wealth estimates show that the top 0.1% of people hold 15-25% of the wealth in America. That is what people mean when they talk about wealth inequality.

47

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 13, 2022, 08:27:19 AM »

... I don't want to have to follow up every post you make with a list of truth claims, ...

You don't need to. We all know WM lives in his right wing bubble. I typically engage with him by asking simple questions about his claims. I know I can't convince him of anything. But I do hope that I can ask questions that may make him question some of the people he trusts. Just like the claim about "mules" being arrested. I just want him to give me a name, crime, and location for who has pled guilty. I know I can't convince him of anything but maybe not being able to answer simple questions about his claims will make him question who he's been trusting on faith. Its unlikely to change his opinions or who he trusts but I think this forum is probably one of the last places he even sees any information or questions that aren't part of the far right. So I hope he stays and is at least exposed to information and questions that don't come from far right grifters.

48

General Comments / Re: machine learning and creativity

« on: June 13, 2022, 08:11:59 AM »

...
These are natural language models - they are imitating natural language and can be expected to have errors present in the training corpus.

Either way, the Turing test is doesn't meet the criteria for sentience. Neural nets with machine learning on huge data sets of conversations will be very good at mimicking human speech. But they don't have any thoughts. They are just a more sophisticated version of a Markov chain.

49

General Comments / Re: Cryptocurrencies

« on: June 12, 2022, 11:13:47 PM »

BTC is crashing hard - 25,511 as of a short while ago. Down about 4500, since Friday.

The super bowl commercials were the beginning of the end. Last bit of the public to buy in. No more money coming in and it’s going to tank.

50

General Comments / Re: The Jan 6 Commission

« on: June 10, 2022, 09:24:09 PM »

I beg to differ. The means they used were sufficient to identify Mules and have them arrested and then plead guilty. …
Far more than 2,000 scammers were involved. the 2,000 concentrated upon were just the easiest ones to prove.

Please can you name one person who pled guilty as a result of 2000 mules? What did they pled guilty too? Where did they plead guilty?

Your failure to answer those questions repeatedly makes me think you don’t know who, what, when, or where but are taking it on faith that it happened from someone you trust.