Quote from SamH :

but are the observations about those Christian denominations really a part of your argument against the existence of god?

Well, it's not exactly about the denominations. I've met a nun who was 100% tolerant of other world views (and a great person, too). I've met a once-in-a-year-to-mass Catholic who was denigrating about atheists without ever having thought about it. The bigotry is not part of my argument against the existence of god. It's part of my reason to become vocal about it, and to re-label myself.

Quote :

Free yourself.. become a pure atheist! One that isn't polluted by religious doctrines! (including abhorrence thereof!)

Yeah. Who knows, some day I might become a true atheist and embrace agnosticism again. I was born free of sin, um, I mean religion. I only need to get back to that blessed state.

Quote from Hankstar :

I concluded that god was created in the image of man

The big question is, of course: Did god just evolve by pure chance, or is he the product of some Intelligent Designer?

Last edited by wsinda, Tue 1 May 2007, 08:55.

Quote from SamH :

See.. most (read: all so far) atheists I know, when I ask them why they're atheist and not agnostic, tell me that they began life as Christian but realised that the whole thing's a big lie.. an insurance policy for the afterlife. Something that's been over-sold to them. They're generally also very angry about it. They hate religion because of the time they lost to it, and because of the misery it brought them in childhood (eg: catholics teachings to minors about hell for non-believers). The atheist stance, thus, forms from a specific rejection of the ideology.

I'll be your exception, then, because I have taken the reverse route. I've been non-religious all my life. Wasn't brought up to believe, and never felt any need to. In my twenties I used to call myself an agnostic: existence of god is undecidable, so it's no use to fuss&fight. Let each have his own view, live in peace, and not bother his fellow men.

I'm in my forties now, and in recent years I've drifted towards atheism. One reason is the growing realisation that accepted scientific theories, most notably evolution, are fundamentally incompatible with religion. (I know there are escape routes, but I see them as uneasy compromises.)

Another reason is my growing anger about the imbalance between religious and non-religious people. Many Christians demand respect for their faith and traditions, but are not willing to respect the views of the non-religious. Too many times I've heard a Christian say that if you lose your faith then you lose all moral grounding. Too many times I have heard the Pope, or some other spiritual leader, make claims and verdicts for all of humanity instead of just his own flock. I can no longer be indifferent.

Wrecker? Who, me??

Quote from Ball Bearing Turbo :

Of course I just happen to share that hallucination / fantasy with hundreds of millions of other people!

You may say so, but there is absolutely no way you can know it's the same, as you've just declared all ways to exchange thoughts as not applicable to your god.

Quote :

Georg Cantor, although that was dealing with "numbers larger than infinity" (!?).

Ah yes, his diagonal argument to prove that the cardinality of the real numbers is higher than that of the natural numbers. Elegant, and not that hard to grasp. If you really want something that boggles the mind you should take a look at string theory with its 27 dimensions. Still, it's the daily work for hundreds of theoretical physicists.

Quote :

you or anyone else cannot grasp infinity in real terms, rather you can express it and conceptualise it, but you cannot intrinsically and completely comprehend it.

That's a ... peculiar way to reason. In the same vein you could state that you can't "completely comprehend" a drop of water, because it contains gazillions of atoms tumbling around -- far too much for any human mind to understand.

Quote from SamH :

Perhaps you're referring to the "weak" versus "strong" agnostic, which doesn't refer to their lack of belief so much as it refers to their interest (or lack thereof) in pursuing the debate.

Yes, I meant the "weak" versus "strong" agnosticism (at least, as described in Wikipedia).

Quote :

Once again, atheism sets out its position in a contrary stance to that of (I sense in this example Judaism and Christianity) the addressing of specific beliefs in a religion. What those granular specifics that Christians or Jews believe, about their god, should not be components in an argument against the existence of god.

Agreed. Proving that a piece of wood from Mt. Ararat is just an oaken plank of 1000 years old does not disprove the existence of god. I only mentioned those as easy-to-recognise examples. But IMO also the most central aspects of religion - most notably, that god(s) created the universe and mankind - have been falsified.

Quote :

Does he prove that God doesn't exist? Or does he just pick particular aspects of specific religions to build a case against those religions, and thus project that therefore god doesn't exist?

No, Dawkins aims his arrows at the core of religion.

Quote from Ball Bearing Turbo :

Logically impossible? Who cares? Logic is again,based on human thought and discovery. To make that assertion, you would have to be somehow greater that both of those qualities - which I don't think is the case.

This never ceases to amaze me: how can a finite mind be arrogant enough (not directed at you personally btw!) to say that the infinite God is impossible? That, from MY perspective is what's totally illogical, even by human standards. Once again, you're applying scientific principles where they are completely not applicable, 100%. If a being has the capacity to create "something" from "nothing" (the big bang) I don't think we're in a position to even comment on the intellect, or the "properties" of their existence.

When we want to convince other people of our views, we have only a couple of valid ways to do so: hard physical evidence, logical reasoning, and the scientific method. You're brushing them aside: you say that none of these apply to your definition of god. If you do, then all discussion stops. You may have some notion of god, but it's your own personal experience. For others it can in no way be distinguished from a hallucination or a fantasy. It's equally valid to talk about pink unicorns or the spaghetti monsters.

Quote :

The concept of infinity, whilst mathematically sound is so far beyond the ultimate comprehension of humans that it's made certain mathematicians insane - and I can understand why.

Quite to the contrary. Infinity can be expressed in five simple postulates from a guy named Peano. No mathematician has ever gone insane by looking at the definition of the natural numbers.

Quote :

Really, all you're saying is "I can't understand God, therefore he cannot exist".

No, I'm saying that god, as commonly defined, is not consistent with the facts.

1.4 seconds before that "Oh blast, I knew I'd forgotten something" moment...

-----

And now you should really watch out for hot exhaust pipes.

Quote from SamH :

The single agnostic identifier is that they acknowledge that it cannot be known or proven. Nothing more than that.

I think there are two types of agnostics. The first says that he has seen as much proof that support the existence of a god as proof that support its non-existence. The second type says that it is impossible to prove either the existence or the non-existence. Where one is undecided on the matter, the other is sure that it's undecidable.

The atheist view (and mine) is that the matter is decidable. Theism makes a number of claims, and many of them have been falsified. Mankind and the universe are older than 6000 years; a worldwide flood is physically impossible; praying does not work; it's logically impossible for any being to be both omniscient and omnipotent. Etcetera. In effect, the claim of existence of god is handled as a scientific hypothesis, and this hypothesis has been refuted.

Quote :

If someone could prove to me (as for something to be proven is the basis for me to become convinced of anything) that god doesn't exist, I'd happily become an atheist.

Well, then read The God delusion by Richard Dawkins. He makes a pretty good case.

Quote from Hankstar :

I must say that it's refreshing to find a good solid debate on something interesting in this forum.

+1

Quote from Ball Bearing Turbo :

It silly (IMO) because it takes more faith to think that all of matter spontaneously came from nothing (which we cannot define other than in terms of concept) billions of years ago, and the content and compostion of which just happened to eventually form a planet with precise conditions, a certain distance from a star, and some atoms came together (100 billion of them or so IIRC) to make a single celled organism which happened to just decide to evolve.

I see a number of misrepresentations here:
- The matter didn't "come from nothing". The Big Bang hypothesis only talks about the rapid expansion after the bang. There's no telling what there was prior to that, because the current physics theories are not valid for those circumstances.
- If you consider the gigantic number of stars and planets in the universe, then it's not surprising that there is a planet with "precise conditions". (See also: anthropic principle.)
- Evolution theory doesn't assume that "100 billion atoms came together" to form the first cell. That's preposterous. Before the first organisms, there must have been chemical compounds capable of simple self-replication. (Unfortunately, they didn't fossilise.)
- The first organisms did not "happen to just decide to evolve". Evolution is the inevitable consequence of a few properties: variation, self-replication and environmental pressures.

Quote :

The requirement humans have for love and affection does not serve any scientific / evolutionary purpose, and should therefore be eradicated from our genetic pool

That's plain wrong. Even simple simulations show that cooperation between individuals is in many cases advantageous and evolutionary stable. In the human mind, the tendency for cooperative behaviour is experienced as love, compassion and parental care.

Quote :

It becomes a religion in itself when you start to worship the human mind as your deity - humanism. Everyone worships something whether they profess to or not - most of the time it's simply oneself.

If you call that humanism, then you'd better read up on the subject. To worship means that you value yourself as having less worth than some other entity, individual, or deity. That's something that is completely alien to humanism. And worshiping yourself is a contradiction in itself. (Unless you're referring to egoism, which is also contrary to humanism.)

Quote from Racer Y :

For one thing, I'd like to see some sort of data on what the majorities of the reasons for them being performed were.

Absence of contraceptives, probably.

I'm only half kidding here. The number of abortions seems to have a negative correlation with the availability of contraceptives. The countries where condoms are hard to get, and where sex education is frowned upon tend to have high numbers of abortions (be it legal or illegal).

Quote :

But exactly when does a fetus get a "soul" during development?

I'm an atheist, so I'd say "never". Hardcore pro-lifers will say that it's at conception. But then there'd be lots of lost souls, because only one third of all conceptions lead to pregnancy.

Quote :

One thing I learned from that snuff flick I saw at the clinic was that some abortions performed were like a couple a weeks from the time of birth.

I'd be surprised if it was. In the Netherlands, abortions after 25 weeks of pregnancy are illegal. The limit is at 25 weeks because from that moment on the fetus has a chance to survive, if it would be born.

Quote :

When does it get to the point it realizes it's existence?

At the age of about 2 years, IIRC.

Quote :

If that fetus was capable of registering some sort of thought, wouldn't that abortion be some sort of homicide?

If you want to base the distinction (legal or illegal) on some sort of measure of "being sentient", then you're in dangerous waters! By all biological standards, an adult chimp is much more sentient than a fetus, or even a baby or toddler. So if it would be forbidden to abort a fetus past a certain stage of development, then it should also be illegal to kill apes, monkeys, and possibly even pigs and cattle.

Quote from Blackout :

Hmmm... no way Russia has the balls to declare war on NATO country, no way they would be so insensible with their thinking.

They don't have to wage war. They only need to bully their neighbours into submission. Stop delivering oil and gas. Take a small incident, blow it up to a diplomatic row and threaten with economic sanctions. Put up a display of military power. Befriend other, bigger countries (e.g. Germany), so the small countries realise that they're alone.

Quote :

And Mr Putin is trying to become the ultimate ruler and dictator. Can you remember how the previous crazy dictator with own dedicated youth organization ended up messing up the world?

He's not crazy. He just knows how to play the power game. (And he likes to.)

Quote from Ball Bearing Turbo :

However, my question is still: what are those laws (created in the human mind) based on, if not 100% arbitrary. It HAS to be based on something (you said based on morals!), and my question is what; and why.

You seem to think that any kind of rules or morals must have been created/designed: a rule must be based on a sacred book or some other supreme authority, otherwise we could all make up our own rules and it would all end in chaos and bloodshed.

Take an evolutionist view instead. If you find a rule that exists in many societies, and has existed for a long time, then it must be useful in some way. Because if the rule was harmful, then any society that held it would have perished long ago. The rule "do not kill your fellow tribesmen" has existed widely, and throughout history. It has stood the trials of time, so it must be beneficial for the survival of the tribe.

(There is another rule that seems to be popular: "it's okay to kill the folks from other tribes, now and then." :shrug

So, looking at things this way, you could say that rules don't HAVE to be based on anything. They only must prove themselves useful.

Quote from MAGGOT :

For all you know, animals may have a higher sense of morality than humans do. After all, they don't seem to kill each other for no reason.

I think they do. Chimpanzees go on war raids from time to time: a group of males enters the territory of another group, ambushes a lone chimp from that group, kills him/her, and retreats to safety. (OK, in a deeper sense there must be a reason for it. For instance: they do it to expand their territory, so they can get more food, and have better chances of survival. But then the wars of humans also have a reason.)

Quote from Becky Rose :

Your parallel isn't quite right. It would be like the Nazi's invading, and America then invading to kick out the Nazi's, then America staying on afterward and putting up airbases and taking tribute from the government, probably under the guise of some more politically acceptable term like 'lend lease' or something like that.... They'd send us off to right in two distant wars at the same time

Hmm, sounds familiar... You're talking about the Netherlands??

Quote from Kalev EST :

Basically it was, first USSR occupied Estonia, then Germany occupied Estonia, then USSR kicked out Germany and called themselves "liberators" while staying for 50 years.

So you've been liberated 3 times in 5 years. Lucky guys!

Last edited by wsinda, Fri 27 Apr 2007, 12:22.

Quote from P5YcHoM4N :

Some hippies planted a bomb at an abortion clinic.

Yes, it's a well-known fact that the proponents of free love, sandals, world peace and mind-altering substances are also violently opposed to abortion.

Quote from Eldanor :

Statues remember us history, we shouldn't remove them, it doesn't matter if they represent fascism or communism, or anything else.

They are history, it's stupid to spend tons of money in archaeological studies while we bury our own recent history just because it has been cruel to some people. Or because we are ashamed of it.

Monuments can also be a means for propaganda, to express only one party's view of a conflict (as in the Valle de los Caidos). They can continue to hurt, even after the conflict itself has begun to fade into history.

Quote from Dj-Aeri :

But, what's the reason for move the car left-right quickly when they're going fast? anybody knows?

It's what you may call an oscillation in the control loop.

The AI code continuously compares the position of the car with the planned driving line. When there is a difference, the AI steers to get back to that line: too far to the right -> turn left; too far left -> turn right.

The problem with the BF1 at high speed is that the reaction of the car is so fast and strong that the next correction from the AI is too late. The AI then over-corrects, and a few milliseconds later it needs another, even bigger correction. The result: a car that is swerving or spinning.

Scawen could solve this by tweaking some parameters in the AI code. But the AI has other problems, and these require a more thorough revision...

Quote from Scawen :

If you want reality then just go racing in reality! If you want a sim then you are avoiding many of the problems of reality, and cutting it down to the actual racing. That's the purpose of a racing sim. Get in and RACE. Similarly the purpose of hotlapping is to get in and LAP!

Amen.

This should be stickied somewhere.

Quote from Shotglass :

therefore the question is clearly about the (nonexistant) angle between those lines and not about the angle between their directional vectors

That is the same, by definition. At least, that's what they made me believe when I studied maths at the university.

Quote from Becky Rose :

I'm now working 8-8 every day and 10-4 on weekends

What amazes me is that you can still find time for your LFS activities. Or can you program in your sleep?

BTW, if you need some help to kill the typos in your resume... (0.5 )

Quote from Shotglass :

theres no way that those 2 would ever intersect

Correct, but you can still define & calculate the angle between them. It's the same as the angle between the directional vectors of the two lines (and these intersect, by definition, in the origin). See also this Wikipedia page.

Viewed from above, the quadrangle ABCD is a "kite" shape, with AC being the long axis, and BD the short axis. The triangles ABC and ADC are mirrored.

Using Pythagoras, the length of AC can be calculated: 4. Since the length of AB is 2, the angle between AD and AC is 60 degrees, and the angle between DC and AC is 30 degrees.

The length of AE is 1, EC is 3.

(i) BD is a normal vector for the plane A - A1 - C1 - C. Hence, BD is orthogonal to any vector in that plane.

(ii) View from the side, in the direction of the plane B - B1 - D1 - D. The requested angle is the same angle as the the angle between EA1 and EC1. The triangle E - A1 - C1 satisfies the Pythagorean equation, so it's 90 degrees.

(iii) Can in principle be solved by using the dot product: x.y = |x| * |y| * cos a. Choose B as origin, create 3D vectors for AD and BC1.

Last edited by wsinda, Thu 26 Apr 2007, 12:30.

At the level of pro racing, where the stakes are high, it's inevitable that mind games will be played. But at recreational levels? In a SIM?!?

In my not-so-very-humble opinion any LFS player who is willing to spoil the fun of his opponents by playing dirty tricks, just to gain a few places, ought to have his head examined.

Thankfully, I've never seen anyone doing this online. But if I did, I wouldn't race him again. He can have the bleeding podium all to himself.

OK, rewindable replays have been requested many times, and they will probably be added somewhere in the not-too-distant future. My suggestion is that, when this gets done, the replays will also be controllable from scripts. That is, there should be commands to pause the replay, to change playback speed, to rewind / fast-forward, etc.

This could be really useful for at least two applications. The first is replay analysers (my specialty ). When you're analysing a lap, it would be great if the analyser could tell LFS to load the replay that contains the lap, and fast-forward to the point in the lap that you're studying. This enables you to, say, find the exact turn-in point of the WR lap for the turn where your own hotlap loses a lot of time.

The second application is educational movies, such as track guides and race craft tutorials. Currently, these must be made by capturing replays and editing the results. It would be handier if you could make "annotated replays": a replay with a script that tells LFS to move to the next interesting moment, and then displays some text message to explain things.

Mods, could you please immediately lock any thread that suggests either less or more features for demo users? Suggestions like these have little to do with improving the sim, they're only questioning the business decision that the devs made about the limitations of the demo version.

Besides, these threads only lead to ranting about "cheapskate" demo users vs. "elitistic" S2 users. Nothing improves, only the atmosphere is fouled.

Ready for the Sirtaki, boys?