Lare Kikkeli

Yeah considering the situation in Somalia and the stuff western nations and corporations have done I can't really blame the Somalis for trying. Looks like they're really trying to improve the living conditions, too.

even if it is man made there still might be nothing we can do about it.

That was a typo, it's supposed to be simpler, which the calculations where Newtonian laws are used are.

Not really no, the topic name is a bit of hyperbole. I used to work in advertisement It's the same thing as when GR replaced Newtonian physics. Newtons rules are still widely used when you're making simple calculations, but GR & SR are the more accurate ones.

Well, the hole is that GR/SR breaks on the quantum level and in black hole singularities. This theory could explain some of the things SR doesn't.

Why do you hope that? If this isn't true it still leaves a hole in Einsteins theories, and we need a new theory to fill it. It's either this or something else.

Both yes and no. The AIDS/HIV virus is extremely hard to transmit via blood - in fact one could hold infected material in the palm of one's hand and not be infected (barring a cut or other puncture in the skin). I meant blood on blood. It'sa risk since most people have tiny cuts on their hands all the time (I know I do). Then again I don't think I've ever met anyone with HIV or AIDS.

No, it's highly unlikely that any STD will ever destroy the human race. First off, because the actual spreading requires sexual contact and especially since we have quite efficient methods like condoms to prevent the spreading. If AIDS got out of hands it would be quite easy to simply make all future children in a lab as well. HIV isn't just an STD since it spreads via blood contact as well, and the fact that it's usually symptomless for a long time so carriers can infect other people without knowing it makes it a lot more dangerous than other STD's. I don't really think any one disease could do us in, but HIV hs been going strong for decades and hasn't shown any signs of slowing down yet. Worst case scenario? A lot of 3rd world people die.

It kind of negates it, as it separates time from space at high energies. Not totally, Einsteins theory will still be correct under normal (our) circumstances but as far as I understand gravity actually behaves differently from how Einstein figured it does.

HIV/AIDS might actually be the end of us. It's steadily spreading throughout the world and while we have drugs that make it non-lethal or at least prolong death a vaccine is nowhere in sight. It's actually pretty interesting how William Gibson wrote in one of his books (one of the Bridge Trilogy books, I forget which) that the cure to HIV will come from an inflicted who has natural protection against AIDS despite getting the virus. There are in fact many people like this and scientists are studying why HIV doesn't turn into AIDS in their care. Maybe in the future we'll be getting HIV shots that protect from the lethal versions of the virus?

Oh? I apologise, you just seem to change your arguments and opinions so fast when other people point how wrong you are it's hard to keep track... As far as the worst tyrannys go I guess that depends on how you look at it... I guess Israel could be considered a tyranny. Iran is pretty bad, but so are most muslim countries. I think Saudi-Arabia is one of the worst once, they've just subdued their people well.

As usual Dagon gives us his opinions as facts. Please, show some evidence that the majority of muslim countries don't allow Christian churches built.

Just read this and holy **** why hasn't it been in the news more? If this turns out to be true it would be the scientific discovery of the century. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article....time-from-space

Free weed or death!

I'm not saying banning minarets is smart, on the contrary i think it's retarded. I'm just saying that it's not really surprising the Swiss voted that way since it seems like muslims are just demanding special treatment and all europe gets in return are suicide strikes. There's been a huge rise in nationalism and far right rhetoric in Finland lately, and they racist far right party is gaining more members every day.

Now this is the thing, better how? I'm not saying banning minarets is a good thing, on the contrary it's retarded, but I do believe we should hold on to our own rules, laws and traditions and not let people who move from the other side of the world say what we can or can not do. It doesn't work that way, unless they're willing to come halfway through and live by our laws and rules. Freedom of religion, sure, but freedom to do whatever the hell they want because of religion? No.

I don't find this really that surprising. Europeans have been making compromises with the muslims for decades, and it would seem to the regular population that all we get in return are demands for more autonomy and terrorist attacks.

Thats the attitude I deal with all the time as someone in IT. 'Well I got a pretty decent box so what if I got 9 apps running at start up?' and then in the next breath 'why does my app keep crashing?'. Wish I charged by the amount of start up apps I disabled when working on a clients machine not hourly. I'd be rich. It's a single program that I actually do use while playing games. It's not really THAT heavy, sure it could be made a bit lighter but when my CPU speeds rarely go over 50% (of which 25% is always folding@home) I don't really see why a program taking 5% or something is a big deal. Same with my ram, the amount Steam uses is insignificantly small. Wait, how is this relevant at all? It's not like 1 app is gonna make the difference. Besides, I run a ton of apps all the time and get crashes rarely. On 32 bit Win XP. You know you can shut off Steam if it's too heavy for your computer right? You don't NEED to keep it on, only when you're playing an online game that uses Steam as copy protection.

I dony really get how something being lighter than Steam on modern computers is a huge bonus. It's not like Steam is exactly heavy on resources.

I'm not sure why you're saying this like it's a counter argument. 200 years ago animal rights were nonexistant. Now multiple countries are banning inhumane treatment of animals. Why is that? It's cultural evolution. Technological development has had a huge part in the development of our culture naturally. And in the future once we get fusion power or solar power to a level where it means unlimited energy we might see the end of poverty. Maybe. I realise this sounds like a bunch of hippie nonsense, but if you told a Finn 100 years ago that no one woul die of hunger and had unlimited access to health care 100 years in te future he'd laugh at you and then stab you for your clothes. So yeah we've come pretty far. Yes, this is what I meant. Places where people need to steal and kill for their basic needs are naturally the places that are the most backwards. If you read my post I talked nothing about solutions to this problem, just what the problem was. The solution naturally would be to eliminate the need for crime and violence as a way of staying alive, which we have done in the western world. Violence is a frowned upon in modern society, and while it's still a problem it's a hell of a lot smaller problem than 100 years ago. We have the basic knowledge and technology to have unlimited energy, and earths resources would last a lot longer if we used them more efficiently. Plus there's always space but I guess that's so far in the future for mankind that it's not a realistic solution to our current problems. I live in Finland, where no matter where I walk no matter how late I don't have to fear any harm. Sure we have violence, but it's so random and rare that I'm mor likely to get hit by a bus than get robbed or come to bodily harm otherwise.

Yeah. After ten thousand years of cultural evolution (read: constant warring), we have finally learned... PR!!! Don't be too impressed with modernity, though. People are still people. I don't get this line of thinking. We've come a long way from for example 500 years ago. We've also come a long way from how we treated each other 100 years ago. We have very finely tuned systems to keep people safe from harm no matter where they are, and places where these systems fail are often the ones that are the most backward. People are people true, but we've changed a lot mentally from the apes we were in the dawn of our species, despite being physiologically identical. I don't think it's impossible for wars to become useless in the future, but it's a long and hard road to that. Still, we've made some giant leaps in that direction lately so I'm hopeful.

Yeah both parties are to blame and I'm not really anti-Israel or pro-Palestine but I don't see what other choice Palestine has than do what they've been doing. Israel should take the first step and stop acting like mini-USA. But as I said they're probably satisfied with having a tiny enemy that they can blame their problems on and strengten the national spirit when it seems like Israeli citizens are starting to doubt the sense in waging war with all of their neighbours. Since you're already pre-insulted I can take the first part of my response as read. As if no other country breaks international law! A tiny minority of countries obey it at all. Reason? Laws have to be enforced by unilateral force or by consensus action. Unilateral force is apparently out of fashion, and worldwide consensus is impossible. Sure lots of countries break international laws. Mostly big countries who feel that they owe nothing to no one and damn everyone else as long as we get what we want. That doesn't make it alright to wage war on false pretenses and treat prisoners of war like we're still living in the 18th century. As I said, 10000 years of cultural evolution has made us to at least make these laws. I guess it'll take us a few more centuries to actually follow them.

^^ Yup that seems to be the common opinion held by americans... Most likely because you're constantly breaking it?

It's a shame our cultural heritage has dissapeared in favour of american pop culture. Ofelas is a pretty crappy movie to be honest, but I really like the setting. Nils Gaup's most recent movie, The Kautokeino Rebellion is actually really good and I recommend it to everyone interested in Sami culture.