towercpu: "I like to talk about programming. I also like to talk about religion and philosophy."

My three favorite topics! Watch out for lion, though, he gets an itchy trigger finger when religion comes up. :-P
infidel

also, lion can be annoyed by confronting him with "too" personal shit.

haha

: towercpu: "I like to talk about programming. I also like to talk about religion and philosophy."
:
: My three favorite topics! Watch out for lion, though, he gets an itchy trigger finger when religion comes up. :-P
: infidel
:

DarQ

also gets angry about bus drivers comments "im taking you to the taliban" haha.

aha. we have the beast in a corner!!


: also, lion can be annoyed by confronting him with "too" personal shit.
:
: haha
:
: : towercpu: "I like to talk about programming. I also like to talk about religion and philosophy."
: :
: : My three favorite topics! Watch out for lion, though, he gets an itchy trigger finger when religion comes up. :-P
: : infidel
: :
:
: DarQ
:
:

leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic

: also gets angry about bus drivers comments "im taking you to the taliban" haha.
:
: aha. we have the beast in a corner!!
:
:
: : also, lion can be annoyed by confronting him with "too" personal shit.
: :
: : haha
: :
: : : towercpu: "I like to talk about programming. I also like to talk about religion and philosophy."
: : :
: : : My three favorite topics! Watch out for lion, though, he gets an itchy trigger finger when religion comes up. :-P
: : : infidel
: : :
: :
: : DarQ
: :
: :
:
:

DarQ

yes, but its only a light hearted joke.

Anyway... lets leave lion alone. Who is going to be picked on next. me?


: leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic

http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_734121.html

typical english.

the tuxedo thing sounds cool. i would do a dare like that.

This message was edited by DarQ at 2002-12-30 9:23:48

---

incredible!

also, dont open attachments because a new virus has spread.

http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.yaha.k@mm.html
DarQ



note: the part behind the @ is a part of the link. PH doesnt display correctly

Thats nasty. luckily all our email goes via a virus clearing house in london.


: This message was edited by DarQ at 2002-12-30 9:23:48

---

: incredible!
:
: also, dont open attachments because a new virus has spread.
:
: http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.yaha.k@mm.html
: DarQ
:
:
:
: note: the part behind the @ is a part of the link. PH doesnt display correctly
:
:

: Thats nasty. luckily all our email goes via a virus clearing house
: in london.

Is it just me...or has there been a big increase over the last few months of the number of email virusses arriving in our inboxes? I've not got unlucky with one yet, but heck, they're a daily occurrence for me now! They used to be a rare "treat".

-------------------------------------------
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: leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
:
Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
'lionb =

LionB

Thank you for keeping me amused. Had a good LOL for this one.

: : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: :
: Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: 'lionb =
:
: LionB
:
:

DarQ

Glad to hear that!
:
: Thank you for keeping me amused. Had a good LOL for this one.
:
: : : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: : :
: : Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: : Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: : Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: : set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: : 'lionb =
: :
: : LionB
: :
: :
:
: DarQ
:
:

: : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: :
: Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: 'lionb =

Ah dear Lion, you have just set the Leeos(j) clone to nothing.

Have a good Christmas eve.

This message was edited by Moderator at 2002-12-31 6:17:41

---

: : : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: : :
: : Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: : Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: : Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: : set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: : 'lionb =
:
: Ah dear Lion, you have just set the Leeos(j) clone to nothing.
:
: Have a good New Years eve.
:
Christmas eve?!! I am not religious may be that's why I thought it was back to December 24.

: This message was edited by Moderator at 2002-12-31 6:17:41

---

: : : : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: : : :
: : : Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: : : Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: : : Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: : : set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: : : 'lionb =
: :
: : Ah dear Lion, you have just set the Leeos(j) clone to nothing.
: :
: : Have a good New Years eve.
: :
: Christmas eve?!! I am not religious may be that's why I thought it was back to December 24.
:
:
:

who mentioned Christmas eve??

: : This message was edited by Moderator at 2002-12-31 6:17:41

---

: : : : : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: : : : :
: : : : Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: : : : Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: : : : Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: : : : set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: : : : 'lionb =
: : :
: : : Ah dear Lion, you have just set the Leeos(j) clone to nothing.
: : :
: : : Have a good Christmas eve.
: : :
: : Christmas eve?!! I am not religious may be that's why I thought it was back to December 24.
: :
: :
: :
:
: who mentioned Christmas eve??
:
:
You did

: : : This message was edited by Moderator at 2002-12-31 6:17:41

---

: : : : : : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: : : : : :
: : : : : Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: : : : : Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: : : : : Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: : : : : set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: : : : : 'lionb =
: : : :
: : : : Ah dear Lion, you have just set the Leeos(j) clone to nothing.
: : : :
: : : : Have a good new years eve.
: : : :
: : : Christmas eve?!! I am not religious may be that's why I thought it was back to December 24.
: : :
: : :
: : :
: :
: : who mentioned Christmas eve??
: :
: :
: You did
:
ok. i admit it... i got it wrong. now behave.

This message was edited by lionb at 2002-12-31 6:54:40

---

: : : : Christmas eve?!! I am not religious may be that's why I thought it was back to December 24.
: : : :
: : : :
: : : :
: : :
: : : who mentioned Christmas eve??
: : :
: : :
: : You did
: :
: ok. i admit it... i got it wrong. now behave.
:
Actually, you shoudn't admit because nobody else exept us was/are going to read that message.

there is no sneaky communication behind my back. Nothing slips my watchful eye! Don't think again mr. lionb!

: : : : This message was edited by Moderator at 2002-12-31 6:17:41

---

: : : : : : : leeos! LOL!!! But i dont think lion will appreciate this topic
: : : : : : :
: : : : : : Not true again. Nevertheless, using Dutch array I'll say:
: : : : : : Set DarQ = Nothing 'after that DarQ =
: : : : : : Set infidel = Nothing ' after that infidel =
: : : : : : set Leeos = Nothing ' after that leoos =
: : : : : : 'lionb =
: : : : :
: : : : : Ah dear Lion, you have just set the Leeos(j) clone to nothing.
: : : : :
: : : : : Have a good new years eve.
: : : : :
: : : : Christmas eve?!! I am not religious may be that's why I thought it was back to December 24.
: : : :
: : : :
: : : :
: : :
: : : who mentioned Christmas eve??
: : :
: : :
: : You did
: :
: ok. i admit it... i got it wrong. now behave.
:

DarQ

: also gets angry about bus drivers comments "im taking you to the taliban" haha.
:
: aha. we have the beast in a corner!!
:
This's not true. I did not like reaction of some people on that story

: also, lion can be annoyed by confronting him with "too" personal shit.
:
: haha
:
That's true

:
: My three favorite topics! Watch out for lion, though, he gets an itchy trigger finger when religion comes up. :-P
:
This is not true at all. I just do not understand atheists who goes to the religious temples to celebrate religious events.
:

: :
: : My three favorite topics! Watch out for lion, though, he gets an itchy trigger finger when religion comes up. :-P
: :
: This is not true at all. I just do not understand atheists who goes to the religious temples to celebrate religious events.

I don't celebrate "religious events", but I do take part in family traditions. I also sometimes play music for different churches, so I sometimes am *part* of a religious event. How about that!
infidel

I think, now after deep discussion about lionb's problems everybody is happy. So let's talk about very phylosophycal/ethical subject - cloning. What do you think about that?

go ahead. BTW: Some shitty cult claimed thay have already did it recently. It were the... eeh... www.reals.org or something??? Realians! Yes, it were those.

Anyway, cloning people can have many good results such as spare body parts instead of a new plastic arm or leg. I can be negative as well. I hope cloning will be controlled and it should not be done by just anybody. Especially not the US government. WOuld they clone bin laden?

Nah, just scientists should have that feature and not groups that already have too much power.


: I think, now after deep discussion about lionb's problems everybody is happy. So let's talk about very phylosophycal/ethical subject - cloning. What do you think about that?
:

DarQ

Greetings.

Well, I'm not particularly offended by it... I just can't seem to formulate convincing philosophical arguments either way (or rather, I can shoot holes in the arguments both ways). So I figure... wait and see. Let's not start crying foul until we actually see which side of the baseline the ball lands on.

However... there is a fundamental concern, should cloning become an alternately to, erm, traditional baby-manufacturing techniques. Evolution never stops. Every generation of humans is still playing the same old competitive natural selection game that we've always played.

If we start short-circuiting natural selection by deciding which genes we want in the next generation (artificial selection, I believe it's called), I doubt we'll be able to maintain our competitive edge as a species.

Just look at the real-word consequences of artificial selection: poodles, corn, and chickens. None of which are capable of surviving in the wild. (Trust me. When's the last time you saw a pack of free-ranging wild pekingeses?) Hate to think that's what we want for ourselves. I don't look good in a collar.

Take Care.
Cody

: However... there is a fundamental concern, should cloning become an alternately to, erm, traditional baby-manufacturing techniques. Evolution never stops. Every generation of humans is still playing the same old competitive natural selection game that we've always played.
:
: If we start short-circuiting natural selection by deciding which genes we want in the next generation (artificial selection, I believe it's called), I doubt we'll be able to maintain our competitive edge as a species.

Haven't we already done this? Hasn't modern medicine allowed people to survive to reproductive age who wouldn't have otherwise? And who ultimately pass their weaker genes on?

infidel

: Haven't we already done this? Hasn't modern medicine allowed people to survive to reproductive age who wouldn't have otherwise? And who ultimately pass their weaker genes on?

Oh, sure we have. However, science itself participates in the process of natural selection; as we've weakened the species, we've also developed the technology to maintain a genetically weaker species.

And we could argue that the same would probably pass with cloning (indeed, this is one of the reasons why it doesn't worry me too much). The fundamental difference I see is this:

With medical advances and such which allow genetically weaker specimens to survive, we're basically creating a larger gene pool with a wider standard deviation to determine "weakness." And as long as we can maintain the species (through technology or whatever), the natural selection process continues functioning... natural selection is just allowed a much broader playing field on which to operate.

The hypothesis being that, should these weaker survivors actually threaten the species, they'd be the first to go in the next punctuated equilibrium anyway, regardless what medicine we have to help them.

On the other hand, with cloning, we're actually narrowing the gene pool. Thus... even if we picked only the genetically "strongest" specimens to clone... natural selection isn't getting much to work with, and one good wallop could knock us all out.

(Think about poodles again. Should humans disappear, poodles disappear. Zero survival chance.)

Remember: genetic "fitness" can not be judged a priori. We are never evolving "toward" something; you only evolve from something. Thus, what concerns me in cloning isn't whom we clone... it's that we're narrowing the standard deviation in the gene pool.

Take Care.
Cody

: (Think about poodles again. Should humans disappear, poodles disappear. Zero survival chance.)

Of course, natural selection is also a great deal more devious than we give it credit for. So I perhaps shouldn't say that poodles have zero survival chance... but they will rapidly become unrecognizable as poodles.

Take Care.
Cody

you type sooo much. i skipped it for tonight and will probably read it partly next year somewhere.

anyway, have a good start for the new year...


: : (Think about poodles again. Should humans disappear, poodles disappear. Zero survival chance.)
:
: Of course, natural selection is also a great deal more devious than we give it credit for. So I perhaps shouldn't say that poodles have zero survival chance... but they will rapidly become unrecognizable as poodles.
:
: Take Care.
: Cody
:
:

DarQ

A perfect explanation. Thanks! You are brilliant.

infidel

Greetings.

Programming, religion, philosophy... among other things. I'm largely happy talking about whatever's on the floor. (For instance, right now on the floor are about four empty beer bottles which I don't remember drinking.)

I'm not particularly concerned about people who don't care for my posts (and that's not specifically to LionB, with whom I have dealt quite cordially on other occasions and on other boards; I refer to people in general). This is because, as I've said on various occasions, I'm not required reading. If I don't entertain you, ignore me. I promise, I won't take it personally.

Right now, I'm working on a thesis which revolves around taking Noam Chomsky's deconstruction of language (syntactic structures) and reframing the English language (and, by extension, language in general) as an XML application. That's philosophy and programming in one whop; now I've got to figure out how to weasel in religion... anyone want a piece of it?

Take Care.
Cody

Hi,

: Programming, religion, philosophy... among other things. I'm
: largely happy talking about whatever's on the floor. (For instance,
: right now on the floor are about four empty beer bottles which I
: don't remember drinking.)
I guess this means one of two things:-

1) You didn't drink them.
2) You were too far gone to remember drinking them.

Or maybe you got bad memory... <grins>

: Right now, I'm working on a thesis which revolves around taking Noam
: Chomsky's deconstruction of language (syntactic structures) and
: reframing the English language (and, by extension, language in
: general) as an XML application. That's philosophy and programming
: in one whop; now I've got to figure out how to weasel in religion...
: anyone want a piece of it?

Sounds like an interesting problem... I doubt I'd know quite where to start in it myself - closest I've got to this was writing a set of Prolog rules to apply to sentences to see if they were valid. Didn't do much work on it, but it was interesting at the time... Maybe that isn't related to what you're doing, maybe it is. But I'm not required reading... <ducks>

See ya,

Jonathan



-------------------------------------------
Count your downloads:
http://www.downloadcounter.com/
And host your site:
http://www.incrahost.com/
Don't say I never give you anything...

Greetings.

At least, according to the photographs of the party I just found posted on the Internet.

Actually, that is more or less what we're doing (referring to the Prolog rules for validating sentences). It's a kind of document type definition which will define English.

It started as a hypothetical discussion which got elevated to project when someone actually decided to fund the thing. Go figure.

Take Care.
Cody

Hi,

: At least, according to the photographs of the party I just found
: posted on the Internet.

Ah, yes. The joys of pictures of parties that you find posted for the world to see...

: Actually, that is more or less what we're doing (referring to the
: Prolog rules for validating sentences). It's a kind of document
: type definition which will define English.

I've always wondered if this kind of stuff leads on to making a system that "understands" language to some degree. After all, if you can apply rules to sentences then you can extract from them what will be a verb, adjective, noun etc. From that you can see what is being done (verb) to what (noun) and how (adjective). Of course, then you have how, who, why, where... I guess "why" is the hardest one of those to deal with.

: It started as a hypothetical discussion which got elevated to
: project when someone actually decided to fund the thing. Go figure.

Figures. In a lot of places, ideas get elevated to projects if they are good ones. Or the people with the money are interested in them...

Best,

Jonathan


-------------------------------------------
Count your downloads:
http://www.downloadcounter.com/
And host your site:
http://www.incrahost.com/
Don't say I never give you anything...

: From that you can see what is being done (verb) to what (noun) and how (adjective).

I freely admit that I did poorly in Grammar, but isn't "how" the adverb, not adjective? Of course, it depends on what you mean by "how", but I don't think it's an adjective any way you slice it.

I (noun) drove (verb) the car (direct object) poorly (adverb).

Damn, it's almost been a decade since I last took an English class.

infidel

Hi,

: I freely admit that I did poorly in Grammar, but isn't "how" the
: adverb, not adjective? Of course, it depends on what you mean
: by "how", but I don't think it's an adjective any way you slice it.
:
: I (noun) drove (verb) the car (direct object) poorly (adverb).
:
: Damn, it's almost been a decade since I last took an English class.

Hmmm...despite obtaining top grades in my English exams back in the days when I had classes in it, I honestly don't have a clue! I thought adjectives were words that described, so poor would certianly be an adjective... Like:-

My English is poor. <== Poor is the adjective

But whether becuase it's describing how something was done (e.g. poorly) makes it an adverb...I don't know. But I sense you might be right. <embarrassed look>

Jonathan



-------------------------------------------
Count your downloads:
http://www.downloadcounter.com/
And host your site:
http://www.incrahost.com/
Don't say I never give you anything...

: Hmmm...despite obtaining top grades in my English exams back in the days when I had classes in it, I honestly don't have a clue! I thought adjectives were words that described, so poor would certianly be an adjective... Like:-
:
: My English is poor. <== Poor is the adjective
:
: But whether becuase it's describing how something was done (e.g. poorly) makes it an adverb...I don't know. But I sense you might be right. <embarrassed look>

Adjectives describe nouns. I'm not sure about your sentence above. For some reason it looks different to me than saying "My poor English", in which case poor would be an adjective.

I hate Grammar.

infidel

In the case of the sentence "My English is poor," the word "poor" is indeed an adjective. It is a special class of adjectives known as an "object adjective," in which the object of the verb serves as an adjective which "renames" the subject. Same applies to the word "fast" in the sentence "My car is fast," and to the word "drunk" in the sentence, "I am hopelessly, unforgivably and happily drunk."

Take Care.
Cody

: Right now, I'm working on a thesis which revolves around taking Noam Chomsky's deconstruction of language (syntactic structures) and reframing the English language (and, by extension, language in general) as an XML application. That's philosophy and programming in one whop; now I've got to figure out how to weasel in religion... anyone want a piece of it?

Sounds fascinating. I'd love a piece of it. Not sure I'm good enough to handle it, but what the hell...


infidel

This post has been deleted.