From: Gordon Worley (redbird@rbisland.cx)
Date: Sat Dec 08 2001 - 19:02:27 MST
On Saturday, December 8, 2001, at 05:38 PM, Jeff Bone wrote:
>
> Clearly I've got some issues with the rather fuzzy definition of
> Friendliness
> that's been offered,
It's not fuzzy, just a megabyte long. ;-)
> strives for equality of outcome rather than equality of opportunity.
> I'm not
> sure that's the best option.
Ah, but here's where you get to have your cake and eat it, too. Those
wonderful simulations (I'm not talking about historical simulations or
anything like that) can be used to trick a mind into getting what it
wants. Can't act out your fantasy in the real world because it steps on
toes, then just do it in a simulation.
>> we should remember that the model the prediction
>> is based on is a model which historically has often changed and
>> currently
>> is still in flux.
>
> Yawn. That's a very anti-scientific argument, Eli --- indeed one I
> often hear
> religious folks (like the Creationist crowd) use to undermine the
> credibility of
> arguments from a scientific bias. Let's keep in mind that the model
> that we have now
> --- while *certain* to change and improve --- is now yielding very
> fine-grained
> predictions with accuracy improving at a rate that outstrips our
> ability to verify
I agree with Eliezer on this one. The Fundies are interested in seeing
physics work in a totally different way than it does, because their
arguments don't work unless things change at a very basic level. The
the point here is that physics changes, but it doesn't really. Our
models change and the laws of physics *may* change with time, but all in
all every day physics is still the same, just we don't know about it.
There's nothing wrong with that; just the way it is.
>> Well... this is something I happen to disagree with, because personally
>> the second law of thermodynamics strikes me as being statistical in
>> nature, and often rather fragile.
>
> Go read up on it --- it's probably the best law we've got, and has
> very, very deep
> implications for the most essential workings of spacetime. Yes, it's
> statistical,
> and yes, there are issues with scope (i.e., clearly life violates 2LT
> on a very local
> scale, but then the law doesn't talk about those scales.) But it's
> still got some
> amazing properties relative to many other "fundamental" physical laws.
Well, this isn't very SL4, but you're both right. The 2nd Law is
fragile, in the sense that it only applies in full effect in closed
systems. So long as the system is open, entropy is still in effect but
energy doesn't (necessarily) run out. Of course, entropy is always,
always, always in effect (or at least as far as we know). But, that's
enough schooling for today. ;-)
-- Gordon Worley `When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty http://www.rbisland.cx/ said, `it means just what I choose redbird@rbisland.cx it to mean--neither more nor less.' PGP: 0xBBD3B003 --Lewis Carroll
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Jul 17 2013 - 04:00:37 MDT