Science of the discworld

well,in my opinion,and you have all heard my opinion numerous times,with regard to religion i understand where people are coming from,it's all about belief,whereas science is factual,and what makes a fact???belief,if you think about it.'this shirt is red'....that is a fact,by why is it a fact???because we believe that that shirt is red.it's not too confusing if you think about it

if it's all about belief, why can guys just see 16 colours and girls about 6 million?
and why are you talking about books i have not read yet?

i haven't read it either,i'm just trying to relate to the topic/issue thingy at hand.and guys don't like to complicate things,that's why we see 16 colours,girls live for detail and stuffs

well, i read science of discworld II and III some time during the last 5 months and you could say the science chapters sometimes gave me quite a bit of a headache, but i found them very interesting. but i did notice what the sarge just mentioned and i have to agree with him. Personally I don’t mind, because I’m not a religious person, but I wonder what a follower of any religion would feel like if he started reading a book about discworld and got this? But I, too, have a rather strong POV on some things and would end up like that if I would write about them, so even though I can see a problem there, I can’t really blame terry.

i'm pretty sure we see more..but I'll sk mum...she's dedicated ~30 years to the eyes.

the shirt is red because we defined red as what that shirt is. facts are tings that can be verified and belief is not enough to formulate a full proof

I've got "Darwin's Watch" up on my bookshelf and have 9apparently) read up to the bit where Pterry takes off as described above. I'll get to it eventaully, but like Ratty (or not?) it's not the most engaging of the DW fraternity of tomes. But perhaps more importantly, a good friend of mine who has PhD's in Pharmocology and Evolutionary Biology, and is a committed evangelical christian, has read it and highly recommends it!

The thing is, though, even a cursory glance at recent history slam dunks the whole "Science Rules" bullshit. The bloodiest and most inhuman time of human history was foisted upon us all by two atheistic philosophies that took pains to tread a new path and define any type of belief system out of the political psyche save that of belief in the ruling system itself. These were namely National Socialism (>40 million dead within 20 years) and Communism (>75 million dead within 70 years but mostly in the 50's and 60's not counting several wars).

Religion has done some stupid things and has a helluva lot to be ashamed of but much of that can be balanced by an overwhelming majority of everyday things like civil liberties, the scientific method, most of modern mathematics, and the vast majority of classical literature, etc, that were delivered to us out of primary research or through preservation action because some monk or Imam somewhere gave a shit and thought it was an important thing to do.

It's one thing to ask the questions in a post-modern context because all religions have to provide answers beyond the ole "you just gotta have faith" epistemology. But the post-modern elves that haven't paid their dues and don't acknowledge the debt they have to the shoulders of the giants they stand on surrender their credibility to the "Oh-god of Hypocrisy" and are worthy of nothing more than having the piss taken out of them.

In my opinion of course

Note: I've suspended the forum's normal cultural abjuration of "strong language" for this thread only. If you use it make it contextual, not punctuation. And no F's and C's.

LEE, LET'S BE CLEAR!

Stalin was a shit-head. A psychophant, psychopath, megalomaniac and sociopath. He did horrible things yes but that has nothing to do with socialism* it has to do with him. Lenin thought he'd be a good prtoégé and he was but trotski was better and (Read animal farm if you don't it's about the Pravda -the propaganda paper[sqealer] stalin and trotski) he would have advanced russia significantly but stalin had him discredited and killed. and DO NOT FORGET in ~20 years stalin draged the whole russian empire through the industrial revolution it took the rest of us centuries to achieve and he couldn't have done it with religion breathing down his back. Stalin was not however a representative of any system, order or governmental form except his own. We still use the term "stalinism" to describe a totalitarian oppressive regime with no socialist connotations. and stalin did kill off any of his own men but he died in '53. his successor cH**rushchev (who btw was in charge of the 1956 re-invasion into Hungary) was somewhat better so I doubt that that meny people died for socialism/communism in the 60's barring the viet and korean wars which were not fough, truth be told!, for any truley political reason! the V.C.s were not told to fight to defent the governmnetal form, they fought to defend their homes which were overrun but americans. the reasons that the americans didn't want this was because by calling themselves commies, countries call the USSR Tavarish (commrade). the government (US) didn't care about the flag, they cared about the nukes. That isn't the a religious philosophy's fault, that just developed after WWII and it just so happened that russia was socialist. Nochdazu, sorry to be the one to break it to you but 14000 GIs didn't die for home and country they died for a shit-load of tungsten which if you are familiar with (among other things) the rods of god*** project you would know the US loves.

Further more, again, NaZi does not mean hitler not the converse. the philosophy of the party was by our standards incomprehensible but that isn't what NAZI is about. They attacked jews because they were an easy target that people would sypathise against and you need a scapegoat to keep the people happy whiole the dovernment decentralises and life gets worse before it bets better. don't forget germany and italy pulled out of the depression rather effectively. Any brits might sympathise as thatcher followed the same fascist**** system. although duriong WWII alone 60 million died (20.000.000 were russian unter uns and 6.000.000 were jewish) granted but that isn't what the governmental form is about. further more hitler DIDN'T OPPOSE RELIGION (as far as I know) he embrased it making himself a sort of demigod to the people. the jewish faith was attacked showing us why religion is "bad" it gives people another reason to attack you.

And neither one of these regimes had anything to do with claiming science was better than all. They were not technocracies. they did however give us scientific advanced that would have taken ages to achieve. In order to validate your point I suggest you find a pile of shit science has stepped into and how religion helped it out

Also the book isn't against religion per se. it's against the organised religion and the power it has. NB in the middles ages the church ruled and lám lám there was no advance. no cultural break through. in fact people degressed from the glory of Rome and shrank into darkness which is what the church likes. they launched 9 crusaides which robably killed alot of people and you should look at population percentages. rememnber the reason that modern history looks so much worse is because we have more people now.
In the US people can't get elected if they are atheist. I mean what sort of republican senator would turn around and say that gays should get married? here, the greens senator bob brown IS gay. I mean in alabama interracial marriage was legalised IN 2000!!!! and it only just managed to pass. what the hell is up with that place!? the policies of the US and the majortity of its citizens is beyong appaling. they are outdated and backwards veiws which have no place in modern society while countries where religion was an established part of the system have evolved to make religion more of a hobby if you will. an optional believe you can hold while still being compassionate to other human beings even though the bible opposes it sometimes. and don't tell me it doesn't indoctrinate racial prejudice. My grandmother is the bigest catholic after the pope and you should here her talk. it's the biggest spate of racist abuse this side of nazi propaganda. well not exactly but close enough. If all religions preach tolerance that's fine but how can you say a book teaches tollerance when the main character sets about destroying armies, cities, peoples etc. you don't think it makes a difference these days but it does. people take it seriously and they'll turn around and say "well God condemned them to death in the bible so it's okay"

that's it form me for now

peace

*communism doesn't exists. Lenin said that in order to achive communism they had to bypass a system called socialism where the people trust a supreme and wise government to make the changes necessary to establish communism.

**as in baCH

***giant tungsten rods in orbit around the earth which can be caused to crash like a meteor into any city at will and would cause aout the same amound of damage as a nuke

****a lot of dispute about how to define fascism but I was always raised to believe Moussolini's definition and not all the other people on wiki who think they know what they're on about but don't. In it's original form fascism is a very nationalist decentralisation i.e. giving all public works to private buisnesses and this is the most efficient solution to a national money probelem.

As we're on a roll today, a new book's been published by someone who's actually done research that pretty comprehensively and conclusively debunks the above. Lenin, Stalin and Hitler were all 3 monsters but Lenin was the reasons for Stalin and provided the scene for the excuse for Hitler. Read and weep.

you actually read the whole rant? wow, I didn;t even read the whole thing and I wrote it.

just ofr that I hsall read your linky thing

[cracks knuckles, drinks glass of water, loosens muscles in preparation, gets into character]

I'm gonna enjoy this.

ok, lenin was not a happy pappy. (duh) his brother was executed for his anti-tsar opinions lenin himslef lost his job, had to flee the country and was imprisoed for i think 6 yrs in sibera [the hungarian anecdote: as tavarish lenin famously said when he first stepped out of his siberian house "It's f***ing cold!"]
So no, no-one ever said that he gained power through legitimate methods. he did it the way the french, hungarina even americans did it...revolution. The tsars were not much better (check "bloody sunday").
I have no doubt that Lenin, who watched his brother executed, lost his sitser and mother (can;t remember y but it was ocntextually important) and was exiled and imprisoned by the tsars, was overjoyed to see them dead...wouldn;t you be? but this has nothing to do with his governence. He was a highly educated man and yes he invented the gulags which at least made the prisoners owrk for the state much like the systems in place all over the world. and hey the siberian imprisonment idea ws there looong before he got to it.
by mass terror do you mean the literacy programs or the 1st world war? and yes Stalin was a logical heir..groomed by lenin for the part but trotsky was nonetheless executed by stalin just in case.

yeah? so? that sounds liek fear to me...how is the "myth" busted. we know he gained power through turning ppl againt the jews and through the night of the long knives where he had his major opponents assassinated.

this has to do with hitler advancing germany because....? we know this is true. Stalin was a sociopathic paranoid..except for the dood in charge of the cheka who was as mad as stalin was and they had been buddies for years

i see, well the first thing you learn about making a point is that the best way to do it is by confronting the other side.

uh many commies were jew cos uh..many russians were jews...you think hitler has 6million jews exterminated in the camps? no the russian fornt (20mil dead on the russian side) brought the figures up. amazing numbers of jews are russian and if you were russian, ukranian, belorussian whatever...you were a communist or you were dead. simple as that. so yet again a point with no real argumentative value.

yes it would because i have a sneaking suspicion that even though no doubt the entire confrontation would be in english mr gellately would be sent home crying.

the report demonstrates a book which represents history of political characters in a biased way through selective language. I have no doubt he has done his homework but it amounts to nothing as far as our conversation goes. I am not claiming that they were nice people I am claiming that ruthless though they were they achieved enourmous things. this book sets out to make them look like bad people which they may be but SO...WHAT!?
It's a slur campaign. like the republicans with clinton...yes he cheated but so what? his politics were good and thats what matters.

in what way exactly? mind i haven;t read the book

well, i did take him 2 months

i read it all,gasp,it was quite informative as i'm kinda new in the whole history field,so shot a lot to all

im sure in SA that last part made sense. well i was indoctrinated against anti-commie indoctrination so i have a lot of opinions on the matter and i've been told of the good things so they don;t get overshadowed by the bad...my parents admit they'd rather live back in the eastern-block before '89 than here. at least back home they told dad he was undeer government surveilance. See I know we prob. are...given my...er...political voice.....but they don;t tell us.