For Your Health (1)

Swine flu arose as a normal, non-lethal flu in the spring or 1918, but somehow, over the following months -- no-one knows how or where -- it mutated into something more severe. Then in 1933, the 50s and again in the seventies a strain of the same flu known as the Russian H1N1 broke out - Bill Bryson. The current virus of 2009 is known as: Pandemic H1N1/09 virus. "This new strain appears to be a result of reassortment of human influenza and swine influenza viruses, in all four different strains of subtype H1N1." - Wikipedia

God

i couldn't get this straight on paper, only in my head, so i had a fellow philosopher help me out...


i had formed these words in my head, but never were they to reach paper successfully. after conversing and questioning my friend, Andy Wooten, it slowly got clearer and clearer in my mind. after a while of not being able to write anything that made sense Andy sent me what was in my head via the internet in typed format.

i did a very small bit of editing, but everything else is thanks to a great friend: Andy Wooten.






It's a pretty simplistic construct. whenever people try to make a logic argument about the existence of god, they define god as the maximally great being.
we can look at god, therefore, as containing all possibilities of existence, i.e. infinity. one commonly put out holds that physics tells us that the possibility for anything that can be conceptualized is equal with the possibility for any other specific thing that can be conceptualized and that both those possibilities therefore exist somewhere within the multiverse. therefore, if we can conceptualize a mgb (maximally great being), then one exists somewhere in the multiverse, and the very nature of an mgb tells us that it would have maximal power everywhere in the multiverse. the problem with this proof is whether or not we can conceptualize god. Returning to the definition, god is infinity, all possibilities, the alpha and omega, the unmoved mover, Yahweh, Allah, Brahma, whatever. Imagine this in a numerical sense - if we were to have one point that contained all numbers, from -infinity to +infinity, then that set is zero, for it contains the negation of the possibility as well as the possibility. in other words, if god contains all possibilities, is "maximally great," then it must contain the possibility of no god at all, thus it's own negation. it's clear how the system is self-contradictory and inherently negates its self - thus making god impossible to conceptualize unless you define it as limited in power - but if god is limited in power then why call it god? even using a very loose definition of what can and cannot be conceptualized that allows for paradoxes, all that a maximally great being would mean is that this being negates itself and brings the metaphorical count back to zero - the condition of there being no god, i.e. if god exists then in effect there is no god.
fin.


thank you Andy Wooten for putting this down for me, i would have never gotten everything straight



another note from Andy:

it's a flawed proof though - firstly, a finite mind cannot conceptualize or begin to understand the universe in totality, secondly, physics tells us that the natural laws only work in our universe, it is possible and probable that other universes within the multiverse have different laws or even no laws at all. to try and apply the construct of ... Read More logic to something as ever-expansive as the multiverse is just plain childish - our vaunted qualities of rationality and reason are simply slightly elevated animal instincts and will never be able to understand the multiverse or even our own planet with our limited capacities. just because a system is self-contradictory doesn't mean it cannot exist. i mean shit, logic is self-contradictory too. the only way logic works is if you make a base assumption - that logic equals truth. the real problem is that you're never going to "prove" or "disprove" god because it's a metaphysical being - it's beyond our existence, thus we're never going to know

Puddle driver

WATCH THE VIDEO THEN GO TO THE SECOND LINK BEFORE READING MY POST

Driver drenches kids at bus stop:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=On1drhgxGWU

Police investigate puddle driver:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/devon/8302320.stm





amazing, but i don't think he should get fined because he was driving inside the lines, and he didn't have to go out of his way and swerve over or drive off the road to splash the kids. public works should be responsible for making proper street draining infrastructure so drivers don't have to swerve out of the way of a puddle. especially in a rainy place like En gland. i see it like so: public works/the city doesn't make a proper street draining gutter system--so the local government feels it necessary to perfect the imperfections of their infrastructure by giving fines to who does not adapt to the flaws of their own roads. i.e. you're not allowed to cross solid painted lines on the road, but you're supposed to avoid puddles to prevent splashing and hydro-planing, this almost always means crossing solid lines at some point if it's raining and the roads are shitty. it's not a loophole but a flaw. and that is that when there are puddles within solid lines of the road, one must drive through it to follow the law. this Briton should not get any penalty of any sort. as soon as public works and the city/local government gets their shit straight, then they can fine whomever they please as long as they are breaking the law. the driver broke no law as long as he wasn't speeding and was staying within the confines of his road. true it's safe to slow down for puddles, but I'm saying that tax paying citizens should not have to, because puddles should not accumulate on city streets. sure it was a bit rude to shower the bus stop kids in street water, but no other lines were crossed here, as in laws. I've never heard of anyone being fined for inconsiderate driving; he may be the first.

My Stay In England

Amersham is one of the wealthiest, if not the wealthiest place in the U.K. It seems a lot harder to get rid of someone around here, especially one's peers. Everyone seems to live very close to each other, but there are fewer people. Things are more spread out here. There are fields, forests and hedgerows everywhere. Though everything is more spread out than in the states, everyone seems to know each other better.
The rumors are true about the tea here; everybody who’s anybody drinks it, and it’s pretty good stuff. There wasn’t a single day that went by that I didn’t have somebody ask if I wanted a cup of tea. The most prominent local culture is a tea drinking, job working, and Hollywood obsessed people. The music tastes among the people I got to meet all had too many artists in common to call the population “musically diverse”. Top forty pop music seems to be in the heads of everyone aged 6 to 35. Eminem is also oddly popular among my peers.
I have really gotten a good feel for what it is like to live here in England, in Amersham where most of my younger childhood was spent.
Everybody is so close to each other it is hard to get away. So, naturally, one is forced to deal with not being able to get away. I’d say one becomes more acquainted. I have often found myself cruising along the small, windy, dark roads in the passenger seat of a newly met friend’s car always listening to FM radio that only plays current top of the chart pop music, unless you prefer classical.
I used to hate listening to the pop music. Now it’s not so bad. I’ve realized that it’s just music to pass the time and sometimes entertain, but rarely fill any deep holes within your mind. Usually the tune has a steady beat with simple words that don’t matter or can’t be easily understood. Either way it’s unimportant. I’ve gotten used to it because the pop music leaves me alone. I feel no emotions from it. It’s just hyper-produced emptiness to me. It leaves me empty and doesn’t get in my way.
Everyone I met just wanted to be friends. I never got the bitterness and the “leave me alone, I’m breathing” attitude like I do in the states.

Only the Sith Deal in Absolutes.

had to post this because i put a lot of effort into it just to be a comment, i thought it worthy of note status.


and sorry if it pisses you off that i've tagged you, sct, but you are in this note, just so you know. ; )




Only the Sith Deal in Absolutes. ------------good and bad (morals and ethics as well) comes from man and it's creation of religion. believing in absolutes is ok, but admitting to absolutes is not ok? i suppose killing is bad. but that would be an absolute if i thought it was completely bad. there is no scientific room for God, but he could be science itself. sure. but i don't believe in him existing. i'd be astounded if there were such a higher power than protons neutrons electrons and quarks. i guess i leave a little room for the possibility of the existence of higher powers, but i doubt it being true. so i believe in not believing, but i'm not absolute about anything. so you can ask me my religion and i'll say atheist, but more accurately nihilist, but im not 100% about anything. how can anyone be? it's ignorance in it's simplest. there are always unknowns (i think). the question one should ask when inquiring about religion should be, "what is your religion" and "how sure are you out of 100%". i think then you can truly tell some that they're complete buffoons. i mean how is anyone supposed to know if someone is 67% Buddhist unless they ask or just come up with it right after you ask about religion. im not so quick to call someone 'bad' if i ask about religion, atheism and Christianity are absolutes, but the people don't have to buy all the way into it. this is obvious. you can't really pick and choose which part of a religion you like and don't like though. i don't want to go around telling people "oh, well im partial to Nihilism, but Buddhism strikes my fancy on Thursdays when im feeling unproductive and wearing dresses. usually around Sunday afternoon i think about taking up Agnosticism again but it's really been pissing me off so Shintoism is my cup of tea on Monday. the rest of the time i'm just partial to Nihilism".......ok so we all cant wear signs on our heads saying "JEW", "88% absolute". so we pick one and get on with our lives. some of us, though, say we're all silly to pick one and go about our day willy nilly. a title or religion or label to give someone who's not absolute on anything i would say have to be agnostic or non-committal; we can always find a label, even for nothing. Scott, to put you under a label i pick relativist. To be a relativist, one must believe that (a) There is no truth, (b) Nothing is knowable, and (c) Nothing is meaningful. im sure you already know this but do you see why i put you under this label?

here's the link to the full convo if you have facebook: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?saved&&suggest&note_id=271653560161#/Adesha.Nuts?v=feed&story_fbid=176579683078