For example to get a class name you can either use [object className]. Or you can use object_getClassName()/directly access "anObject->class_pointer->name" without dispatching any messages. The same goes for any other runtime attribute of an object.
if you are religious/spiritual, then you have to believe some phenomena are inexplicable, as they are performed/commanded by some entity we cannot comprehend
it just doesn't usually encourage the kind of inquisitive/iconoclastic/skeptical attitude that scientists need
and if you are doing research, it could also result in confirmation bias
why do you think it is not relevant? you could explain that instead of condescendingly accusing the OP of being condescending.
I think it's clear why the OP comes off as sounding condescending. Just as I think it's clear why I come off as condescending in that post.
I also think the implied definition of what is religious and spiritual is pretty narrow, and seems to lend itself to monotheistic and/or abrahamic traditions. A lot of what people might say is 'spiritual' can end up being a lot more philosophical than mystical. The terms always end up being muddy, so I'm not saying that as a personal dig.
I would say that being human results in the confirmation bias. A marked understanding of it's psychological mechanism can perhaps reduce your susceptibility, but I'd need to see good research on the topic ;). It's a pretty fundamental heuristic.
I don't think the ideas of coding and Religion are by necessity parallel and intertwined. Perhaps one can draw a more distinct parallel between hard-line, rigorous Computer Science (Capital CS), and a complete inability to be 'spiritual' but I've been mostly referencing folks who show creativity in more peripheral areas, or at least in areas not directly related to Formal Research. I also think that people who are heavily involved in sciences, and still subscribe to Christianity, tend to deemphasize the parts of the bible that seem like fairy-tales, being much more liberal in cutting them out (see the bible Jefferson edited) while focusing on the interesting philosophical and ethical implications of the portions they deem more legitimate. I'm not 100% familiar with Larry Walls interpretation, but it seems pretty darn flexible.
I also don't know that a religious confirmation bias is going to translate into his coding ("My algorithm is fast. God must have made it that way"? ;)
I don't mind people disagreeing with theism, or talking about it. What I don't like is the implicit attitude, which can often be, "you believe in something other than pure hard science, and I don't, so I'm smarter."
I'm not saying that's the only version of the general sentiment, just that it's frequent enough.
But you're probably just too self-righteous to even read this inspiring post
"I don't mind people disagreeing with theism, or talking about it. What I don't like is the implicit attitude, which can often be, "you believe in something other than pure hard science, and I don't, so I'm smarter.""
unfortunate, because the usual representation of the believers in media are tea-partiers/creationists etc. or the ones who voted for bush because "he prays and asks god for his decisions, so he's good"
but it could also be because, to become a non-religious person from a religious person requires a _lot_ of reading/searching for answers(evolutionary biology, reading about other religions, cognitive-biases etc)
"But you're probably just too self-righteous to even read this inspiring post"
Do you think science will ever answer this question? The universe as a whole is on some level inexplicable, unless we somehow manage to transcend our existence in it...
Saying that a scientist's belief in God causes confirmation bias in his research results is more ad hominem and less productive criticism. Einstein believed in God, and in fact wrote extensively about the relationship he felt between God and his theories of the universe. Likewise many scientists lead productive careers without an iota of their religion (or family, or culture, or whatever have you) impacting the rigor of their work.
einstein-god relationship has been proven false repeatedly. it has stuck around because people keep mass-forwarding stuff like that..
"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly." from http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0691023689?ie=UTF8&tag=...
I didn't say he believed in a personal god. He believed in a more abstract sort of god, one that reflected the mysteries that humans will never penetrate; he also said this concept defined his sense of being religious.
"A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, of the manifestations of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty - it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute the truly religious attitude; in this sense, and in this alone, I am a deeply religious man."
"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings."
source please?
that was in response to a rabbi.. was he trying to be diplomatic?
so he was.. agnostic?
"My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid consciousness of the primary importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment." from: http://press.princeton.edu/titles/7921.html
are agnostics believers?
you are still assuming einstein is infallible.
einstein believing in god would not really prove the existence of god
Maybe. Maybe not. But I certainly think we've advanced well beyond the 6 day creation myth of the bible.
Can you still call yourself a Christian if you selectively edit the parts of the Christian faith you chose to hold? If so, how much?
Most people don't actually hold their beliefs up to scrutiny. And none of us can claim to be totally consistent. My impression is that most Christian "scientists" (not Christian Scientists, TM), are really Judeo-Christian ethicists, and culturally connected to a Christian community. But they have left a literal belief in the Christian canon far behind.
(You rewrote your comment while I was drafting mine, so it looks like I'm replying to something I'm not.)
I don't have to believe anything's inexplicable; in point of fact, I don't. That's not to say I think our puny little monkey brains are (presently) capable of understanding everything, but that's a completely different claim than that those things are inexplicable.
As for assertions, I'm not the party making one. You asserted that religious/spiritual folk "have to believe some phenomena are inexplicable". That's a universal claim, which can be refuted by any existential quantifier to the contrary. In simple predicate logic:
∀: All believers hold that some phenomena are inexplicable.
∃: I don't.
∴: Not all believers believe so.
As for specific examples, name any old thing you'd think a believer would hold as inexplicable. That. I believe it's explicable. Granted, I believe that because I believe the divine wants us to understand our world — to the extent we can anthropomorphize and attribute intent to it, of course. Indeed, it's one of my highest moral duties, according to my beliefs, to learn and understand as much as I possibly can. To do anything less with the incredible, indescribably precious gift of having a mind is to piss it away.
So, net, in a lot of ways, we probably actually agree. I decry ignorance and superstition and the like pretty strongly, too. What I don't do is condescend, or paint with a brush broad enough to cover everyone in a class of humanity I seem not to have taken the time or effort to understand.
i don't think i need predicate logic notation to get that :D
the reason i said phenomena-inexplicable was because there are a lot of claims made by religions that were later found to be from other natural causes.
ex. in christianity:
- diseases were supposed to be curses and punishments till the germ theory was discovered
- creation story does not hold with modern evidence
- there are contradictions between biblical incidents and historic records(bethlehem census, great flood, etc.)
- the nature of heaven, hell, souls are supposed to be unanalysable
- without an understanding of astronomy, there are implications that heaven was located above the clouds(angels with wings, looking down from heaven, etc.)
- jesus had conducted exorcisms in the bible, they are considered silly now
so, professing to be religious and accept scientific discoveries at the same time seems difficult..
"What I don't do is condescend, or paint with a brush broad enough to cover everyone in a class of humanity I seem not to have taken the time or effort to understand."
there is a reason the debate _has_ to happen:
- accepting religious opinions as respectable has led to a majority of americans to consider evolution as untrue.
- education policies are being influenced to paint evolution as just-a-theory with undertones that it is a fringe group with a political agenda
- religious people who believe in and look forward to an armageddon have been in charge of a massive number of nuclear warheads
- stem cell research has been set back by almost a decade
- abortion clinic doctors have been shot
- the representative of god on earth has said 'child-molestation is bad, condoms are worse'
- the catholic church has systematically protected child-molesters under them
- the islamic world has become more extremised because the clever american government thought it would be a machiavelli move against the ussr. we know how that turned out
if the result is that people think atheists are condescending, small price to pay if we can get fewer people to blow each other up because their imaginary friend says so.
"that which can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof"
and why give weight to the ramblings of the religious but not to all schizophrenics?
shouldn't we give both views equal respect without calling to reason?
edit: referring to the "difficult to tell the difference between real and unreal experiences/delusions/hallucinations" symptoms when i said schizophrenics
> "that which can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof"
Exactly! And vice versa!
Who said anything about "giving weight" to "ramblings"? You are fixated on everything being about truth and facts and who's right, but that's not what I'm talking about.
Maybe you don't want anything bigger than observable facts and theories based thereupon in your life, but I hope when your parents say they love you you don't tell yourself that it's simply endorphins firing in their brains.
"You are fixated on everything being about truth and facts and who's right"
would you rather i countered an argument with untruths and lies?
what i'm trying to say is, if you are willing to give credibility to any assertion which is without proof, then you have to give an equal amount to credibility to _all_ assertions without proof
i.e, all religions equally, fairies, leprechauns, elfs, russel's teapot, a furry-god, Elvis still alive, alien-invasions and abductions, etc..
and problems arise then, if you give credibility to _all_ religions, there will be contradictions
- they have different creation stories and timelines
If a schizophrenic developed an elegant solution for highly efficient, commercially viable solar-panels, I'd probably listen intently to his views on semiconductors, while politely opting out of the dissertation on talking toast.
but other companies like htc, motorola etc. can also manufacture WP7 phones.
and nokia cannot make too many changes to functionality even if allowed as it would fragment the WP7 app-market. even gui based changes would kill the ui-consistency that MS is touting..
so i do not understand how nokia is differentiating itself by becoming a WP7 phone manufacturer...
I think it is about the developer/apps/market place "ecosystem". Elop mentioned that in the burning platform memo. I'd give Microsoft some credit in their developer relationship machine that's already in place.
The deal makes sense to me in terms of economies of scale ... more popular OS = more developers/apps.
I guess almost everything can be implemented by something else that is general enough, the question is how convenient and practical it is.
A core concept in CSP for is channels, and I think you can mostly build that on top of an actor-model, but I don't think that is the way I would do it.
In Go and similar languages for example it is usual to pass channels around, and even send channels over channels, I'm not sure how one would translate that into an actor-model, but I doubt the result would be as clear.
This is not a criticism of the actor-model, just trying to say that they involve different ways of thinking about concurrency and trying to apply one to the other probably will end up with a mess.
If you send references to actors inside messages between actors, then I think you're pretty close to the same idea. The main constraint that actors add is that an actor has one incoming mailbox. In CSP you have more flexibility to have multiple input channels or other arrangements. I have no idea whether that really gives you a more interesting level of power or not.
