some important definitions

After participating in some--mostly hilarious--exchanges in MySpace fora, I realized that certain terms are not used by many participants in a standard way (especially by those of newage or religious varieties, although some atheists and scientists have also been guilty of such transgressions). Allow me to propose some much needed redefinitions that would surely go a long way towards resolving all the confusion and bitterness due to misunderstandings.

a.close-minded: somebody who refuses to accept the correctness of my beliefs.

b.arrogant: somebody who presumes to question my beliefs.

c.truth-seeker: somebody who has found it already and is now only accepting further confirmations of their rightness; myself, certainly; others, not so likely.

d.scientism: usage of science to question my particular cherished dogma.

e.reasonable: somebody comfortable with my ontology and metaphysics, somebody that will gladly accept that black is white, if I say so.

I am sure there are several more, including the antonyms to the above definitions, but I hope this will be of some help...

happy new year

and, on a totally unrelated note,

My beliefs, today

Books
What was the last book you read?	Old Man's War by John Scalzi
What is you favorite Genre (kind) or Book?	Science Fiction (of science-y variety), fantasy (of epic-y variety), magical realism, fabulism, mythology, history, science, bloody technical manuals!
When a movie is made of a book you've read are you happy or dissapointed?	I try not to prejudge, but disappointment seems to be more frequent than happiness
When you read a Book does it often create an emotional reation	YES.
Do you read for pleasure?	YES.
DO you read more than one book a year?	Far and beyond
More than one a month?	Far and beyond
What was the most influential book on your life?	Too many to mention. But, for one, Carl Sagan's Demon-Haunted World
What was the most powerful book you ever read?	again, a lot. Lots of SF, and, in non-fiction, Emma Goldman, Michael Walzer, Bertrand Russell, David Hume, et al
If you could, would you ban a book and if so, Why?	never.
People
DO you dislike people that are a different color than you?	no
DO you dislike people that come from another country?	no
DO you dislike people that are a different sexual orientation that you are (Gay/ Lesbian /Transgender /Straight?	no
DO you dislike people that follow a different faith than you do?	no, it's their beliefs that are idiotic, not the people themselves
When someone speaks to you and says something that upsets you, does it make you angry?	no
When someone speaks to you about different Ideas, Are you willing to listen?	YES.
Outside the Box:Space
DO you think that there are intelegent life forms in other solar sysytems?	I don't know, but I would suspect so.
If not, why not?	Again, we do not have sufficient data.
If So, do you think they are friendly or hostile?	see above
If so do you think they would ever come here?	see above
If So, do you think they already have come here?	no
If someone from another solar system asked you about the human race, What would you tell them?	deeply confused but holding soome promise
Outside the Box:Time
DO you believe in the possiblity of Time Travel?	It is a simple fact in some of theoretical models
DO you believe inAlternate Universes?	see above
What is your favorite Time period?	anytime. Present.
What time Period other than now would you live in, if you could	Future? I don't know, I am going there already.
CREATE YOUR OWN! - or - GET PAID TO TAKE SURVEYS!

Unholy Racket No 004: A short update

1.Vancouver is full of weird-looking people, and, considering that my definition of weird is perforce different from that of mere humans, you can imagine what I mean.

2.Why is it that when I am waiting for a bus, reading a book on quantum field theory and desperately trying to wrap my brain around a particularly painful Lagrangian, some old codger or a born-again fool always attempts to engage me in some inane conversation? And they refuse to stop babbling and persist in ruining my concentration. Go play on the freeway, you goddamn freaks!

3.Conversation overheard on the bus:

SLOB, to DRIVER: "Are you going to Vancouver?"
(The front of the bus is lit up with a glowing sign saying, MAX via Jantzen Beach).

D.: "No, I am going to Delta Park."

S.: "Just to Delta Park?"

D.: "Yes."

SLOB (getting on the bus): "Let me know when we get to Mill Plain."

!!!!!!!!!

4. An old joke popped up in a new book on brain states:

--Knock knock.
--Who is there?
--O.J.
--O.J. who?
--You're on the jury.

5. Finally, to clarify my definition of weirdness, I prefer mango peach salsa to chocolate. So there!

Everything is getting faster and smarter

Just over the last few weeks it seems that captchas have grown in length enormously: they used to be about 4-5 characters long; now, on my Myspace account, I usually have to fill out 8-9 characters. Hah! Nobody can escape the righteous wrath of spam. That's why we need true artificial intelligence to deal with it. (I won't make any bad jokes about the relative lack of natural intelligence on this planet, of course, nor about my addiction to self-referential statements. Consider yourself warned).

impressions 54211

I am quite impressed with the fact that over 60% a significant plurality of the visitors to this page use Firefox (it keeps changing; apparently I had a rash of IE users recently!):



Of course, the majority are still running Windoze, but one has to derive some satisfaction from the low share of the IE use even among them.

An Unholy Racket No 002: Goodbye, Humanism

As of today, I am no longer a humanist.

Of course this does not mean that I abandon my beliefs in the desirability of human rights, civil liberties, liberty and justice for all and such. And naturally I am still the epitome of secular. It is just that I no longer feel like I can define myself in terms of species, for several reasons.

Firstly, of course, the entire concept of species is fraught with problems. Chronospecies or reproductively isolated populations? Species do not really exist; they are convenient fictions to help us in our taxonomical/classifying/descriptive behaviours, and have no use beyond that. Every individual is unique, and while I may be a member of H. sapiens sapiens, I am Jorg above and beyond that.

Of course the aforementioned Jorg may choose freely not to belong to humanity any more. At this point of time such a decision would be no more than a ridiculous stand in the face of adversity, but we are rapidly approaching the time when intelligent entities will be able to—and many will choose to—change their genetic makeup and phenotype, making themselves distinct from the "base" human beings. Are some of their "innate" human rights going to be lost because of such a change? I don't think so.

Also, we are on the verge of creating self-aware machine intelligences. What about them? They certainly will not be human, and—despite anthropomorphizing attempts of movies such as Matrix—will not have human emotions. Our emotions are the result of a long evolutionary history and are inseparable from our phenotype. AI's will not feel love or jealousy, but they will be self-aware. Does any self-aware entity possess the innate rights to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness? I say, of course!

Lastly, and looking in the opposite direction, what about millions of species with which we share our planet? (And others, unknown, somewhere else in this huge Universe). Do they have any rights? It seems to me that while perhaps not quite having access to a full complement of rights available to a self-aware entity, they deserve some, at least. And claiming the uniqueness of humanity tends to obscure the uniqueness of every other species and every other individual within those species (well, with the possible exception of some clones....)

In any case, I am perfectly okay with the label of transhumanist nowadays...an extremely secular one.