|
The guy obviously hasn't figured out why statistical calculations are never done going backward: You always end up at the same starting point, which is zero.
Before the beginning of the universe, the probability of anything at all being as it is today was zero, which is fair enough.
But, since then, a lot of things have happened (I think it must be more than eleven), each one of which has increased the probability of everything being exactly as it is now.
Ask the Bueller kid: If you prop your dad's sports car up on axle props and run it in reverse, the wheels may go backward, but the milometer remains exactly as it is.
i.e. the probability of your father having met your mother remains at 100%; the probability of your grandparents having met remains at 100%, etc.
Gawd! that's more than plenty serious discussion, for today. From the rest of the day, the probability of my postings being idiotic is at 120% (and rising!).
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
|
|
|
|
|
Mark_Wallace wrote: Before the beginning of the universe, the probability of anything at all being as it is today was zero,
I feel less alone knowing we share such humble beginnings.
thanks, Bill
«To kill an error's as good a service, sometimes better than, establishing new truth or fact.» Charles Darwin in "Prospero's Precepts"
|
|
|
|
|
Mark_Wallace wrote: Before the beginning of the universe,
But there was no before ...
PooperPig - Coming Soon
|
|
|
|
|
Sure there was.
We totally unimportant creatures on a totally unimportant world in a totally unimportant solar system in a totally unimportant arm of a totally unimportant galaxy in a totally unimportant tiny region of the universe don't know what it was like, but the universe doesn't care about our opinion, because it's totally unimportant.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
|
|
|
|
|
Mark_Wallace wrote: totally unimportant creatures
Speak for yourself 
Depends if the single-big-bang theory is true, really.
If Time started with the big bang, then the very concept of 'before' cannot exist.
PooperPig - Coming Soon
|
|
|
|
|
Time became what it is with the big bang; that's subtly different from starting.
Still, why waste energy thinking about it? Sooner or later, someone (possibly on a different but equally totally unimportant planet) will make a time machine, and there'll be another big bang, so every totally unimportant thing we ever do will be gone.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
|
|
|
|
|
or maybe it's already happened 
PooperPig - Coming Soon
|
|
|
|
|
My interpretation of the "reverse statistics" is not that they contradict any proof we do exist; rather that they contrarily confirm the 100% probability we do not exist is as improbable as the belief/experience/assertion that we do exist, and that what we do experience as our "existence" in what we belive is a one-way arrow of time is, in fact, a fiction of an astoundingly improbable miracle, as much an artifact of our symbiosis with the virus of language as anything else.
Any pseudo-factoid that assists one to walk the razor's edge that never shaved Occam is, ergo, an entheogenic homeopathic remedy.
To awake to that is to know Chuang Tzu's inner state at the moment he was not sure he was a butterfly dreaming he was a man, or a man dreaming he was a butterfly; it is to know what Dorothy speaks of when she said: "Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."
In that moment the experience of both "butterfly-ness" and "human-ness" is never more crystal-clear, not to mention Kansas, red-slippers, etc.
Which way is Capistrano ? I think I need to roost.
«To kill an error's as good a service, sometimes better than, establishing new truth or fact.» Charles Darwin in "Prospero's Precepts"
|
|
|
|
|
|
Odds are not applicable once an experiment's outcome is known/becomes a fact.
Whoever did that poster wasted his (or her) time and made other waste theirs (including mine!)
Be happy.
|
|
|
|
|
Quote: Odds are not applicable
Indeed. Everything evens out in the end!
|
|
|
|
|
So that's why I can't see my reflection in a mirror?
|
|
|
|
|
The real mess comes when you ask to yourself why on the Earth I am entitled to perceive subjectively just that particular human being that was born in those particular circumstances... or even better: the fact that in the whole world existed some very particular circumstances (whatever they were) capable to make "me" feel subjectively "alive". People that realize that this is the real problem may be interested to what I wrote at http://www.iacopovettori.it/laterzaipotesi/eng/ArgumentsProOI.aspx (with some discussions also with professional philosophers).
|
|
|
|
|
In the grand scheme of the universe, I do not exist even though I am answering this silly question. No probability about it.
|
|
|
|
|
The wars that have been going on since the development of C++ has been going on in between those who praise C and those who praise C++; nice conversation with Linus Torvalds of other preachers[^].
By the way, I am with C! 
The sh*t I complain about
It's like there ain't a cloud in the sky and it's raining out - Eminem
~! Firewall !~
|
|
|
|
|
Quote: By the way, I am with C!
good for you - I am with whatever language enables me to model an abstract idea in my head and turn it into something a computer can work with - at the moment, c# fits the bill, although Im not adverse to c++, c or a slew of other things as required (obviously I have my 'preferences', but I'll keep an open mind if I cant solve a situation using what Im comfortable with 'right now')
|
|
|
|
|
C# prophecy is yet to come; so they don't fight right now!
The sh*t I complain about
It's like there ain't a cloud in the sky and it's raining out - Eminem
~! Firewall !~
|
|
|
|
|
Both have there place!
New version: WinHeist Version 2.1.1 new web site.
When you are dead you don't know it, it's only difficult for others.
It's the same when you're stupid.
|
|
|
|
|
|
yay !! lets hear it for number crunching - anyone for RPG ?
|
|
|
|
|
You think a Rocket Propelled Grenade might improve code quality?
Could be right if you aim it at QA querists... 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
|
|
|
|
|
Classic RPG won't even scratch their surfaces; you need RPG IV at the very least
If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.
--Winston Churchill
|
|
|
|
|
Some are indeed rather thick skinned. Thick everything, some of 'em.
And others are so thin skinned it's surprising they can wear clothes without being flayed every time they move... 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
|
|
|
|
|
As long as you keep posting links to intended-to-piss-people-off seven-year old articles: well, yes, the war is still on ... at least in your head
cheers, Bill
«To kill an error's as good a service, sometimes better than, establishing new truth or fact.» Charles Darwin in "Prospero's Precepts"
|
|
|
|
|
He's just a bit behind the times... 
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
|
|
|
|
General 
News 
Suggestion 
Question 
Bug 
Answer 
Joke 
Praise 
Rant 
Admin 
Submit an article or tip
