failure

My theory is that, in polygamous cultures, the old farts have an incentive to kill off the young studs. But I can't explain what's in it for the youngsters.

Yup. I wonder what percentage have been used up so far.

John

--
That one brought a tear to my eye.

You\'re a very wise man, John Woodgate.

--
Well, that "harm me" rule covers a lot of ground if you consider
opinions which you find objectionable to be harmful to you.  So you
may not be as tolerant as you think you are.

--
So much for your pretense at tolerance...

--
OK, I just wasn\'t sure because it was so pejorative and there was so
much more there than a simple "I agree."

Just don't hold your breath while waiting...

Meanwhile, our ignorance isn't evidence.

Jon

Would you mind citing your source(s) for this last sentence's claim? Or is this just a _personal feeling_?

Jon

Michael still doesn't get it... I'm only intolerant of ignorance.

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC\'s and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.      Sometimes I even put it in the food.

I'm not really building a coherent theme here, except that there's an ugly (in my opinion) intolerance, even hatred of religion that I think isn't at all rational. And it's actually (I think) a "religion" of science, cargo-cult/Discover/New Scientist kind of science mostly, and the practioners of the cult mostly aren't actual scientists.

Funny, people seem to prefer Leftists vs Rightists, or believers vs nonbelievers. I thing what's the really important separation is nice vs nasty people. And, as I've said, most forms of intolerance are bad for electronic design.

John

But if you're smarter than everybody else (let's accept that as an axiom) then it's not their fault that they're ignorant by your standards. So cut'em some slack.

John

So, you are suggesting that an RC will decay with a different time constant, depending on the initial voltage.

John

My wife is a devout Christian, who left her church (along with 60% of the members) because they were no longer teaching (or acting) what she believed. She is far from intollerant of any religion, and taught such in sunday school.

While I was brought up a Christian, I don't conisider myself to be one now. However, like you, I find this anti-religion trend to be scary. I also note that anti-semitism has taken over much of Europe and is workign its way here. History, ...all over again.

I've found the same sort of thing. One of the best engineers and

*scientists* I've met in the last few years was a Siik. ...hardly the anti-religious extrememist that you see here.

--
  Keith

I read in sci.electronics.design that John Larkin wrote (in ) about 'failure', on Sun,

25 Sep 2005:

Do I have to be personally acquainted? Yes, some of the nastiest people I've met are professed Christians. We see Jewish and Muslim extremists on television and in press pictures every day. They also have fun web sites, with snuff movies, or at least the Muslims do. Of course, not ALL of them are extremists. Is there such a thing as a Buddhist extremist?

He tolerated human weaknesses, while encouraging people to change their ways. I don't have any problems with Jesus as a moral teacher, possibly the best one ever. I don't go for all the mumbo-jumbo that was attached to his story later, some of it much later.

I didn't notice much tolerance for extremist Jews, Pharisees and Sadducees. In other parts of the Bible, we read of vicious intolerance of other faiths, some of it no doubt justified.

Bigotry? Baseless stereotyping? I speak as I find. I don't mind people having a religion, as long as they don't mind me not having one. And it's quite undeniable that there ARE a lot of religious extremists about.

That's because engineers and techs are more sensible.

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only.
If everything has been designed, a god designed evolution by natural selection.
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk

Why should you hope for that? And why should you scorn those who tell you that it's a hopeless question? Is it because you believe the universe was made by some being (or Being) in another universe? And if it did, where did that universe come from? Even if, one day, humans demonstrate that it's possible to create a new universe, what would that prove about the current one? And if some power claimed to have created our universe, how could you know whether to believe them? Oh, I see, it's turtles all the way down... What does it take to make you people admit defeat on that question, the way the rest of us have? Better to spend your energy on a *relevant* question that has a possibly *useful* answer!

Surely, rather than speculate on how or why we got here, you can agree to rational study of where it is we *are*, and at the extent of our power to change things? Having done that, to accept that our only trustworthy moral direction is to act in ways that defend and extend the wonderful diversity and complexity of which our own life is the most remarkable occurrence?

Such is the creed of creativism.

Clifford Heath.

We don't have to get it... We already have it!

to

One of my engineers is a Muslim. He's a sweet and thoughtful guy, and is absolutely tolerant of Christians and Jews. But he's a Sunni, and swears that Shiites are all nuts.

John

Ah, so that's all it was.

You were making a point which, I believe, you hoped might _put down_ engineers who disbelieve by making the implied suggestion that people smarter than they are (I think you were probably hoping that the suggestion would stick, that scientists are smarter) have _more belief_ in god and that therefore _dumber_ engineers "should get a clue" from that. Otherwise, why make such a comment? But in any case, this isn't a particularly useful way to make an argument. Doing so from personal experience is ... well, it's not useful.

Consider the following:

Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi and Michael Argyle, "The Psychology of Religious Behaviour, Belief and Experience," London & New York: Routledge, 1997. ISBN: 0-415-12330-5 (hbk) or 0-415-12331-3 (pbk).

"Beit-Hallahmi (1988) found that among Nobel Prize laureates in the sciences, as well as those in literature, there was a remarkable degree of irreligiosity, as compared to the populations they came from."

-- Beit-Hallahmi, B. (1988). "The religiosity and religious affiliation of Nobel prize winners."

Or the paper that appeared in the July 23rd, 1998 issue of Nature by Edward J. Larson and Larry Witham: "Leading Scientists Still Reject God." Nature, 1998; 394, 313. A summary line from it is:

"Disbelief in God and immortality among NAS biological scientists was 65.2% and 69.0%, respectively, and among NAS physical scientists it was 79.0% and 76.3%. Most of the rest were agnostics on both issues, with few believers. We found the highest percentage of belief among NAS mathematicians (14.3% in God, 15.0% in immortality). Biological scientists had the lowest rate of belief (5.5% in God, 7.1% in immortality), with physicists and astronomers slightly higher (7.5% in God, 7.5% in immortality)."

Neither of these make comparisons with engineers. But if engineers are more disbelieving than scientists, they must be a unique lot, indeed.

My own experience has been primarily with physicists. And every one, where the subject came up, has expressed disbelief in god and immortality. Engineers I've known and discussed this with are much more likely (in other words, non-zero from my experience) to have a belief in god. So my experience is at odds with yours. Which won't surprise anyone who understands the difficulty of drawing conclusions about an entire body of people from our own personal and very limited observations.

Jon

than to

apart.

Allah, of course, then me.

John

Once more you completely miss the point. Do you expect to see G*d's signature in the conformation of the early universe? Or what if Hawking's hypothesis is right, and everything's curved around inside the Plank length so there's no beginning anyway? What difference will it make to your life or anyone else's?

Deal with the here and now - there's no need to resort to outside motivations. Whether the result of Someone's deliberate action or not, humans occupy a desperately improbable niche in space and time and we have the choice to make that niche either slowly larger or suddenly smaller. To placate our fearful emotions with thoughts that all must be going as Planned, or by pursuing some indefensible Plan, is only to ensure disaster.

I'm not an atheist - it's just that the question must be deemed irrelevant because it's unanswerable.

Clifford Heath.

I read in sci.electronics.design that John Larkin wrote (in ) about 'failure', on Sun,

25 Sep 2005:

Vox pop interviews, and studio interviews with 'community leaders; from the Settlements and Occupied Territories tell their own story, as do the videos the suicide bombers make before the event.

Are they all lying?

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only.
If everything has been designed, a god designed evolution by natural selection.
http://www.jmwa.demon.co.uk Also see http://www.isce.org.uk