np NP: Wednesday, August 10, 2016

[The Old Hack 2,448]

1 hour ago, PSadlon said:

Quit twisting words you bloody Dane Devil. No good would come of a furry falling into the clutches of someone on a mission to create chaos and annoyed with biological prime directives; not for the furries or anyone associated with them no matter how good or bad they were. It might be funny to watch but it won't be a good thing.

Says you. Pandora has shown surprise twists to her personality and has even been randomly nice. Maybe she likes furries.

As to twisting words, maybe try to not phrase it so it sounds like anyone who wants anything to do with furries cannot be a good person.

[Xenophon Hendrix 47]

Perhaps she wants to make some furries who can actually breed some biological furries. That would spread some chaos.

[hkmaly 490]

10 hours ago, ijuin said:

Well, the rule of Evolution is "whoever dies with the most kids, wins"

Actually, helping your kids have their own kids counts as well. Did your grandma annoyed you with constant questions about when you finally get some children? Well, she was doing the best she could under the rules of evolution, as she didn't had other options anymore.

2 hours ago, Xenophon Hendrix said:

I'm pretty sure that the "fittest" part of "survival of the fittest" is actually referring to fitness at reproducing, not the toughest or cleverest or whatever, although popular belief often gets that wrong.

The "fittest" is defined that way now, yes. But seems there were questions about it at first and even today, some biologists prefer to not use it to not create confusion.

10 hours ago, ijuin said:

In short, everybody in the past who DIDN'T seek to mate, didn't leave any offspring. Everyone now alive is the result of an unbroken chain of mating going back to the Precambrian.

Yes. Even the ones who tries to deny that.

2 hours ago, Xenophon Hendrix said:

Perhaps she wants to make some furries who can actually breed some biological furries. That would spread some chaos.

I though THAT was the reason PSadlon accused her of not being good.

The idea is sound: she wants to give some transformation spells. With people so far "yearning" for stuff related to "biological primary directive", well, who might have transformation and sex connected? Furries. Problem is that not all furries see the sexual aspect in it.

I would leave the rest to someone with actual experience, but what Pandora shown definitely sounds like potentially dangerous way of thinking.

Although, this being EGS, I think everyone she marks with furry spell would be happy with that.

[ijuin 572]

Yes, "most kids" should properly be "most descendants". Basically, any strategy that maximizes the number of genetic descendants at any arbitrary point in the future is a winning one. "Survival of the fittest" also should mean survival of the genetic line, not survival of the individual.

[Don Edwards 548]

12 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Actually, helping your kids have their own kids counts as well. Did your grandma annoyed you with constant questions about when you finally get some children? Well, she was doing the best she could under the rules of evolution, as she didn't had other options anymore.

The "fittest" is defined that way now, yes. But seems there were questions about it at first and even today, some biologists prefer to not use it to not create confusion.

Some don't like to use the expression because, when you add in the definition of "fittest", it becomes a tautology: "survival of those who survive" or "those who have lots of descendants, will have lots of descendants".

[ijuin 572]

The most important "real" information (i.e. not tautology or platitude) that I take from the phrase "survival of the fittest" is that aspects other than the ability to leave behind descendants (who in turn do the same) are completely irrelevant to evolution. How long you live after your continued living stops contributing to your descendants' survival, how pleasant your life is, how knowledgeable, cultured, or even how moral you are, all are irrelevant. Evolution cares not that you take the moral high road, only that you produce descendants who live long enough to continue the chain of life. This stands in stark contrast to the religious worldview that God(s) reward those who thoughts and actions show moral virtue, and is probably one of the reasons for rejection of evolution by those who do so (along with the "humans came from animals instead of being specially separate only-creatures-who-get-an-afterlife" idea).

[Xenophon Hendrix 47]

Yep. It's a tautology, but it's not apparent to most persons. Nature keeps score in only one way. If something increases descendants, nature selects for it. If something decreases descendants, nature selects against it.

[ijuin 572]

"Go forth and multiply" is the One Commandment.

[hkmaly 490]

13 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

Some don't like to use the expression because, when you add in the definition of "fittest", it becomes a tautology: "survival of those who survive" or "those who have lots of descendants, will have lots of descendants".

Well, there are lot of science books which are just big heap of tautologies. Especially mathematical ones. Full of definitions and tautologies. And proofs that those complicated theorems are indeed tautologies.

10 hours ago, ijuin said:

Evolution cares not that you take the moral high road, only that you produce descendants who live long enough to continue the chain of life. This stands in stark contrast to the religious worldview that God(s) reward those who thoughts and actions show moral virtue, and is probably one of the reasons for rejection of evolution by those who do so (along with the "humans came from animals instead of being specially separate only-creatures-who-get-an-afterlife" idea).

I'm not sure why. I mean, just because evolution is not going to reward you for moral virtue doesn't mean noone else can't. Also, it's totally possible humans are only one who gets afterlife - I mean, I don't think it would be fair to dolphins, but I think God is jerk anyway. They just weren't created for that from start.

(Also, I think that the "God created mankind in his own image" isn't supposed to mean God had belly button, appendix and 32 teeth, four of them only good as source of pain.)

9 hours ago, Xenophon Hendrix said:

Nature keeps score in only one way.

Nature is actually very lazy in keeping the score. She doesn't keep anything, if someone asks her for score she just looks who's most common.

[Pharaoh RutinTutin 1,586]

3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Nature is actually very lazy in keeping the score. She doesn't keep anything, if someone asks her for score she just looks who's most common.

That would imply Bacteria are the big winners

[mlooney 3,417]

2 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

That would imply Bacteria are the big winners

Followed by beetles, then ants.  Among the warm body, furry, milk producing set, we off course have rodents, followed, by all things, bats, at least in terms of number of species.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

8 hours ago, ijuin said:

"Go forth and multiply" is the One Commandment.

I consider this discriminatory against the three other forms of basic arithmetic.

[Scotty 1,061]

9 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

I consider this discriminatory against the three other forms of basic arithmetic.

Considering "divide and conquer" promotes violence.....

[The Old Hack 2,448]

1 hour ago, Scotty said:

Considering "divide and conquer" promotes violence.....

Okay, okay. The other four forms of basic arithmetic, then.

(Anyway, "divide and conquer" does not promote violence. It ends it. Once conquest has occurred, the war is over.)

[Scotty 1,061]

2 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

(Anyway, "divide and conquer" does not promote violence. It ends it. Once conquest has occurred, the war is over.)

Could the act of dividing in the process of conquering be seen as violent?

[The Old Hack 2,448]

3 minutes ago, Scotty said:

Could the act of dividing in the process of conquering be seen as violent?

Well, multiplication in general is violent as it causes conflict.

[ijuin 572]

The solution, of course, is to add allies and subtract enemies.

[hkmaly 490]

16 hours ago, mlooney said:

18 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

That would imply Bacteria are the big winners

Followed by beetles, then ants.  Among the warm body, furry, milk producing set, we off course have rodents, followed, by all things, bats, at least in terms of number of species.

Yes. I mean, I'm not sure about bats, as it's number of specimens in species and not number of species which is important, but I'm well aware humans are NOT the winners. In fact, even if we eradicated everything around, the species of bacterias we have in guts would then win (wait ... they might've been near the top already actually ...).

Not speaking about the fact that using nuclear weapons for that eradicating would be more likely to make roaches winners than us.

14 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

23 hours ago, ijuin said:

"Go forth and multiply" is the One Commandment.

I consider this discriminatory against the three other forms of basic arithmetic.

Note that biology is only science where division is a method of multiplying.

 

[mlooney 3,417]

21 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

I consider this discriminatory against the three other forms of basic arithmetic.

There are 6 basic function in arithmetic.  Addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, exponential and roots.  You really need to know all 6 to function in a modern world.  For the last two, squares and cubic and square roots at least.

 

[The Old Hack 2,448]

30 minutes ago, mlooney said:

There are 6 basic function in arithmetic.  Addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, exponential and roots.  You really need to know all 6 to function in a modern world.  For the last two, squares and cubic and square roots at least.

 

Ah, thank you. So, discriminatory against the other five basic functions of arithmetics.

[hkmaly 490]

11 hours ago, mlooney said:

On 08/14/2016 at 2:47 PM, The Old Hack said:

I consider this discriminatory against the three other forms of basic arithmetic.

There are 6 basic function in arithmetic.  Addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, exponential and roots.  You really need to know all 6 to function in a modern world.  For the last two, squares and cubic and square roots at least.

Why? Sure, you can define sines and cosine in terms of exponential, but you can also define subtraction in terms of addition, division in terms of multiplication, subtraction and exponential and roots in terms of division and exponential. What makes you declare specifically these as basic?

Also, logarithm will be relatively hard to define ... I mean, sure, as inverse function, but that doesn't help you compute it. Alternative? Sum of infinite series.

[Pharaoh RutinTutin 1,586]

Where do "Guess" and "Cheat" fit into the mathematical disciplines?

Asking for a friend, of course...

[Don Edwards 548]

52 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

but you can also define ... division in terms of multiplication

And that is why X/0 (for X<>0) is "undefined" but 0/0 is "indeterminate".

Part of the mathematical definition of division is that if A = B/C, then A*C = B.

For, say, N = 3/0, there is no value of N that meets this definition.

But for N = 0/0, ANY value of N qualifies. 0 = 1*0. 0 = 17*0. 0 = (242375892374i + 4)*0.

[hkmaly 490]

On 08/15/2016 at 1:16 AM, Don Edwards said:

Part of the mathematical definition of division is that if A = B/C, then A*C = B.

I was actually referring to B/C = B*C^-1 ...

On 08/15/2016 at 1:16 AM, Don Edwards said:

But for N = 0/0, ANY value of N qualifies.

Depends on where you get those zeroes