L. Marcus Posted September 25, 2015 Report Share Posted September 25, 2015 The Science of Discworld books are also excellent pop science. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted September 25, 2015 Author Report Share Posted September 25, 2015 BTW Bazza, I have a book to recommend to you, re: your early influential books idea. A recent book is "To Explain the World" by Steven Weinberg, in which he makes a personal attempt to tease out the beginnings of modern science from its forebears. I have barely started it (just finished chapter 1) but some of the names and themes he addresses are those which seem to be dear to you. Weinberg is a theoretical physicist, and perhaps the closest to a reigning Grand Old Man in physics these days; he is coming at this from the hard science point of view. Cheers. I had a peak into it at Amazon and you are right it is of interest. However the authors statements about religion in general, disinterest me in him personally. So I'm a bit torn... But thanks for bring it to my attention. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted September 25, 2015 Report Share Posted September 25, 2015 I suspect, but do not know, that his opinions of religion have been shaped by 80 years of active hostility from the louder portions of the population in the US who identify themselves as religious. Among Weinberg's books is The First Three Minutes, and while physical cosmologists don't get the same knee-jerk "You're all damned and we righteous people rejoice in that, and we have the political clout to have our opinions installed in the the school textbooks no matter what you say, you heathen scum" treatment that American religious fundamentalists give to evolutionary biology, the same undertone is there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pariah Posted September 30, 2015 Report Share Posted September 30, 2015 Our school library just got a book titled "The Science of Interstellar", discussing, I understand, what the movie got right and what it got wrong. I'll have to take a look and see if it's worth a full read. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted September 30, 2015 Report Share Posted September 30, 2015 Do it! Do it now! I imagine they got the black hole and the wormhole right, but gripes will be raised by the SSTO-several-ways-without-refueling shuttles. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted September 30, 2015 Author Report Share Posted September 30, 2015 Is their life on Venus? Well... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted September 30, 2015 Report Share Posted September 30, 2015 Whose life? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 1, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 1, 2015 Any form of life. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted October 1, 2015 Report Share Posted October 1, 2015 It'd be a very strange form of life ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pariah Posted October 1, 2015 Report Share Posted October 1, 2015 Perhaps the souls of the evil departed. Because I can't think of anywhere that fits the description of a literal Hell more completely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted October 1, 2015 Report Share Posted October 1, 2015 I take it you've never been to McGuire AFB in New Jersey in August. Venus seems relatively unpopulated. McGuire is full to the gills with other damned souls who can't get out. Pariah 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted October 1, 2015 Report Share Posted October 1, 2015 We're talking about Venus but completely ignoring Serena? Wait, wrong Venus. Never mind! Edit: 21,212 posts. I don't want to post anymore; I would break the symmetry. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted October 2, 2015 Report Share Posted October 2, 2015 The symmetry, it is a silly. And that is a very right Venus -- in a different context. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 2, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2015 I suspect, but do not know, that his opinions of religion have been shaped by 80 years of active hostility from the louder portions of the population in the US who identify themselves as religious. Among Weinberg's books is The First Three Minutes, and while physical cosmologists don't get the same knee-jerk "You're all damned and we righteous people rejoice in that, and we have the political clout to have our opinions installed in the the school textbooks no matter what you say, you heathen scum" treatment that American religious fundamentalists give to evolutionary biology, the same undertone is there. I thought i had posted this but it seems i didn't. The quotes from him which raise a red flag for me are below. I understand and acknowledge the reasons for his views (well i mostly do), I don't agree with them. His views on religion were expressed in a speech from 1999 in Washington, D.C.: "'Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."[17]He modified his comment in a later article derived from these talks: "Frederick Douglass told in his Narrative how his condition as a slave became worse when his master underwent a religious conversion that allowed him to justify slavery as the punishment of the children of Ham. Mark Twain described his mother as a genuinely good person, whose soft heart pitied even Satan, but who had no doubt about the legitimacy of slavery, because in years of living in antebellum Missouri she had never heard any sermon opposing slavery, but only countless sermons preaching that slavery was God's will. With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil – that takes religion."[17] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 2, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2015 9 Surreal Places You Need To Visit Before You Die http://www.lifehack.org/142227/9-surreal-places-you-need-visit-before-you-die Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted October 2, 2015 Report Share Posted October 2, 2015 I thought i had posted this but it seems i didn't. The quotes from him which raise a red flag for me are below. I understand and acknowledge the reasons for his views (well i mostly do), I don't agree with them.Actually, that Wikipedia quote you have is pretty much spot on what my guess was about his thinking, and it comes from living in a place where, bluntly, the most visible organized religions are strong forces behind various forms of hate, including forms that target him and his lifework directly. When I lived there I felt largely the same way. Now that I work at an institution operated nominally by a religious order who are more focused on compassion and tolerance (rather than in enforcing a social order in which their adherents are atop the social and political ladder and others are routinely denied full rights), and I live in a community where organized religion has rather lower influence than holds elsewhere in the US, I no longer receive more or less daily stimuli that reinforce the feeling that religious organizations spend most of their time stirring up hate and and organizing hateful measures against those who do not kowtow to their doctrine. I figured you'd write him off because he dismisses the ancient Greeks' efforts at natural philosophy as poetry and not much more, because they valued beautiful ideas only for their beauty, not for their accuracy, and never soiled themselves by holding those ideas up for testing against reality. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 4, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2015 Actually, that Wikipedia quote you have is pretty much spot on what my guess was about his thinking, and it comes from living in a place where, bluntly, the most visible organized religions are strong forces behind various forms of hate, including forms that target him and his lifework directly. When I lived there I felt largely the same way. Texas? if so, I can understand where you and him are coming from. (Aside to LM: remember the ep where Sheldon Cooper goes to Texas and has a disagreement about evolution with his mum?) Now that I work at an institution operated nominally by a religious order who are more focused on compassion and tolerance (rather than in enforcing a social order in which their adherents are atop the social and political ladder and others are routinely denied full rights), and I live in a community where organized religion has rather lower influence than holds elsewhere in the US, I no longer receive more or less daily stimuli that reinforce the feeling that religious organizations spend most of their time stirring up hate and and organizing hateful measures against those who do not kowtow to their doctrine. No worries. I figured you'd write him off because he dismisses the ancient Greeks' efforts at natural philosophy as poetry and not much more, because they valued beautiful ideas only for their beauty, not for their accuracy, and never soiled themselves by holding those ideas up for testing against reality. Write him off, that is fair, for the most part. I've been wavering in doing do. He wrote a monograph on cosmology which seems to a standard text on the subject which looks interesting. I'm not against science, I'm against the philosophy that underpins it, mainly, scientism (belief that the scientific method is the only viable tool to give reliable knowledge) and anti-realism (disbelief in nonmaterial realm & intelligibles). I've recently come to the point of view seeing the natural science along the lines of journalism. I'll explain that in a later post. That i can discuss this with you shows that science is worthwhile. I may be a fool, but I'm a wise fool. FrankL 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 4, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2015 I'll wait for the 16-D model. "D" for dogs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 4, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 4, 2015 And in a couple of weeks i graduate again from university. tkdguy and Pariah 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted October 7, 2015 Report Share Posted October 7, 2015 Sigh. I missed this when it happened. Callahan's stuff appeared in a supplement section of the local paper on Sundays in the '80s and '90s, IIRC. The one collection of his I know about takes its title from the second comic in the link: "Don't Worry, He Won't Get Far On Foot." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 10, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 10, 2015 Everybody enjoying the weekend? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted October 10, 2015 Report Share Posted October 10, 2015 Just finished Firefly; soon dinner with the folks; later, bro D and I will go see The Martian; ending the night with Serenity. All in all, can't complain. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bazza Posted October 10, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 10, 2015 Just finished watching Pixels, the classic video game attacks earth film from this year. Quite enjoyed it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted October 10, 2015 Report Share Posted October 10, 2015 Toootally ripped off a Futurama episode! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted October 10, 2015 Report Share Posted October 10, 2015 ... who ripped off who in turn? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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