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Search found 58 matches

by robzed
June 2nd, 2011, 10:57 pm
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: Free will
Replies: 683
Views: 81601

Re: Free will

On a semi-related thought...

What is the test for 'free will'?

What is the test for who (or what) has moral responsibility?


-Rob
by robzed
June 2nd, 2011, 7:28 pm
Forum: Miscellaneous Discussions...
Topic: Is it a boy or a girl?
Replies: 18
Views: 2523

Re: Is it a boy or a girl?

Even two-year-olds are influenced by television ( and can become aware of brands, for example ) The nursery do an interesting exercise with the 3 year old kids and parents and get the kids to identify as many brands as possible. We were shocked how many brands they can name from the logo alone. The...
by robzed
June 2nd, 2011, 6:45 pm
Forum: Miscellaneous Discussions...
Topic: Is it a boy or a girl?
Replies: 18
Views: 2523

Re: Is it a boy or a girl?

But what I find unconvincing is the idea that girls have some inbuilt preference for pink frilly things, flowers, butterflies, hearts, kittens, dolls and dressing up, and boys have an inbuilt preference for cars, lorries, tractors, trains, ships, spaceships, robots, dinosaurs and fighting. There ma...
by robzed
June 1st, 2011, 9:39 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: Facts and Theories
Replies: 21
Views: 2999

Re: Facts and Theories

dasha wrote:Confidence that arises out of ignorance [...] is hard to shake
and
dasha wrote:Confidence [...] arises out of ignorance
I like those.
by robzed
June 1st, 2011, 9:26 pm
Forum: Miscellaneous Discussions...
Topic: Is it a boy or a girl?
Replies: 18
Views: 2523

Re: Is it a boy or a girl?

Another thought: it sort of bugged both of us that first question you are asked when you are pregnant is usually not 'How far along are you?' or 'Are you feeling ok?' but 'What are you having?'. Like Fia, our answer was 'a baby'. The next question was, "haha, no really ... do you know yet?'. Then wh...
by robzed
June 1st, 2011, 8:56 pm
Forum: Miscellaneous Discussions...
Topic: Is it a boy or a girl?
Replies: 18
Views: 2523

Re: Is it a boy or a girl?

I get the impression society norms are only the part of the story. Warning: anecdote coming up :-) We dressed our daughter in more 'male' type clothes and we both played with a selection of balanced toys with her. She still likes to play cars with her brother, loves any games on computers, Wii, PS2,...
by robzed
February 11th, 2011, 10:10 am
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: Free will
Replies: 683
Views: 81601

Re: Free will

What evidence so we have that the world is deterministic? It seems a reasonable amount, but it doesn't necessarily mean we have a correct view of the physical world.

If we don't really know if the world is deterministic does this mean we can't decide about responsibility?
by robzed
February 10th, 2011, 9:28 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Where were you in the 1960s ?
Replies: 38
Views: 8617

Re: Where were you in the 1960s ?

Alan H wrote:You were a man trapped in a woman's body...
Exactly. :laughter:
by robzed
February 10th, 2011, 9:28 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Where were you in the 1960s ?
Replies: 38
Views: 8617

Re: Where were you in the 1960s ?

I'm not sure where I was either. I remember the late 60's was sort of dark but warm. Lots of swimming. But the start of the 1970s was a bit of a pain. You were a man trapped in a woman's body... Bu don't most . . . Oh, see what you mean! "And man cometh from the womb of woman and spendeth the rest ...
by robzed
February 9th, 2011, 8:58 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Where were you in the 1960s ?
Replies: 38
Views: 8617

Re: Where were you in the 1960s ?

Nick wrote:Can't remember..... :D
I'm not sure where I was either. I remember the late 60's was sort of dark but warm. Lots of swimming. But the start of the 1970s was a bit of a pain.
by robzed
February 9th, 2011, 8:55 pm
Forum: Culture Club
Topic: What's the use of libraries?
Replies: 34
Views: 6375

Re: What's the use of libraries?

Just for what it's worth... Books are a brilliant local resource but there are several others things that our library does I know about and have had contact with... * Place for students - somewhere to study. Lots of laptops that people bring, of course. Reference books help, even in the libraries th...
by robzed
February 9th, 2011, 8:30 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

robzed if man doesn't cut down all the trees, I'm not even going to try and get my head around the main topic of this thread, but I do think (IMHO) deforestation is causing much more damage to the planet than anything else we humans are doing. I think we are off-topics, strictly speaking. This is w...
by robzed
February 9th, 2011, 7:59 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

That is to say, human heating is 0.00862% of the energy we receive from the sun. Fascinating! I suspected that what man produces would be tiny in comparison, but hadn't looked at the numbers. If you think about it, all we manage to do is warm our buildings a bit; the sun warns everything around us ...
by robzed
February 9th, 2011, 7:10 am
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

What I don't know is whether the vast amounts of energy we use is in any way comparable to the heating effect of greenhouse gasses - any ideas? This is not a full answer, but I suppose all heat generated is radiated away into space pretty soon, whereas the greenhouse gases persist for longer and tr...
by robzed
February 9th, 2011, 6:48 am
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

Hi Alan, Obviously I was being argumentative just because it's more interesting. In terms of cost, I notice 3 Philips 14W CFLs are 30p. Good grief! This made me laugh :-) I'm saying that (virtually) all power you use in your home is dissipated as heat, thereby heating the planet, regardless of what ...
by robzed
February 7th, 2011, 9:33 pm
Forum: Humanist Ethics & Morality
Topic: Free will
Replies: 683
Views: 81601

Re: Free will

The behaviour of certain non-human animals, like dogs, responds very well to operant conditioning. One can use positive and negative reinforcement and positive and negative punishment to control a dog's behaviour to an extraordinary degree. (Actually, one doesn't really need the positive punishment...
by robzed
February 7th, 2011, 9:01 pm
Forum: Social Club
Topic: Weather - or not!
Replies: 1122
Views: 117532

Re: Weather - or not!

I can't find the original story about the one that blew over but it's mentioned in this article. Read it for a laugh. CAMPAIGNERS against plans for one of Europe’s largest wind farms being built on Shetland have raised concerns after a test mast was discovered to be damaged in the past few days. A ...
by robzed
February 7th, 2011, 8:52 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

But it's not that simple! The heat generated by equipment on standby is dissipated into the room (so, if a device takes, say, 5 W, on standby, all of that 5 W will be dissipated into the room. If you have a thermostat on your central heating, it will switch on your CH less because of that 5 W and y...
by robzed
February 6th, 2011, 10:31 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

Dave B wrote: = 1.2W(ish)
Your sums look ok (late at night) - but 1.2W ... you should able to feel that as hot...
by robzed
February 6th, 2011, 3:24 pm
Forum: Sciences and pseudo-science
Topic: How much electricity would I use...
Replies: 57
Views: 9145

Re: How much electricity would I use...

*Kettle small but still 2kW, low wattage kettles actually waste electricity; the extra time taken to heat the water also means proportionately more losses due to radiation & convection. Yeah, I agree with this, and it might also be worth saying (I didn't see anyone else say) - only boil what you ne...