Posts made by FinsterniS

majoriwhat ? :D

I still don’t think the majority is catholic, the majority is theist, like in most country sadly, but not very “religious”. I am not trying to make dangerous deduction like; french are more scientific, french are more clever, french are superior and blablabla. Sure i think the fact they read a lot help a little; but it is more cultural, french like good sex, good wine and liberty, things the catholic church saw as being “bestial”.

And i am curious, there is any statistic on religion in the USA in university ? More Atheist/Agnostic ?

Note: Although the implication of intelligent design was there, all i did was take a light-hearted swing at “blind-watchmaker” hypothesis. Also, you seem to be saying that just because we don’t know all the causes of something is no reason to doubt the process we’ve come to believe in. This argument, when i applied it to lack of understanding with regards to biblical occurances you shot down as “fanatism”.

The bible is a book, it is made of statement. You seem to think it is perfection, while it contain strange theory. Also;

1; history teach us that “god” was far too often an answer to the unknow; the weather, the moon, the sun, et cetera…
2; it is not because we don’t understand something that we need to go into mythology to find answer… There is evidence of something we don’t understand but there is no evidence of “intelligence”. Order does not need intelligence, look at planets, suns, clouds…

• sorry, no fancy quotes by some German or French guy right now
  not-signed-in-Crypt

Just read Jery Falwell you will get some quote for religion :)

I just answer YB’s ironic remark, i do not want to attack americans

danke f_alk
mein europaischer verbundeter

Multiply that by thousands of proteins (and genes), and one starts to see the incredulity of many people (scientists etc.) when considering the “blind-watch-maker” hypothesis.

Hey Moses, that was what i was talking about, when we don’t know, it is god… And i really don’t see how our ignorance on the subject can be use as an argument for god ? If each time i saw order in math without understanding the cause, then think it is somekind of god; then i would be a very strong Theist !

Ist denn wohl unser Begriff von Gott etwas weiter als personifizierte Unbegreiflichkeit?

What is our conception of god other than the personification of the inconceivable ?

• Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742-1799)

@F_alk:

@yourbuttocks:

Besides, Fisternis, what French Mathematicians put a man on the moon?

Was that the german rocketbuiler? Or the american NASA dude who mixed up inches and cm and lost a multi-million Mars-probe?

:) :)

Ja !

If the american were able to sent someone on the moon it was in a great part due to the technology they had steal from the german (they also got some german scientist)…

@yourbuttocks:

You still haven’t convinced me about the whole French-Catholic thing. You know, Atheists in America do not consider America a religious country, and they would dispute such an insinuation much as you do.

Well, that would be irrational. They have no survey from official agencies to support their ideas anyway…

Also I never said France was irreligious, atheist are still not the major faction. But we are not 90% catholic.

Tell me Fisternis, how many people are there in France? 100 million? How many French have you met? A couple thousand? Of those, how many do know their religious affiliation? Some of them? And you know better than some kind of census (and even if I believe that it is a projection, like Yanny said, something like 85% of people are the religion of their parents) ???

~60 000 000

And what you just said is not valid from a statistic point of view, by taking only 100 person and the street and ask them what they think about religion you will have a good idea, that is probability. You just have to walk in the street, listen to our politician, look at church, listen to people to know France is not as religions as America, and there is a huge difference. If i had to say, just from what i think of France i would say…

15% Atheist
20% Agnostic
20% Reincarnationist
The rest is a mixt of Theist/Deist/people who don’t know, not a lot of people are really into religion.

…with more Atheist/Agnostic in university (like most country, certainly even in the US)

Also i can hardly imagine you really think the “85% people stick with the religion of their parent” can be applied to the French people. Bouddhism is rising quite fast, like agnosticism, people do not seem to stick a lot. You seem to forget France is full of French, and French culture is not the same as American’s culture. That is a little Americocentic to think French are subject to the same behavior as American, we had a lot of atheist thinker in the past 2 century, Voltaire, Legendre, Zola…

As a matter of Fact, without work by mathematician like Legendre and Lagrande (Mécanique analytique (1788)), i doubt you could put a man in the moon. Don’t forget Mathematic is just a tool, a tool engineer and phycisian always use. Also i just said America was not a people really good in Mathematic, i never said they were bad eveywhere. I never said French were good in all social & natural science.

And yes; America is very religious.

Most non-statistic theorem are not english, and Jonh Nash does not work a lot on pure mathematic, more on application. If you go on analyse & geometry, you will find out that most basic theorem are not english. Also i did’nt say American were dumm in math, but;

1; That is cleary not your stength
2; There is not a lot of american innovation in math
3; You score very bad in math test.

Sure Nash’s equilibrium theory was not idiot; but it was for application, it is a theorem base on induction, more statistic than mathematic. I don’t see any Hilbert, Gauss, Lobatchevshi, Riemann, Poincaré, Legendre or Lagrange in America.

I don’t know why you are taking this seriously, no country is perfect, all have + & -.

@yourbuttocks:

ABMD systems:

Laser Based-Air bourne Laser, Space Bourne Laser.

Non-Laser Based- Aegeis, Patriot, Thor, and all the rest

Laser technology is only one part of it.

There is Patriot on it !?! I wish it’s a new version, these anti-missile were dangerous.

good ideas… good ideas to exploit people you mean. The most genius mind are rarely rich. When you see some rich people you will say; hey, he got a good ideas ? you forget he was probably just at the right place at the right time. The rich people always say it was good ideas that make them rich, that is the speach of the victor.

Just take W. Bush, he is not very brilliant, still he get a good education and lot of money. That is not the exeption; he is the “normal” case.

And crypt, when i was speaking of the hocky player; what i said was; he did’nt work as much as 20 times more than a normal worker, he was just lucky, at the right place at the right time.

(CRYPT’S GRAND UNIFICATION THEOREM)
capitalism is like evolution - the talent makes it, the crap gets weeded out.
communism is like intelligent design - an almighty over-seer (gov’t) creates the economy - jobs, etc. and makes certain that certain ideals etc. are created into the system.
(it needs work, but you can kind of get the gist).
note that many capitalists appear to be intelligent design people, and the communists seem to be blind-watchmaker types
Capitalism is like evolution

Then i’m a capitalist. Wait a minute, that does’nt work out :D

Maybe communism is a step in social evolution that we are not ready to make, but it is still maybe a step.

@cystic:

@Yanny:

Your from Canada right? Well your acting like a typical American.

1. We are not better than France.
2. France is not better than us.
3. France is the leader of Europe.
4. France has a history 10x Longer than North America.

Your swinging Nation vs Nation here, not talkng about the census. I am tired of this Roman type idea Americans have about themselves. Yes, I know your Canadian.

really Yanny, i’m not at all sure where this is coming from . . . . I mean, i tease FinsterniS a little bit, but i’m not really taking any shots at any nation, but i don’t recall being aggressively insulting. I really don’t believe that any country is better than France (although it’s my patriotic duty to claim that Canada is better than everyone :) ), i don’t believe that France is the leader of Europe, or that any nation is, and i believe that the France today is not really that old (Portugal has the longest history of nationhood dating back to the 1180’s or so), but there are a lot of buildings and ideas that are old in France.
Look at my record on here. Certainly i have strong opinions, however i do try and keep them objective, and struggle to rise above my base-nature, even if provoked.
(and please do not compare me to a typical American - those people keep me out of all of my most desired tourist spots :D )

Overall each culture is equal. But different… All culture have its strength. American are not very good in Math, French in management and German in marketing :evil:

Also CC, France was really soon a country in europe. In the 9th century it was a country with relative unity.

About leadership, France is not better than other European country; but they are still the leader in europe, now with Germany. Back to the first move of the Union; Italy lack stability, Germany lack the power to start the union & the UK was too isolated, France take the lead, now Germany & France form the backbone of our union.

Second, a wealthy capitalist creating jobs, but getting part of the wealth produced by the workers, that is a symbiotic relationship, maybe, but how could you call it parasitic? Worker creates wealth, part of which goes to Capitalist, while worker is given the chance to create wealth.

I just don’t agree; but there is no absolute truth in politic. I call it parasitic when, like i said, someone is taking far more to the society that he/she really can produce. That is not only against justice, but also against those law of nature some capitalist are using to say their system is “natural”. If an animal survive, he is probably fit to survive. If an human gain power; he is certainly fit to survive ? No, he probably exploit others, and we encourage that. You will not make me believe a bank owner is 20 time more productive than a normal worker….

Also unemployment is part of capitalism, in a capitalist economy you must have unemployment.

Sure it encourage parasitism, those who live by putting money on action are not productive, and those entrepreneur who have 10 time the paid of their employes, they are 10 time more productive that them, they have work harder ? Sure they take risk, but with what money ? And the risk, those you are’nt at the good place at the good time should be poor, they deserve that ? An hokey player that win 1 million a year is worth in term of production 20 workers ? He is working 20 time harder ? That is parasitism, they take far more than they give to the society.

Sure those who are not working are paid a little (the strong word is Little) in a left-wing society, but what; we sould let them die because again, they were not at the right place at the right time ? Also you should know that unemployment is a normal thing in any capitalist society, more than a normal thing; this is how it work, you need people that are not working.

I was the probably not, but it has nothing to do with faith. I remember reading stuff which said the probablility was low. So that is how I voted.

All scientific theory on the subject are in pure contradiction. The fact is; we lack information to form coherent theory, i have no evidence, i just think the universe is so vast; life can have appear somewhere else… That’s why i vote “probably…” but not “yes”.

@cystic:

not quite sure about microbes . . . maybe viruses, but there is debate about whether they are “alive” or not - some consider them to be merely machines . . .

I don’t know about microbe, but we believe not so long ago animals were merely machines… Also it depend on your definition of “machines”, we can consider ourself, to some extend, to be some some of biological machines.

Also there may be life in ways that we do not understand it . . . using non-organic metabolites and structures, with/out systems of respiration reproduction etc. different then we’d imagine. I’m not too sure about the little green men concept, but i do wonder if there were aliens, what they would be made of, look like, and would they bear any resemblance to life around here to an extent that we would even recognise it as life?

This is an interesting subject, maye life is always formed around some immuable basis or maybe life is in the contrary more diverse, so life on another planet is completly different from life here… It’s very hard to be sure.

Historicly you are right YB, but you are thinking like an american, french are not like that, they change very fast, maybe too fast sometime… France was really catholic not so long ago, but it is not the case now. We have no strong Catholic/Christian party, and if the stat said only 12% catholic it is becaue of an exageration of Agnostic, certainly due to the question… At the limit, an agnostic can be consider someone that is not sure. But as always i will argue your Statistics is invalid because there is no survey, and that is for that reason Germany get so much “Unnafiliated”, not because the communist convert a lot of people, (sure they did but not that much) but because the statistic only consider how people are born, i can assure you christianism is stronger in Germany than in France.

I am sure that i you had visit france you would understand how religion is weak. Church are never full, priest are getting really old and our politician never finish their speach with “que dieu bénisse la France”. As CC said, the “old world” start to let down tradition in general, after the WWII there was a renew in Europe.

It has been suggested that we change, but here in the U.S. anything French is associated with eating babies

I always found the hate between French & English culture to be quite amusing.

Exactly, every culture is good in something anyway…

The day they change the speed limit from miles to wimpy kilometers is the day I die!

There is movement in the US to change the system ?

But seriously, NASA doesn’t use the metric!? Come on, even as a lab student, I use metric! Get with the program! Inches, feet, it’s all an evil invention by the British to keep America is a backwards position.

They use the metric system, for distance anyway… And it was a problem because one engineer use the Imperial system, and it cost a lot…

America do not use the Metric system, and the UK too i think ( i am not sure )… i am sure it will endangers there sovereignty :roll:

I will, for once, agree with YB about the conservative issue. A communist, even more in the US, cannot be very conservative… in russia there is conservative communism and i can understand but in the US i find it more curious. Sure “Conservative” is not equal to “Right-wing”, but here we are speaking of an ideology (communism) very different from the current system you live in… in this context, how can you be conservative ?

Moses, you are leftist. Leftists are for Gay Rights, Tariffs, Cloning, Abortion, Euthanasia, Socialism/Communism, etc. A couple of conservative opinions does not make you conservative. What Republican hates capitalism? Or is for legalizing drugs and prostitution?
Why do you think they are not already legalized? Conservatives!

Leftist, anyway here in France, are not for Gay Rights & Clonings. Chirac (The right, even if he is more Leftish than the Democrat) AND Jospin (Left) were against the right from Gay couple to adopt children as long as it was not proven that it was not a bad thing for the children (for now it seem it is not a good thing).

You are making a big generalisation YB about Left & Right. “Left” is first and primarily an economic principle, same thing for “Right”, the ideology behind these principle are not the same from country to country.

Life… well; microorganisms, plants, animals, insects…

But anyway; if microbe are common outside our solar system, is it not logic to assume somewhere life can have evolve beyond this level of complexity ? There is so much stars, so much planets…

BTW the metric system rules…damn all those who use farhenheit!

Why you (amerian) are not using the metric system ? Because it is french ? :lol:

And Canada is on the Metric system ? I know Quebec is, but i am not sure about the rest of the Canada…

It cost Nasa a lot…

(CNN) – NASA lost a $125 million Mars orbiter because one engineering team used metric units while another used English units for a key spacecraft operation, according to a review finding released Thursday.