Bitcoin Forum

Simple question.

Yes there are lots of things that have more power than humans, the sun for example.

You didn't disappoint me. Question modified.

yes

simple answer

What do you ask for? Are you asking at all?
This is rather an assertion than something which is usually preceding a wobbly phallus underlayed with a dot.

p.s.
I have faith in my chainsaw. Ask those trees or better the rest of them which have not yet went through the chimney.
The sun is not stronger than me as I can safely hide in a cave.

Higher power,  maybe.

Religion,  no way.

lulz

Higher power, absolutely

Religion, only with several truckloads of salt and a serious cross-cultural comparison

I'm liking these poll results

nope
maybe

overall: no

I have faith in SHA 256

i do not mind if people are religous, its when they push it on me...religious people no problems...bible pushers ug...
 :P

Some would say the first enable the second. And worse, the third  :-\

Well, first live enables it all. How about stopping there?
Enabling is slightly different from forcing. Choice is an important part here.
Choice enables but should it be therefore restricted?

No, just enlightened.

so you can have more mining rigs... :P

I have faith SHA256 will be worthless for bitcoin within 3 decades, likely 2.  I also have faith we will transition away from it before this point and the bitcoin blockchain will still be secure.

I have faith that Bitcoin will not survive in space because it takes too long to send block data between Earth and Mars (between 4 and 21 minutes), but I have faith we'll figure something out, and that Gavin is already on top of that serious and urgent problem  ;D

Mining would simply be infeasible to bootstrap on Mars.  Martians could still broadcast their transactions back to Earth, but miners would just have their blocks rejected unless they could outrun all the miners on Earth.  Maybe as more miners get rich and move to Mars, the Earth hashrate will decrease enough that all the miners who have already made it to Mars will be enough to overtake the Earth blockchain.  They could also have a MarsCoin and an exchange with Bitcoin since it takes up to an additional 42 minutes to reach X confirmations (21 minutes to broadcast transaction to earth, 21 minute delay on receiving blocks).  This would help reduce the transmission costs since it takes a lot of power to send data so far.

Of course, all this is moot if we are able to develop faster-than-light communications by manipulating quantum entanglement effects.

religion has a lot of corruption from it's power but it's still a useful resource

There's a lot of misunderstood things in life that could  be attributed to god but can they equally be labelled as natual processes;

i.e. Pray to god for something could be law of attraction rather god... Could be.

For me, religion and atheism seem to fit side by side peacefully no worries with no dualistic thinking of does god exist etc

Sit on the fence to stay productive

Religion <> Theism

You can be a theist without belonging to a religion. IMHO it is the even the most rational position.

I would order from most to least rational position:
Theism > Atheism > Religion

How is theism, believing that an event is supernatural until it is explained through natural processes, more rational than atheism, believing that we don't understand the event until we can explain it through natural processes?

I'm not talking about explaining an event as supernatural. I am talking about a general worldview. More precisely it is "Pantheism", or even more precisely the Conscious Universe model. The reason it is more rational is because it explains all the phenomena, ie. all the anomalous data, instead of ignoring them.

Religious worldviews are logically inconsistent and mostly irrational, relying on blind faith. I think we can agree on that. Atheists (more precisely Physicalists) believe in mainstream science, which is good because it is an improvement over Religion. The only problem is that is fails to acknowledge that mainstream science is also being manipulative or ignorant to some degree when it chooses to ignore "put off" all the evidence that supports conspiracy theories and paranormal phenomena. This is not being scientific, it is being willfully ignorant at the least. It is excusable though because it is a psychological hurdle that many people - including mainstream scientists - fail to overcome.

The Conscious Universe model incorporates these "anomalies" into a complete worldview that is logical and explains everything. Part of this model is the idea that Consciousness is fundamental property of the Universe, and that the Universe was created in conscious manner.

What kind of anomalous data, and what is the explanation for it? This is the first time I'm hearing that atheists or science ignores data...

Faith is essential to both religion and science.

Explain please

What the hell is a 'higher power'? I've only ever encountered the term when watching AA meetings on "Law and Order". Can I have a definition? Is it some kind of god-thing?

Faith is a belief in something without evidence for it.

Science takes evidence observed in a continual present and uses it to try to make future predictions without any actual evidence of a future whatsoever.

Will you see the sunrise tomorrow (assuming you're an early-bird and also assuming I don't receive any complaints about the fact that the sun doesn't 'rise')?  Do you have any evidence to suggest that it will, or only evidence that suggests it has in the past?

More than being essential to both religion and science, I think faith is essential to survival.

Not sure if I would use faith for "expectation for something based on prior results/observation." Religion doesn't have "prior results/expectations," so it may be stretching the word a bit. But I do see your point.

See...the science that I know says "it's likely the sun will rise tomorrow, but we can't answer for sure, because of the possibility that there will be an anomalous event, like an alien abducting the sun. Or it might just go out. But given what we've experienced in the past, and from the data we've managed to collect, our money's on the sun rising."

Does science rule out a more powerful, conscious being? No. In fact it says that somewhere, one should (but doesn't have to) exist. Based on the science I know, I do have to have faith that Math is absolute. But that seems to be it.  

Math, and faith in accurate and/or comprehensive interpretation of real-world objects and events.  Consider this -- a definition of a thing is essentially a theory of it.  When researchers operationalize their variables, they are creating or reusing miniature theories of these variables.  Not only that, but the variables themselves are miniature theories of the real-world things or events they explain.  The whole process by which we cognitively know anything depends upon a whole chain of assumptions that could only be proven to be true if we could compare their past and future states.  I just don't see, nor have I ever seen, concrete proof of a past and future.  Actually, you could argue that there's evidence that suggests past and future states do not exist because the present is the current evidence we have.  Even the theory of relativity seems to imply that individuals are only stratified temporally and that we basically all live in a relative present.

But on the whole, I agree with you.  I just think religion and science have a lot more in common than people generally think.  

Edit: I always found the following semantic musing interesting, though I admit its a stretch:

When I doubt, I don't know.  (e.g. I doubt the Cubs will win the World Series, but hey, who really knows?)
If doubt is related to a lack of knowledge, does faith relate to knowledge? 

The concept of "evidence" requires some kind of continuity between past-future and different points in space. If you do not see any connection between past events and your current experiences (or events that occur across the room from you and those that occur nearby)... then I don't really know what to tell you. You would not survive long if you let this determine your behavior.

Are you familiar with the terms "false positive" and "false negative"? If so, how would you have mainstream science distinguish these occurrences from "anomalies"?

Evident means "that which is apparent."  When you interpret some real-world event or thing as "evidence," you then refocus your present awareness on your abstract representation of it.  But, extrapolating meaning from that evidence is what requires a comparison of past and future states.

I guess it really boils down to whether the belief that "the established laws of the universe will continue to function in the future" can be considered faith or not. There's no reason to believe they won't. There's no reason to believe anything claimed by religion will.

What determines one's abstract representation of an object? Past experience?


I think it is more fundamental than that. Why does anyone hold the belief that the past can be used to predict the future?

to hopefully predict blocks while mining.

...and hopping, while at that.

 :P

Because it is a testable and repeatable theory.

I would use the example of:

If I just took a dump and my toilet won't flush, what should I do? Should I pray for it to start working again? I think no.

Or, should I try to figure out what is wrong with it? If in the past I have discovered that usually this is because the chain disconnected from the flapper, shouldn't I check this first?

Science is just taking this strategy to a new level. Most religious people will live their lives like this, but make some exceptions.

What past experience?  You mean the 'memories' you have that you observe in the present?

Well that is basically the same question. What determines the memories you have?

Talking about time...time is another dimension.

The first dimension is a line. You need 1 coordinate to fix yourself in it -- think of a number line. If I tell you "1" it can only be that point.

The second dimension is a flat surface. You need 2 coordinates (x, y) to fix yourself. This is your standard Cartesian plane.

Three dimensions is what we experience the most of. You need 3 coordinates (x,y,z) to fix yourself. This is why, as far as we are concerned in daily life, triangles and tripods are the most stable geometry.

Four dimensions we experience a sliver of every moment. You need 4 coordinates to fix yourself -- not only do you need to anchor your location in 3d space, but at a specific location in time. Like in a computer simulation -- you need to specify where, and at what point in time.

Sure we only experience an infinitesimally small piece of "time" at any moment, but mathematically it's there. Now, ala Slaughterhouse Five, you could have "creatures" that lived in the 4th dimension, and moved through it just like we move through our world. But that's getting a little out there.

Obligatory Big Bang Theory explanation of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1YUmJBN6vs

Well, actually every dimension would appear "time-like" to the one preceding it.

The following dissertation is a good summary of the arguments against Physicalism. You will find many scientific studies mentioned therein on paranormal phenomena (mostly ESP). These scientific studes are basically the "anomalous data" that mainstream science chooses to mostly ignore:
http://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/ETD-UT-2009-12-682/SMITH-DISSERTATION.pdf

Furthermore:
- the studies of Masaru Emoto on the effects of consciousnesss on water
- the UFO phenomenon with thousands of recorded cases that have no conventional explanation
- the scientific studies on the events of 9/11 and why the official version of these events is a lie
- plus a lot more

Another good source that sums of up the scientific evidence for the Conscious Universe is the book "The Source Field Investigation" by David Wilcock.

There are a number of other phenomena such as reincarnation, ghosts & spirits, cryptozoology, mythological history (e.g. Atlantis), "free energy" devices, and even some philosophical arguments which also fit into this expanded worldview.

The model that explains all this, to put it very briefly and incompletely, is the following:
The Universe is essentially One Conscious Being and we parts of that being. We are foremost eternal spirits having a brief human experience. Consciousness is the primary property of the Universe and influences matter (i.e. mind over matter). There many more "dimensions" or layers of existence above and beyond this material realm. There are many ET civilizations existing on other planets and the higher realms. Planet Earth has been put in a kind of quarantine for several thousands of year for the purpose of spiritual growth. For this purpose certain powerful, "evil" groups were allowed to take control over the Earth manipulating the people into believing the current limited worldview. Their reign is ending now though (this year). Humanity's distant past is far different than what is told in the history books, for example there were ancient, highly advanced civilizations that existed many thousands of years ago (and also on Mars).

Emoto's experiment was repeated in a triple-blind study, and they did not get repeatable results.

UFOs happen for much the same reason magic tricks work -- our brains make a ton of assumptions.

What does 9/11 have to do with science?

That last paragraph...I don't even know what to say, except that from a scientific viewpoint, we have no evidence of any of that. There's the possibility, but we've yet to uncover anything on Mars that gives an indication of life.

What was the design of the triple-blind study?  I'd be curious to take a look at it.

You see what happens here is that Atlas asks one question, he counts on no one being able to stay on topic, then he walks away and feels like he's done some good in the world because people are talking in a thread that they can lock whenever he wants.

You guys are suckers. From now on, never respond to a thread from Atlas-- start your own as a response and then lock it immediately. It will really fuck with his mind.

http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_22_4_radin.pdf (http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_22_4_radin.pdf)

That's the full write-up for it.

Thanks :)

Putting down UFOs as "tricks of the mind" is exactly what I am talking about. This is not being scientific.

The events of 9/11, or rather the conspiracy behind it that scientific studies have uncovered proves that there is a powerful group of people that are able to control the media, mainstream science and the perception of the masses. It therefore cannot be concluded that unusual phenomena are false just because they are not accepted in the mainstream view. These people have the power to hide the truth from us.

There currently is no life on Mars (at least none we have detected) but in the past there was life, even an entire civilization on Mars. They destroyed themselves and the planet's atmosphere (which used to be much thicker).

Mageant - you need to go here: http://www.davidicke.com/

You will fit right in.

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/17-05/ff_neuroscienceofmagic?currentPage=all
That's what I'm talking about with magic tricks. It's science -- the brain makes all kinds of fun assumptions, magicians abuse that.

If mars had a much thicker atmosphere and life, we should be seeing much heavier carbon-rich deposits than we do. Assuming you're talking about "life as we know it".

lets have a bash at this, atm > 1 bottle of wine & < 2 bottles

there is only the present eternal moment, it encompasses everything & when one's awareness isn't in it then one is in a dream like state, an illusion

there is only an infinite awareness, it encompasses everything, it is everything including everything that ever could be, we are it, but just for the lulz it chooses to play a game of lets forget & manifest this LF consciousness in to physical material temporal existence (in our case) & while we retain some profound realization of this (which explains all religions etc), we are actually programed (have programed ourselves) to not get it - otherwise there would be no game to play = less fun & actually there's also a purpose behind it, but I'll leave that for now

side note: by programed to not get it, it doesn't of course mean that we can't, in fact the whole game seems to mostly evolve/revolve around our getting it what could be called enlightenment or presence & as for programmed it's just like we choose to play some computer game & then assume that char within the rules we've set, the more aware one is the more one may see the program, most peeps live in the equivalent state of a sub-routine atm but that's OK, eternal time & the penny may/will drop one day - the funny thing is that's such a shocking experience when it does that it's hard to survive the level up, still infinite lives hax so np

Earth = elementary school, master the elements here & level up, to help you get them in balance guide books like a simple pack of playing cards can be very helpful, Tarot cards if you're close to graduating otherwise leave them alone, baby food - any religion of your choice but try not to end your days still supping baby formula - the mystic sections which each religion have are for sure though a potential stairway to heaven (awakening), like Sufi, Qabalah; maybe even ninja Jesuit (haven't checked those guys out so much as yet) & of course Buddhism isn't a religion at all though many like to treat it as such - it's seeing/being reality which one is (excuse spelling pse - ie how I spell Kabbalah)

Reality is created anew in every present moment, it isn't linear

anyway to get back to the OP, "Faith in a higher power" from a viewpoint say of the ego, of separation, then obviously there are going to be powers & more importantly awarenesses both higher & lower than one's own (less seemingly separated), just look at nature & evolution, we have just about climbed out of the primeval swamp but not that long ago & are all too happy to dive back in the moment the lights go out &  the game gets the better of us

"Faith in a higher power" is just reinforcement of the illusion of separation & a dis-empowerment, plus a negation of one's own total responsibility for one's reality - ie it's an ego trip & a sure way to level down

"Are you an atheist" I believe it asked in the poll - this would really need a definition of what might be construed as god here I expect, as an atheist I guess disagrees with that concept - to me both atheist & faith in a higher power are equally flawed & anyway it's time to be getting on with the 2nd bottle of wine, sry about having done no spell check etc...

Mageant, none of the things you mentioned can be tested through repeatable experiments. I can't see any way we can design an experiment to repeat and record UFO sightings and come to any conclusion. How would you design a scientific experiment around UFOs that could be carried out by anyone with similar results?

The scientific studies mentioned in the paper can be repeated.
There fields of science, such as meterology, that work without repeatable experiments yet are still considering scientific.
Even so, the evidence the UFOs have left behind have been measured and these measurements can be reexamined.
Also, there are in fact "hotspots", where UFOs keep reappearing. Here you can (and people have) set up measuring devices which have in fact measured UFOs recurringly.

Specific theories about how weather patterns function, based on irrefutable laws of physics, have been established. Those theories predict the weather perfectly within a range of specified input parameters. As predictions go further out into the future, there are more and more inputs to consider, which is why they get less and less precise a few days out. Still, key point is meteorology depends on physical interaction of things, based on laws of physics. Even better, these theories and computational models ca be tested and adjusted as we experience more weather.


These measurements, do they start out with the conclusion of "we don't know what this is, and should explore all variables to build a conclusion," or do they start out with "these are aliens, let's measure the variables to prove they are aliens?" That's the major difference between science and faith: the former doesn't work towards conclusions.

Higher power as in higher hash power, right ?

This thread went emo.

I think I found bigfoot!

https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcR-k2nnhMijZduH8XyriqlolFnCvCCfR-RjyPJnbB3cWGRK_W6R

What is Faith?
Faith, pure faith, accepts or rejects without basis of reason, beyond the scope of that which is perceived through the five senses. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. This is why some scientists and sudo scientists (Atheists) have a problem with those who have faith.
 
What constitutes a higher power?
This depends on the ideal of the individual, and at what height the ideal is set. It can include a material goal like money or a spiritual goal like oneness with God, as well as anything in between. The higher the ideal the greater the achievement that's possible, so why limit yourself and be an underachiever. ;)

O.o

You just posted the secret CIA research override code!

FIFY