The identity of an animal is determined by billions of base pairs of DNA. A creature's identity, once composed, is fixed — Bitter Crank

Not true. An individual's DNA mutates over time.(reference)

You still aren't getting it. What should be the basis of pursuing an investigation? Is a hunch that's rooted in animosity sufficient?

I know you don't believe Trump was doing this for political gain, but would it be OK if some future President actually did something analogous for personal political gain? If not, then on what principle do you allow the just investigations while disallowing the unjust?

They're both wrong, and you're wrong. We can change internal features as surely as we can change external ones. So if sex is constitutively determined by some arrangement of physical features, then a person's sex can be changed. Not just apparently changed, but actually changed. — Bartricks

I think you're missing my point.

The fundamental question is: what are the necessary and sufficient properties for belonging to the set "human female sex" and "human male sex" respectively?

There is no objectively correct answer to this question. That's why I said they're both right- they simply have different views of which sets of properties are necessary and sufficient.

When that political opponent may have abused his office for personal benefit by letting his son reap vast sums of money from a corrupt company in a destabilized country he just helped destabilize. — NOS4A2

If I take you literally, and extrapolate to any serious wrongdoing (you were too specific to the Bidens; makes it sound like a special pleading), it suggests you think a President can investigate anyone because anyone "may" have done something seriously wrong. Can you provide a reasonable, nonpartisan generalized standard that you'd be fine with applying to someone of either party?

Please expand on this by answering two questions:
1) are you saying it doesn't look bad to YOU, or do you feel that it shouldn't look bad to any reasonable person?

1) it doesn’t look bad to me. In fact, to me, it looks like the president is doing his job. — NOS4A2

OK, do you think reasonable people could think it does look bad (on the surface, at least)? Bear in mind that a September poll showed that 63% of Americans (including 32% of Republicans) considered it wrong (source)

)
2) It is always ok to ask another leader to look into possible corruption between two countries no matter who is involved, but especially when it involves the conflicts of interest of high-ranking officials, their family, and corrupt energy companies paying vast sums of cash. — NOS4A2

That's not what I asked. I asked when it is OK for a President, utilizing his office, to push for the investigation of a political opponent.

Can you offer any evidence that Trump was actively battling corruption in Ukraine -other than the Biden matter - that predates the whistleblower complaint? — Relativist

Trump has no jurisdiction in Ukraine so I do not see how he could actively battle corruption there. He was clearly concerned about Ukraine’s involvement in the Russia hoax, their election meddling with the DNC, Biden’s involvement with the Burisma. — NOS4A2

He could have established more, or stricter, benchmarks and held up funding if they weren't met. There were, in fact, benchmarks and these were met in May. Do you surmise that Trump considered these inadequate? — Relativist

There are no explicit statements regarding benchmarks that I am aware of. — NOS4A2

OK, but the point is that going after Biden wasn't the only thing he could do about Ukraine corruption. A process was in place, and if he deemed this was inadequate he could have addressed it. He didn't. Which gets us back to this:

Do you agree that on the surface it looks bad to pursue the Bidens in this way, since Joe is a political opponent? — Relativist

No, I do not. — NOS4A2

Please expand on this by answering two questions:
1) are you saying it doesn't look bad to YOU, or do you feel that it shouldn't look bad to any reasonable person?
2) Under what circumstances is it OK for a President, acting as President, to push an investigation of a political opponent? For example, is it always OK? OK if there's an objectively good reason to think the opponent committed a crime? OK if he has hunch that the opponent committed a crime?

Trump has no jurisdiction in Ukraine so I do not see how he could actively battle corruption there — NOS4A2

He could have established more, or stricter, benchmarks and held up funding if they weren't met. There were, in fact, benchmarks and these were met in May. Do you surmise that Trump considered these inadequate?

— NOS4A2

Fiona Hill opined that the efforts to look into the Bidens was a "political errand." Was she lying? Was she simply mistaken? Is there no possibility she was right?

There is always a possibility she could be right. — Relativist

Ok, but you obviously do not believe she is right. So what's your take on it: Mistake? Lying? Something else?

I doubt this will change any minds:

The GAO has determined the administration violated the Impoundment Act.

This negates the claim that Trump committed no crimes. I suppose some might say the crime was committed by OMB, because they failed to defy Trump's order.

I would go further than presume he is innocent. I believe he has done nothing wrong, and more, I think he was right and obligated, morally and as a public servant of the country, to look into possible corruption between US and Ukrainian officials. — NOS4A2

Thanks, but I hope you can clarify a few things.

Do you agree that on the surface it looks bad to pursue the Bidens in this way, since Joe is a political opponent?

Fiona Hill opined that the efforts to look into the Bidens was a "political errand." Was she lying? Was she simply mistaken? Is there no possibility she was right?

Can you offer any evidence that Trump was actively battling corruption in Ukraine -other than the Biden matter - that predates the whistleblower complaint?

There was no wrong doing. — NOS4A2

You are aware there evidence of wrongdoing., right? Are you just saying the evidence is inadequate to meet some standard of burden of proof?

You started out critical of me for not basing my personal judgments on the legal standard. I think you came to accept that outside a courtroom, such personal judgments are reasonable as long as one remains open to reevaluating as more evidence is available. But given your initial reaction, I'm wondering if you are simply presuming Trump innocent (you labelled this a basic human right) because you feel he hasn't been proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Is that it?

Why are you calling the Senate trial a "show trial"? I'd have expected you to consider the Republican-led trial to be a REAL trial. If you think he's innocent of wrongdoing, a trial is a perfect opportunity to establish that.

Through art a man can look like a woman, and a woman can look like a man, but through no amount of surgery, hormones, clothing, cosmetics, and propaganda can a man become a woman, or a woman become a man. — Bitter Crank

Of course sex can be changed, but these changes would be wholly artificial. — NOS4A2

You're both right. If we define sex solely in terms of external anatomy, then certainly the sex can be changed. If we define it in terms of the presence or absence of a Y chromosome, then sex cannot be changed.

Is there a right answer to the definition? No -it's arbitrary. Perhaps we could say it's a societal definition. The problem with that is that society is not united in that regard.

Psychologically it can be understood why most people do not want to consider conspiracy theories seriously: because they do not want to believe that individuals more powerful than them are working against their interests. — leo

I don't think that's it. Sure, conspiracies occur, but "conspiracy theories" have a bad name because many people have a tendency to jump rashly to the conclusion that a conspiracy has occurred. Conspiracies are complex, and therefore there should be a considerable epistemic hurdle to justify belief in one. O.J. Simpson's attorney's proposed to his jury that the LAPD conspired to frame him. Of course it's possible, but consider how many people would have to be in on it and that 100% of them would have to keep it secret. Good epistemology calls for finding the simplest solution to a set of facts, and since conspiracies are complex - it's rare that a conspiracy would be the simplest solution.

Not wanting to believe something should not blind us, but the other side of the coin is confirmation bias: some people unjustifiably believe the world (or the rich) are out to get them. When examined more closely, that rarely seems to be the case.

The scenario is somewhat different, but this link provides a detailed, but fairly easy to understand explanation of the Twin Paradox.

In the Op, you said:

BUT many physicists DO believe that she doesn't have a well-defined current AGE when he is separated from her (at least if he has accelerated recently). THAT'S the conclusion that I can't accept philosophically: it seems to me that if she currently EXISTS right now, she must be DOING something right now, and if she is DOING something right now, she must be some specific AGE right now. So I conclude that her current age, according to him, can't be a meaningless concept. That puts me at odds with many other physicists. — Mike Fontenot

The animated charts in that link suggest to me that it's perfectly reasonable to consider there to be simultaneous points in time between the respective inertial frames (they can be mapped to one another), albeit that they proceed at a different pace.

God as the creator of spacetime cannot, by definition, be of spacetime (be of nature). — Devans99

...but we have no evidence of anything existing that is not part of spacetime, so you can't just assume it. Without evidence, it's merely a bare possibility - infinitesmal probability. So if we start with this question, we're done: no need to consider anything else. The fatal flaw in your argument is that it's a biased framework - choose questions that are loaded with biased assumptions.

As to whether God is made of some sort of material and whether he is complex or simple, I am not sure. — Devans99

If a material creator exists it's not God - because the same questions arise for the creator's material existence as for the universe's existence.

"Whether there was intent to create life is not relevant to the existence of a creator so this point does not belong in the probability analysis.
— Devans99
It is relevant to your fine-tuning argument because that argument treats life as a design objective. Aside from the context of my questions entirely, this defeats the fine-tuning argument you stated.
— Relativist

The meaning of life is surely information - more information of good quality results in a better life. This applies to us and God equally. Which contains more good quality information - a non-life supporting universe or a life supporting universe? It is the 2nd, and that is what a god would seek to create.

In addition, God is constrained by logic to being benevolent. That means given the choice between creating a non-life supporting universe and a life supporting universe, he would always take the 2nd path. — Devans99

You're interjecting your prior beliefs about God, which means you're reasoning is circular. My original point stands that your fine-tuning argument depends on the assumption that life is a design objective. Since that entails a designer, you are basically assuming God exists in order to prove he exists; i.e. it's circular.

I'm not trying to convince you God doesn't exist, I'm just trying to help you understand why "proofs" of his existence fail.

If you're seeking a rational reason to believe in God, consider reading Alvin Plantinga's book, "Warranted Christian Belief." It contains nothing that is persuasive to a nonbeliever, but it proposes a rational framework for believers.

2] Who says God is an unembodied mind? He may have a body. I do not know.
You can follow both possibilities, and consider the probabilities. If he's material, and performing acts - he's expending energy; if the material and energy of the universe "must" have been created, then this material, energy-expending "god" must have been created.
— Relativist

I think this question overlaps with question [1] so it is not right to consider it separately in the probability analysis. I also think you are assuming that God must follow your common experience of what applies within spacetime. God is from beyond spacetime so I not believe that temporal constraints such as energy expenditure would apply. We as humans are only familiar with a tiny fraction of what might exist and trying to say that everything in existence must follow the tiny fraction (of what we know) is a fallacy. — Devans99

If the supernatural exists, that makes certain things possible that are othewise impossible. If God is natural, it raises other questions - like energy conservation, what he's made of, how he came to exist....The point is that the question of God's existence is complex, and creating some yes/no questions to which you apply 50%probababilities cannot possibly be an objective approach - the specific questions chosen are subject to bias, and the probabilities attached are subjective.

We run simulations of the universe on our computers, so it is not even beyond our very limited abilities; why then should it be beyond God's? I think this is therefore 100% yes. — Devans99

We simulate gross behavior and get general results. This simulation entails modelling from a pre-big bang state to the formation of 1st generation stars, to 2nd generation star systems with the building blocks of life and the conditions for abiogenesis- and determining in advance what life would look like. More importantly, when we model physical systems, we are applying known science. Observing and determining how the world works is of negligible complexity compared to designing how the world will work, from the ground up.

Whether there was intent to create life is not relevant to the existence of a creator so this point does not belong in the probability analysis. — Devans99

Whether there was intent to create life is not relevant to the existence of a creator so this point does not belong in the probability analysis. — Devans99

It is relevant to your fine-tuning argument because that argument treats life as a design objective. Aside from the context of my questions entirely, this defeats the fine-tuning argument you stated.

1) Does the supernatural exist? (P=.5)
2) Can an unembodied mind exist? (P=,.5*.5)
3) Can material come into existence without prior material? (P=.5*.5*.5)
4) is it possible for a mind to plan something as complex as a universe? (P=.5*.5*.5*.5)
5) Was there an intent to create life? (P=.5*.5*.5*.5*.5)
— Relativist

[1] Is 100% IMO, spacetime is a creation, so 'super-spacetime' must exist — Devans99

You're allegedly proving the existence of a creator, so you can't assume it.

[2] Who says God is an unembodied mind? He may have a body. I do not know.

You can follow both possibilities, and consider the probabilities. If he's material, and performing acts - he's expending energy; if the material and energy of the universe "must" have been created, then this material, energy-expending "god" must have been created.

[3] Material could timelessly pre-exist the creation of spacetime. God could have used that in creation of the Big Bang

This implies he didn't create the universe, he just played a role in shaping it - but this raises other questions: can energy come into existence, violating conservation of energy?

[4] I think this is 100% yes. God might have done a few prototypes first

There is zero basis for your claim that it is possible.

[5] Is 100% IMO. What other motivation could he have?

Artistic pleasure; the joy of problem solving; scientific experiments to see what might result.

Your answers reveal your bias, and it demonstrates that your approach of applying the Principle of Indifference(POI) to carefully selected loaded questions also reflects bias. Compare this to a case where the POI is applicable, like coin flips: there is no alternative set of questions that leads to a different result.

Nice try but you just publicly stated why you assume his guilt, and did so while suppressing exculpatory evidence, dismissing the testimony of the accused and other witnesses with a hand wave while accepting as faith the testimony of the accusers. Believe it or not but there are strong reasons why this sort of reasoning is unacceptable in criminal trials. — NOS4A2

What exculpatory evidence did I dismiss? I made a point of listing the facts of which I'm aware, and invited you to provide additional facts. You didn't do that.

A “best explanation” may be plausible, but not necessarily correct, especially when these “facts” are derived from a one-sided, political show trial and not any sober and fair examination.

Very little in life is certain, but we adopt beliefs along the way on a pretty constant basis. As I said, we should always remain open-minded and be willing to revise our beliefs based on new evidence.

Show trial? Sure, sort of - in that the Democrats were making a show of presenting the facts that had been discovered. I invited you to challenge them, and/or raise additional ones. Instead, YOU played the same as the House Republicans: you failed to confront the facts and just dismissed them with a wave of the hand as being partisan - as you're continuing to do. All I see is you engaged in a genetic fallacy: you assume the facts are wrong because they were presented by Democrats.

Instead of making these after-the-fact charges about me, why don't you go back to the list of facts I posted, comment on them individually and directly, and provide additional facts that I overlooked. That is the sort of discussion I was looking for in the first place. If I merely wanted to engage in partisan bickering, I would have merely stated my opinion rather than providing the basis for it.

Likewise, considering your disdain for the president, I find it surprising you adopt his thinking. — NOS4A2

Nice try, but I noted the need to make an effort to understand all the available facts, whereas Trump clearly ignores evidence when making his accusations. Besides, it's one thing to make a private judgment and quite another to publicly defame someone with an accusation.

It is a good standard because one cannot correctly judge if another is guilty until it is proven. Assuming innocence could be wrong, of course, but it is at least just. Assuming guilt is unjust.

"Proof" is ambiguous: it can imply absolute certainty, or it could simply refer to the evidence at hand. I'm referring to justified belief, and it is reasonable to belief a hypothesis that best fits the evidence and can plausibly be considered more likely than not. Adopting beliefs doesn't entail closing ones mind: beliefs should be revised if additional facts change the initial conclusion.

As an example, I remind you that I presented a set of facts pertaining to Trump's Ukraine scandal. I explained that IMO, the best explanation for those facts was that he did something wrong. I invited your input. I did essentially the same thing in another forum. No one disputed the facts or offered additional ones. This seems a reasonable justification for my belief that Trump did something wrong. Wouldn't it be nice if Trump would do something like this?

But with the elephant, YOU are introducing evidence. Which is it - do we consider "evidence" when determining whether or not there's a "boolean sample space", or not? — Relativist

I think you have to be careful with the question selection, but certain questions can be said to be normally distributed (between yes and no): — Devans99

Sure- when we have prior knowledge of the probabilites, as in a coin toss. When else is it reasonable?

If applying the Principle of Indifference (that's what is called when you apply equal probabilities to a set of possibilities), to a yes/no question is reasonable then the order and mix of questions should result in the same conclusion. Let's test that with a different sequence of questions:
1) Does the supernatural exist? (P=.5)
2) Can an unembodied mind exist? (P=,.5*.5)
3) Can material come into existence without prior material? (P=.5*.5*.5)
4) is it possible for a mind to plan something as complex as a universe? (P=.5*.5*.5*.5)
5) Was there an intent to create life? (P=.5*.5*.5*.5*.5)

Clearly, this doesn't lead to the same conclusion as in YOUR questions. Are any of my questions unreasonable?

One school of thought is that he says that she is ageing more slowly than he is, on both the outbound leg and on the inbound leg, but that he concludes that she instantaneously ages by a large amount during the instantaneous turnaround. — Mike Fontenot

I don't understand why he concludes she is instantaneously aging by a large amount at that turnaround. Suppose the turnaround were not instantaneous, but rather there's an instantaneous stop , a 10 minute delay to turnaround, followed by an instantaneous acceleration back to near light speed.

Shouldn't he conclude that during that 10 period, they are aging at (pretty close to) the same rate? As we shorten the turnaround interval towards zero, the same-rate-aging period gets shorter, and at a zero turnaround - the same-rate-aging period is zero.

What am I missing?

But you have statistical evidence (common experience) that there are no elephants in your backyard. So the question does not have a boolean sample space; it is loaded with evidence towards 'no'.
. — Devans99

You're trying to have it both ways. First you said:

By showing that the 2 possibilities are not symmetrical, you are introducing evidence for/against the proposition. — Devans99

But with the elephant, YOU are introducing evidence for/against the proposition. Which is it - do we consider "evidence" when determining whether or not there's a "boolean sample space", or not?

By showing that the 2 possibilities are not symmetrical, you are introducing evidence for/against the proposition. I was assessing the proposition as 50%/50% - before introducing evidence for/against (as a separate step in the probability calculation). — Devans99

OK, let's treat what I said as evidence. The fact that you are ignoring this evidence demonstrates assymmetry and bias.

I think we can assume the probability space is normally distributed and so assign a 50%/50% chance of either. ... — Devans99

Normal distribution of 2 possibilities (creator, ~creator)? You're just restating your unsupported claim that we should consider these equally probable.

Like when we toss a coin 100 times, it comes out heads about 50% of the time.

Coin toss outcomes are symmetrical: each possibility is clearly of equal probability. We can't say that about the existence of a creator. Consider the possibility of an elephant in my backyard. There are exactly two possibilities (elephant, ~elephant), and (per your claims) we should ignore evidence (e.g. no elephants have been sighted in the vicnity), so that suggests we should consider the probabilty of an elephant in the backyard as 50%. That's silly.

That's laughable to call a presumption of innocence a "precious human right, considering your support for President who so frequently accuses people of crimes with little or no basis.

The presumption of innocence is a legal standard in a criminal trial. It's an appropriate standard for that, because of the consequences of conviction. That doesn't mean it's a good, general epistemic standard. Imagine being on the jury of an alleged child molester. You decide the evidence did not rise to the "beyond a reasonable doubt" level, and because of your decision he's acquitted. Would you consider hiring this person to babysit your children? Would you even want that person living nearby? If not, what became of your presumption of innocence?

We are within our epistemic rights to judge people on the basis of a preponderance of the evidence if we've made an effort to understand all the available facts.

Thanks for the insight. I agree there was a historical mistake made, but there's no changing that. Do you have any thoughts about a path forward? e.g. two-state? one-state?

The existence/non-existence of a creator is not symmetrically balanced. How likely is it that the supernatural exists?
— Relativist

You are loading the question with evidence. My approach is to start at 50%/50% for analysing an unknown boolean proposition and then adjust that estimate in light of evidence.In this case, I do not think you have valid evidence against a creator. Supernatural is a rather loaded word with all sorts of connotations to ghosts and unexplained phenomena. — Devans99

I didn't give you any evidence. I merely showed that the 2 possibilities you presented are not symmetrical. You're obsessing on exactly one of the items of complexity I mentioned (supernatural), but that's beside the point. The point is that there's no objective basis for assigning prior probabilities to the two possibilities you stated (creator vs ~creator); the POI cannot be applied.

Furthermore, this is false:

If there is a creator then there is a 100% chance he is interested in life. — Devans99

There could have been a creator completely indifferent to what his creation might eventually result in.

. Is the universe life supporting by chance? That seems very unlikely. A billion to one shot maybe. — Devans99

Consider a random number generator that generates numbers between 1 and a1 billion. The number 379,219,771 is generated. It's odds were 1 in a billion. Should we be suspicious that the generator was not truly random?

2. There is separately (say) a 50% chance of a creator. If there is a creator then there is a 100% chance he is interested in life. That gives the chances of a creator who is interested in life at 50%

The principle of indifference can only be applied when the probabilities are symmetrically balanced, as in the probability of a coin coming up heads or tails. The existence/non-existence of a creator is not symmetrically balanced. How likely is it that the supernatural exists? that intentionality can exist without a physical basis? that an intelligence is omniscient/omniscient (or at least sufficiently knowledgable and powerful) to act? I could go in, but the point is that the POI is not applicable.

So [2] is more likely than [1].[/quote]

I agree that if one assumes the universe is fine-tuned for life, this entails a fine-tuner. The problem is that you cannot show that the universe was likely to have been fine-tuned for life. Your unstated premise is that life was a design objective.
— Relativist

It is extremely unlikely for a randomly specified universe to support life. There are about 20 fine tuned constants that have to be at or near their current values for life to be supported. — Devans99

You're missing the point: you are implictly treating life as a design objective. Indeed, if the goal was to have life, the designer needed to carefully tune those parameters. But that doesn't prove life was a design objective. Low probability things happen all the time purely by chance.

But X in this case is life - the prime reason anyone would create a universe. — Devans99

Sure -IF someone created the universe, life is a plausible objective. But you can't assume a creator if you're trying to prove there's a creator.

There are 2 possibilities: 1)life was an unintended consequence of the universe's properties. 2) life was a design objective.

You haven't given a reason to think #2 is more likely than #1.

Is there a creator? is a boolean question. It has a unknown sample space so we have to assume a normal distribution (IE 50%/50%) before taking any evidence into account. — Devans99

That's nonsense. It's a naive use of the Principle of Indifference.

I think it is necessary that the two biological sexes have certain areas that are separated from each other. A transwoman may feel comfortable in a women's restroom, but this is unfortunately a violation of a standard safe space for women. — darthbarracuda

I agree with much of what you said, but take issue with the above.

I actually agree with the first sentence - it makes sense that women would like to feel safe in the restroom. However, the second sentence is a bit tricky. A biological male who dresses as a women would feel unsafe in a men's restroom - particularly if they look like males.

I've noticed that some places of business are putting in multiple single-person restrooms that anyone can use. This sort of thing seems to me the best solution for all considered.

I say he's a criminal. Does anyone say differently? (A simple question: it will be interesting to see who cannot or will not give an appropriately simple answer.) — tim wood

Criminal: A person who has committed a crime. (source)

This definition does not say that conviction is necessary, just that the person committed a crime. So the question becomes: is it reasonable to believe Trump has committed one or more crimes?

There's pretty strong evidence that Trump is guilty of multiple counts of the crime of obstruction of justice, so it's reasonable to consider him a criminal on this basis.

There's a good bit of evidence he's guilty of sex crimes (sexual harassment and/or rape) ( source). My impression is that there's more evidence of his guilt than there was for BIll Cosby - so it's reasonable to consider him a criminal on this basis as well.

There's evidence he's guilty of violating campaign finance laws with respect to Stormy Daniels. His lawyer pleaded guilty to this and provided some evidence of Trump's guilt. There may or may not be enough evidence for a criminal conviction, but we can justifiably consider him a criminal because the preponderance of evidence supports the view that he committed a crime.

He's certainly guilty of multiple counts defamation (source: his twitter feed), although that is not a criminal offense (it's a tort). He certainly deserves to be sued, but this is not a basis to consider him a criminal.

It's murky as to whether or not he can be considered a criminal for killing Suleimani. (See this).

1. The universe is fine tuned for life so there must be a fine tuner — Devans99

I agree that if one assumes the universe is fine-tuned for life, this entails a fine-tuner. The problem is that you cannot show that the universe was likely to have been fine-tuned for life. Your unstated premise is that life was a design objective.

Life exists as a consequence of the universe's properties. Had the properties differed, there would be no life. So what? Just because something exists does not mean it's existence was planned.

In general, suppose the universe had a different set of properties, and this resulted in objects of type X. The mere existence of X objects does not imply X objects were a design objective rather than merely being an unintended, accidental consequence.

Of course. But does that mean you never reach a point where you think the conclusions you’ve made are correct and you’ll act on them. Or do we sit around all day over a cup of tea agreeing to disagree. — Brett

Here's the statement of yours that I disagreed with:

The problem is that we have our own take on things and seek information that contributes to that view. There’s nothing wrong in that, unless you think that view is wrong, then the news source one has is either leftist or right wing. — Brett

I disagreed because it seems a wallowing in comfirmation bias. Now you suggest we might reach a point where one might think one's conclusions are correct. But that's the root of the problem.: we think we have correct conclusions, and we then only go to news sources that confirm them. A person who challenges his beliefs by seeking contrary views has a stronger epistemic basis for his opinions than someone who only seeks confirmation.

I agree its a different thing, but Trump still owns all the unintended consequences of what follows. It is part of the ledger upon which his actions will be judged by history.

But it is possible that this aircraft downing will actually have positive consequences - since Iranians are pretty pissed off that their government did this.

That does not follow, but if it's true - those other instances of inflation would not be detectable to us because they would be causally disconnected.
— Relativist

I do not believe they would be causally disconnected; they would be overlapping in time and space and there would be evidence of multiple instances of inflation. — Devans99

That's another big, convenient assumption. Why assume they should be causally connected (which just means they are detectable)? The fact that others have not been detected could mean there's just the one, or it could mean they are merely causally disconnected. You eliminate possibility #2 by assumption, and that's irrational - there's no basis for this, and so it simply sounds convenient.

I'll also add that even if there is but one inflationary landscape, that doesn't preclude the scenario I gave of inflation occurring from a high energy eigenstate, which results in the quantum collapse of the other eigenstates.

take issue with the notion of indirect responsibility though because it seems to be essentially hollow: perhaps a village or a town bears some abstract "responsibility" for a school shooter.

Ultimately, the responsibility falls on the perpetrator. And I'm not blaming iran for this one; I do believe it was an honest mistake. — BitconnectCarlos

Your point about indirect responsibility has some general merit, but not necessarily with Presidential actions that can have wide ranging consequences. History will judge his decisions based on the totality of consequences, whether they are intended or not - and that's how it should be. We don't yet know what will be the longer term total consequences, but this data point is clearly not in his favor.

Iran finally admits it shot down the jet. Incompetence. — NOS4A2

Sure, but it's an unintended consequence of the tense state of affairs Trump got us in. So although Iran is directly responsible, Trump bears indirect responsibility for heightening tensions.

Personally, I cannot force my reasoning mind to believe something, no matter what might happen. — Carolyn Young

Agreed. On another forum, I've pointed out that this is simply not the way beliefs are formed. I'll share the best rebuttal I received.

This depends on having a benign view of some religion, despite not believing it. The benign view entails seeing that this religion encourages moral behavior (ideally, consistent with Piaget). Keep your true beliefs to yourself and join them; become an active member - participate in doing good works for the community. Engage socially with the best among them.

This might result in your coming around to to their way of thinking. This actually IS consistent with the belief formation process - we humans have a tendency to think in ways consistent with those around us. We become influenced by the context: everyone around us is doing good things, motivated religious beliefs, and we're hearing their reasoning - which can be quite rational, even if the ultimate intellectual foundation of their religious belief is shaky. After all, how many of our beliefs about the world are truly a consequence of pure reason, rather than largely just accepting the worldview of those around us?

In terms of Pascal's wager, it means choosing a course (which is feasible) - not directly choosing to believe something (which doesn't work). This seems fairly reasonable. I really doubt this would work for me (an agnostic-deist), but it could potentially work for some.

I do not believe quantum fluctuations can give birth to a whole dimension (time). — Devans99

The potential for time would have to have been present in the initial state.

If what you describe happened naturally, then there would be many instances of it (inflation).
There is but one instance of inflation so it is not a naturally occurring event.

That does not follow, but if it's true - those other instances of inflation would not be detectable to us because they would be causally disconnected.

As I expected, you're coming up with assumptions that dismiss the non-preferred alternative. It's futile to try and show that God's non-existence is impossible, and many philosopher's of religion would agree with this. You'd be better off just striving to show that your belief is rational - I acknowledge that it MIGHT be, but it is NOT rational if if depends on proving the unprovable, as you're trying to do.

Unless you live without a view on things at all, or oddly enough believe you are wrong, what else can you do and why? — Brett

Of course we all have a worldview, but we're also fallible and I think we should value truth. You won't get to truth simply by seeking out reinforcement for what you already believe. One should challenge his own beliefs, and this is best done by seeking alternative perspectives and trying to understand them.

Haven't you ever been in a conversation with an individual with whom you disagree strongly about something that you have a lot of knowledge about - so you are certain they're wrong? Wouldn't it be nice if that other person would be receptive to hearing the actual facts? We've all been in that situation, and probably on both sides of it. Only if you're willing to be wrong will you be receptive to learning what the truth actually is.

The problem is that we have our own take on things and seek information that contributes to that view. There’s nothing wrong in that, unless you think that view is wrong, then the news source one has is either leftist or right wing. — Brett

I disagree. There IS something wrong with that. As individuals, it reinforces confirmation bias.