What is it with Catholic Priests?

[Ben Kenobi]

It's amazing. I referenced the story of that Anderson guy in Virginia. To re-iterate, 11 years ago, as a young man, he was convicted for burglary. He served his time and is by all accounts rehabilitated. He is studying at George Mason University and worked for a political campaign. But he is barred from voting because he has speeding tickets from his time working as a courier.

You can't seriously say that this man, at 32 years old, should be barred from voting for the rest of his life for a crime he committed when he was 20.

He is barred from voting because of his break and enter. I don't honestly give a **** whether he works for a political campaign, or that he is studying at a university.

Has he tried to go back to the person that he hurt to try to make it right?

[Al B. Sure!]

He is barred from voting because of his break and enter. I don't honestly give a **** whether he works for a political campaign, or that he is studying at a university.

Has he tried to go back to the person that he hurt to try to make it right?

How is this relevant? Is he going to be able to vote just because he apologizes? An apology changes nothing.

[giblets]

Ben is employing fantastic reasoning, as usual. Why not life imprisonment for all crimes? If criminals don't like it they shouldn't commit crimes. The more draconian our punishments, the better.

[Ben Kenobi]

Blah blah... so what's your brilliant proposal that will revolutionize evolution in the same manner than quantum mechanics changed classical mechanics? Creationism?

God, you are thick.

Go reread the post and look up all the big words. What does non-deterministic mean? Why would it be a significant change from how we understand evolution today?

You act like a 'founder effect' or a population bottleneck wouldn't result in a beneficial mutation becoming more prominent in a population.

What makes a mutation 'beneficial'?

Why would the population bottleneck not accumulate detrimental mutations too?

Plenty of species encounter population bottlenecks prior to extinction.

[Ben Kenobi]

How is this relevant? Is he going to be able to vote just because he apologizes? An apology changes nothing.

I am starting to think you don't understand rehabilitation either.

Rehab doesn't mean that the criminal goes on to school, and works on a political campaign. Rehabilitation means that you have understood why what you did was wrong, how you hurt the other person, and why you must not do this again.

[giblets]

Go reread the post and look up all the big words. What does non-deterministic mean? Why would it be a significant change from how we understand evolution today?

It would be a significant change because it would be an abandonment of the scientific method. You can't make predictions if your idea isn't deterministic. But I'm not surprised you want everyone to just go back to saying "God did it" whenever they run into something they can't explain.

[Ben Kenobi]

Why not life imprisonment for all crimes? If criminals don't like it they shouldn't commit crimes. The more draconian our punishments, the better.

It's called proportionality. Look it up.

[Ming]

Gee... a catholic commits a sin, goes to confession, says a few Hail Mary's, and god forgives them on the spot.
But a young man who commits a felony, pays his debt to society, turns his life around, but shouldn't be allowed to vote again EVER!

Nice try Benny Boy... you are a worthless christian

[giblets]

It's called proportionality. Look it up.

Duh. There's no need to punish someone extra by taking away their vote if the prison sentence is already proportional to the crime.

[Ben Kenobi]

It would be a significant change because it would be an abandonment of the scientific method.

Hardly. It just means that the freight train doesn't pull out of the station and chug along to the destination like the standard model.

Radioactive decay is nondeterministic, in that we cannot predict which particular atom will decay, but over the entire sample, we can explain how the process works and make predictions.

Statistical mechanics works along this entire principle that we can make predictions for the whole sample, that cannot be broken down into smaller chunks.

You can't make predictions if your idea isn't deterministic. But I'm not surprised you want everyone to just go back to saying "God did it" whenever they run into something they can't explain.

I don't. I just want biologists to move on to the modern world.

[Al B. Sure!]

What makes a mutation 'beneficial'?

Why would the population bottleneck not accumulate detrimental mutations too?

Plenty of species encounter population bottlenecks prior to extinction.

They can accumulate detrimental mutations as well. Who said they can't? The problem is that if a mutation has a detrimental effect on an organism's ability to survive til procreation, it's obviously not getting much opportunity to spread its detrimental mutation in aggregate. And yes, if a species becomes maladapted for their environment, they'll die out.

[Ben Kenobi]

Duh. There's no need to punish someone extra by taking away their vote if the prison sentence is already proportional to the crime.

Part of the punishment for serious crimes like felonies is disenfranchisement. It's all one parcel. Oddly, I don't see anyone arguing that we should permit felons to own weapons.

Clearly people believe that the 14th is more important than the 2nd.

[Ben Kenobi]

Nice try Benny Boy... you are a worthless christian

Great.

How does your argument do anything to mine, in saying that the person who has sinned against someone ought to do restitution to them?

[giblets]

Hardly. It just means that the freight train doesn't pull out of the station and chug along to the destination like the standard model.

Radioactive decay is nondeterministic, in that we cannot predict which particular atom will decay, but over the entire sample, we can explain how the process works and make predictions.

Statistical mechanics works along this entire principle that we can make predictions for the whole sample, that cannot be broken down into smaller chunks.

Radioactive decay is deterministic on a macroscopic level.

I don't. I just want biologists to move on to the modern world.

Uhh, what?

[Ben Kenobi]

They can accumulate detrimental mutations as well. Who said they can't? The problem is that if a mutation has a detrimental effect on an organism's ability to survive til procreation, it's obviously not getting much opportunity to spread its detrimental mutation in aggregate. And yes, if a species becomes maladapted for their environment, they'll die out.

This is a statistical mechanics problem. Sufficiently large samples will trend to the mean, and to an equitable distribution.

Small samples will see clustering and clumping. This clustering and clumping is both beneficial and detrimental. The clumping as a whole is neutral.

If the bottleneck is sufficiently small, then the population will not recover, irrespective of the 'beneficial' or 'detrimental' adaptations.

If the distribution is sufficiently clumped, they will not recover either. It's all a dice roll. If they keep rolling snake eyes, then populations larger than what we would expect would die out. If they acquire a sufficiently equitable distribution, then they will survive on fewer numbers.

So rather then saying that the distribution accumulated beneficial mutations, it's better to say that the distribution remained relatively flat and even despite small numbers.