Why is there something instead of nothing?

Original Question from Yahoo Answers

Anything which is infinite, by the very nature of the concept becomes all things, as an infinite variety of apples includes at least one that is an orange and one that is an orangutan etc.. So an infinite amount of nothing eventually becomes something. 

Atheists do not so much have an argument with the existence of God as they do with the existence of infinity because if anything is infinite unicorns can fly. Infinitude opens the door to gods and monsters but the people who so love the Big Bang that they cannot say "theory" behind it want only one kind of unicorn in the universe - the creating singularity. If you are going to accept something so bizzare as the Big Bang (and Hubble and other long range pictures of the universe confirm it) why not go whole hog and imagine a multiverse where all of the other potential universes are NON-EXISTENCE and our little play gets to be real in REACTION to those shadow plays?

Potential particles rule the atom and the infinite nada rules us.

Old Man Infinity and Ms. Nada

What created the universe?
(The original question)


The universe is a result of a surfeit of non-existence. Think of it as a old married couple. Old infinity is the man, and non-existence is his wife. When you breed infinity with non-existence you get reality. Pretend instead of non-existence, you pair infinity with an apple. You get an infinite variety of apples, including red ones, green ones, blue ones, ultra-violet ones, square apples, tubular apples, apples that look like umbrellas, apples that TASTE like umbrellas, follow this list infinitely and you get the whole multiverse. You can do the same thing with non-existence; when you run out of all the non-existent types of non-existence you start to get all the existent types of non-existence, which is what I call the surfeit of non-existence.

The question is, do you believe in the infinite, and that my friend (unfortunately for you) is the God question again

The Creation Story (again)

The Original Question: Can infinite regress be applied to anything?

Infinite regression only applies to things which are infinite. I am a believer in God, but I agree with Dawkins that infinite regression - as I understand it, which is called eternal recurrence - applies to God. That which goes on forever loses all character and becomes a gray melange, everything and nothing, EXCEPT FOR ITS FINITE PARTS. So an infinite thing is no thing (nonexistence) and the surfeit of an infinite nonexistence is EXISTENCE (if something is infinite it becomes all possible - and impossible, versions of itself (which is exactly the infinite regression problem) so that the very thing that he uses to demand there be no creator DEMANDS a universe CREATED OUT OF NOTHING. 

We, those things that exist, are the absurd tip of non-existence, which is a vast ghost ship, as it were, of all our nonexistent potentials; in other words - God. 

God is above mere existence and is not the pantheist's delusion but more than everything and nothing COMBINED.

What is your personal philosophy of the universe?

The Original Question

The universe is a surfeit of non-existence. God swallows the flame ball of eternal recurrence for us and we serve as the valve that allows God to be discrete (meaningfully finite.) Man's finite and imperfect idea of God is our greatest gift to our creator. 

We live, like our creator as disembodied spirits, consciousness without color or shape, tied to a concrete body that identifies and serves us. Our body is our greatest asset. It allows us to be specific things. Limitations make us whole.

Our mind includes a conscience (usually) and an ability to identify patterns, (reason.) Life is meant to be lived, despite the relative misery that comes from the brevity of physical pleasures. Pleasures of the mind are more durable, but everything is an exercise, to be played with dignity and skill, like a game. In the end we go back to that dreaded infinity.  

The formula for beautiful life is finite from left to right and infinite from top to bottom. As Oscar Wilde said, we are all in the gutter but some of us are staring at the stars. 

Thank you for asking the question. I wish someone were able to figure out what I am taking about.

More refuting "theories" of creation

How can atheist live in a world created for no reason?
See the original question

I resent the idea you start with that a degree makes you worthy of discussion and my lack of one devalues my opinion. As a non-atheist, you make a strong case for the atheist BY USING THEIR TACTICS. 

If everyone who knows science better than me is a better judge then your opinion is an outlier and I should ignore it and go with the statistically more consistent answers.

Contradictions in particle physics and the disconnect with the theory of gravity give string theory and the multiverse traction, which by your logic is worthless (which also throws out the unprovable creative intelligence theory.) So rather than trying to use minimalism and reductionism to defeat well accepted theories, why not admit that if God is a cubit or a Higgs particle it diminishes God and your minimalism and disdain for theories is much more atheistic than anything you are arguing against. I believe God can only be encountered by faith and those who wrap God in "theory" are swindlers or fools. Which are you?

If you woke up one day as an atheist,,,

The Original Question (from Yahoo Answers)

I am not a Christian, but I find the people whom I know that are atheists are angrier and distrust a universe that coincidentally gave them a perfect environment to live in and supermarkets filled with food. 

They seem to have a Somali pirate mindset in a Disneyland environment.

It is worth maybe being delusional just to be less paranoid. What I would do differently if I were an atheist, is I would not rely on that part of my brain that is hardwired for faith (which apparently gave my ancestors an evolutionary advantage) and I would say "it's just you, no one or nothing else is going to help you, care about you or even leave you alone in peace." It is not faith in God my atheist would be lacking but faith in his fellow humans. 

If I thought other people's spiritual (moral) instincts were valid I would not need to question their faith and I would be an agnostic and a friend to faith rather than an enemy and parser of the values of others.

Addendum to Perils of Twitter

con·flate: \kən-ˈflāt\ verb

From Latin conflatus, past participle of conflare to blow together, fuse, from com- + flare to blow — more at blow

Date: 1610

transitive verb

1 a:  to bring together, fuse; 1b: confuse;  2: to combine (as two readings of a text) into a composite whole.

So in response to my asking why are you conflating ISIS with all of Islam (or in my exaggeration with the black community as well) my friend replies "I am sorry to disappoint you but I just hate them."

Who are THEM?

Hate ISIS? Sure. Hate all of Islam? Stop using math and science then (oh wait, I take that back, they will be banning higher math and science next) Hate the fact that the liberal media gives some blacks a pass on violence? Reinstitute Jim Crow Laws, and don't allow them out after dark. I mean after all, conflating a criminal group with a whole community (or in the case of Islam about 20 communities) is an appropriate response and a MEASURED RESPONSE is just a sign of weakness.

I have discovered first hand what I already knew about the left (that they cannot hear anything but their own side,) is equally true of the right. 

So Twitter away, reinforcing what you already believe and damning language with your nonsense shorthand. I'm done.

It's just with society polarizing and speaking different languages, I am left (right of center) with nobody to talk to.

But I will be voting for Hillary Clinton I assure you. Nixon was the last free president (free of the IMF that is) and Clinton was the last SANE president. I'm gonna get in my time machine I vote for the Clintons (as I never did in the nineties) and see if maybe they will bring some sanity back.

As the divide between left and right becomes a chasm, Russia, and other petty dictators around the world are smiling (and killing babies, but the media is only hyping ISIS.)

The Perils of Twitter

The Perils of Twitter
By Happy Hiram 

Okay so I am sitting here with my phone service stalling as it always seems to be when I am not on the highway somewhere, thinking about the state that the idiocy of Twitter has gotten me into.

First, why bother then? My friends and I have a normal interchange and then I go on twitter and they say things that they would never dream of passing off in any other form of communication. So I feel compelled to respond... And then I get stuck on the stupid format.

My friend, my reasonable friend, retweets things that say "Islam is a violent religion" and site ISIS as an exemplar. I wish I could find the sequence of posts but twitter is like the Atlantic Ocean and each post is like that one hypodermic swimming around. You respond to being poked and the poke and response end up on opposite ends of the coast.

Anyway I respond by saying "ISIS and Islam do not equate." Except somehow I can't fit equate in 140 characters (after all the names of the retweeters) so it goes in as = WHICH IS NOT THE SAME THING. It's okay, they'll tell ya, its Twitter shorthand. No, it is not okay to sacrifice sense to mere speech. That is why I am responding in the first place. Because what was SAID was ridiculous IF MEANT, but of course when you separate MEANING from communication you don't have any IDEA what was meant. 

So my friend replies "I take ISIS at their word. WTF does that have to do with the question? How do you functionally say "what you are saying is a non-sequitur and has no merit to the subject at hand which is that the conflation of a hate group with a WHOLE SERIES of cultures makes the respondent a hate group instead of just having an opinion." Even if you could BASTARDIZE that into 140 wrds you have to take out for the names you are RESPONDING TO.

So then my friend retweets "a white person is 250% more likely to get assaulted by a black person than a black person by a white."

If I have eight friends and one of them is a red-head, if I swing a cat and throw it I have a slim chance of hitting a red-head. If HE SWINGS a cat at US, he has a 100% chance of hitting a non-redhead. That alone makes him 12 times more likely to hit me. Black on black crime is higher than black on white crime, so see, poverty and ghettoization WORKS! Add the super high rate of drugs in the ghetto and you have a formula for 250%.

On average, most black Americans have less wealth than white Americans. So I post that I should have been robbing poor people instead of people with money because I was messing the statistics up completely.

No response. Is that good or bad? How do I know if anybody even read what I wrote? On blogger I get stats. On twitter I get piecemeal promos like "7 people were interested in your tweet" Six months from now that seven number will be meaningless. I won't even know what week it was.

So in response to the ISIS "take them at their word" canard I reply "ISIS is not Islam" to which I get "They say they are... I'll take them at their word."

To which I reply, "The Black Panthers say they represent the black community, so does that make all blacks black panthers?"

Now, I know my friend, he is a good guy, not out to entrap me or make me look foolish or anything. He responds: "if you said all black panthers were black, I'd agree with you..."

Does he mean:

A) you wrote your argument wrong ways round (ignorance?)

B) I am willfully pretending to not understand you (arrogance? Not really his style) 

C), well, I can't really think of a C. The point is that now I don't know if I am being fucked with or my smart friend can't read.

So I respond "saying 'all A's are B' is not the same as saying 'all B's are A' but by the time I mangle that into a tweet it has lost all sense of meaning.

"I don't know what you are saying." He replies. Wow, you think?

I reply (of course you can't cut and paste out of the twitter app so this is long form) "'If Nation of Islam members are black and ISIS represents Islam, then all black people are terrorists' is the kind of logic you are proposing." You can just imagine how distorted THAT gets in 140 (minus the sendees) wrds.

So is communication by twitter possible? I think not. I mean who is ever gonna read this article? It has WAY MORE THAN 140 CHARACTERS!

The response will quote where I am misquoting (due to lack of access) the original tweets, or their sequence. Well I can't ACCESS the original tweets nor copy them if I could. So if you think I am somehow wrong, it is twitters fault again. Don't blame me. 

The Nature of Humor?

The Question:
Is it impossible to be FUNNY and KIND?

Funny AND kind?

My Answer:

Humor, even from the classic comedians is based on aggression and psychic disturbance. Some commenters confuse "clean" comedy with "kind" comedy but all humor is based in inequity and anger. The trouble is that inequity and anger are real, so that someone who is going to deny other people's suffering, deny inequity and deny the right to call those things out is not being gentle to me, they are selling me out. I personally think the whole range of human emotion is appropriate and that can never be fair or painless to those around us. So I have the choice between being kind or true. I don't want people who are being nice to me. I want people to be real. So I guess I am pro-comedy and anti-golden rule. If a person can't be true to their own experiences what good are they to me?

One Appeal and One Answer

My Appeal to YA! for my removed question:

Which is worse, saying the truth, or giving every idiot with a grudge the right to bury questions, remove them and write slurs and insults anonymously (so that you can't block them.) You are encouraging bad behavior because it causes Stockholm Syndrome and ties users more closely to YA! 

So you can no longer hide behind the bad behavior of a few. YA! has now industrialized it.

The Removed Question:

"Is YA! actually trying to facilitate troll behavior with their new policies?"

Another person's Question:

"How would one behave after being tortured?

Happy Hiram answered just now:

Well let see:

You try and go about the room being yourself, but every utterance or move you think is going to be slammed down or intentially distorted and misinterpreted. You spend an inordinate amount of time studing those who have captured you to the extent that you understand their motives better than they do. You find yourself imitating their

strategies (in order to regain some semblance of self-power) and

agreeing with thier motives to the point where you become in effect,

your own enemy (see Stockholm Syndrome in wikipedia for the details.)

Eventually you live in the abuse and violence of your attackers which

is exactly the point of allowing them to do this to you. You become

addicted to the place of abuse.

At least that is how I experience Yahoo Answers.

What was the question again?

Everything I ask or answer in Yahoo Poetry gets violated

My Appeal to Yahoo Answers:

1) it is not against Yahoo guidelines to ask help locating a poem.
2) almost* every question or answer I have done in yahoo poetry in the last three months has been reported because your "trusted members" want to blackball me.
3)*They have left two of my questions up and the REPORT ANYONE WHO ANSWERS THEM (to give me a bad reputation) and THEN they will report ALL of my questions and answers.

If Yahoo is unable to deal with this (or even offer a COMPLAINTS department to take it up with) then why are you in the Internet business?


The question on Yahoo Answers was reported and deleted by one or more trusted members of the Answers community:

"My friend wrote a poem?"

-------------
My three questions for yahoo:
A) why don't you monitor your own damned site?
B) why doesn't it say "having problems? Call here: _____ 
C) how does the money work when you lose all the users?

The Left's Secret Weapon

27% of Americans are self-identified Republican, 31% Democrats. That leaves 44% of Americans in the middle. I guarantee you there are very very few Americans who are against the parties because they are not extreme enough. So what do the parties do?

While Elizabeth Warren called murder a "vague moral objection*" Hillary says her favorite book is the bible. The tea party ousts any republican candidate that can't pass the lunacy test. So who is the independent voter going to vote for? The answer is the democrats. 

Most voters would rather be thought of as stupid rather than unamerican. It's that simple folks.

You can have your ideological purity your House of Representatives and your pride OR you can think about being a party that gives a shit about the 44% who have no voice: the hawks who are *pro-choice; the people who are against gun control AND the death penalty; the folks who support tougher borders AND immigration reform; who want equal rights for gays AND Christians (like prayer in schools.)

But noooo the tea party finds those voters suspect. Is the Democratic Party going to compromise on any of those things? No. Are they going to get those votes? Yes. Because they tell these folks their opinion is stupid, self-defeating or ignorant whereas the right will tell them they are in a cultural war where any deviation of opinion marks defeat. 

THAT is the left's best weapon.

Thank You Yahoo for Banning me!

Edit: Apparently I am not banned from Yahoo, someone hacked the parental controls on my phone (long distance) and blocked the site. Still, enjoy the rant below that was.

Many years ago, I discovered a fun web site called Yahoo Chat. I spoke with strangers from all over the country in a jumbled free-for-all that was annoying, joyful and spontaneous. After a while pre-teens took over the site with  their outrageous sexual remarks (designed to scare off us adults) and their anger and nihilism. Then one day, chat went away, rolled over into messenger in some manner incomprehensible to adults. 

Every once in a while I would go back to Yahoo looking for Chat but it was never there. One day I stumbled upon answers. It was stilted and pretending to not be a chat site (with some indecipherable guidelines that nobody really understood) but it was a way to talk to people around the world about common interests. 

But soon it was all about trolls. Trolls who insult you and call you malicious names (which mostly reflect on their own sins) and report your questions which makes them "trusted members" in Yahoo and gain status. Eventually this led to my account being frozen out of Yahoo. Friends urged me to just open a new account - or four. I took the first step towards troll-dom.

Several lost accounts and several upgrades of Answers, from a friendly site to an ugly box filled with inane questions and now when I click on Answers - nothing. They have blocked me out.

All I can say is thank you. Answers was becoming such a misery that I feel I have been liberated. 

Dear friends, if you hear bad things about me there, please set their readers straight.

Be well, friends and trolls alike, and see you around the Internet.

Happy Hiram

Allen West: Voice of Reason?

A Moderate Conservative Responds to Allen West's 5 questions (for the progressive liberals, since I can't find any to respond.)

Here is the original article:

http://allenwestrepublic.com

Question 1) 450 billion of the 900 billion requested TARP money was APPROVED UNDER Bush and a lesser amount was disbursed under Obama. I would love to be able to congratulate Bush on preventing "The Great Depression II" but they did the whole thing under pressure from the incoming administration so as to not look like another Warren G. Harding. They figured you'd blame the whole thing on Obama anyhow, which you are, missing the point: the trillions spent on the Iraq War is why progressives call Bush un-American, but much less loudly now that their guy spent an equal amount. So whatever you are going on about it is confused and not helpful. Half of the national debt payments go to Europe to fund the world bank, an arrangement which has been in place since WWII and which if we didn't owe them, as ALL member nations do, they would consider us a renegade like Iran and put embargoes and other restrictions on us. Please pay off the national debt so I can have a world war on home soil.

2. How many men were left behind in Vietnam comparatively. We all grew up knowing MIA's and now you are going to pretend that war is not like that? Shame on you. Men get left behind in war. Saying "we leave no man behind" is supposed to bolster the troops, not fool them.  Illegal immigration is a different issue.

3. Obama did not promise lower gas prices as a result of the Iraq war. Progressives and Liberals all have electric cars anyway.

4. If Nixon resigned over being threatened with Impeachment why doesn't Congress find something to impeach Obama over? Because it isn't there.

5. The fact that you don't say "Millhouse Nixon" and your Sotero remark make their case. If you can't make an argument without fear-mongering then you have already lost the argument.

Terrible terrible points every one. We used to spend the whole page arguing against Obamacare but arguments on the right seem to not be about issues but about fear-baiting. The left is no better, so does that justify this garbage?

Peter is reporting again

He is calling himself the best post in YAP again and when I disagreed he reported it.

Now he reports this old gem, an answer to Love Child:

After The Beginning of The End

He followed a shadow, to hear it 

his path crossed those with spirit 

Patches of light in the dog-eared vine 

Till he was giddy with muse's wine. 

The fakers threatened, the timid thrashed 

paranoia wound its circular cast; 

but a home it was nevertheless. 

Encouraged, inspired and blessed 

as music stirred insipid nights, 

it wasnt his, it wasnt right, 

so curtains fell, the play was done 

The middling spell became unspun 

The marching band refused to yield 

No rosy dawn was e'er revealed. 

Just a dead commercial site 

a fading smile and endless night.

This is about Yahoo Poetry becoming crap. Aside from the dastardly format, whom do we have to blame: good old Peter Benoit, report hound terrible poet and shifty friend to those foolish enough to befriend him.(Gene).

An apology (sort of)

I was in the bagel shop this morning and I ran into a friend. He mock cut in line in front of me and as I said "Hey!" he turned around and laughed. In this very busy bagel shop, people wait on a line ten or more people long, but they have maybe eight servers, so they get through the line quickly (another ten customers turn up real quick though.)

My friend and I were talking about how some folks, when they place their orders, continue to stand in the way of the line instead of stepping aside, until the line ends up running well out of the door whether in the rain or snow or shine. My friend said, "I used to try and correct people, but they never want to hear it and it just ends up ruining my peace of mind, and getting into altercations."

I agreed and said, "Yeah I stopped playing cop in here a long time ago. But I still play cop out on the internet."

That's when it struck me that I need to be spending much less time wrangling about other people's behavior and focus instead on what I have to say in Yahoo Philosophy. I have gotten quite hot an bothered about some people's inability to take advice OR EVEN JUST ACKNOWLEDGE THAT THEY HEARD IT. But all of that is frankly NONE OF MY BUSINESS.

So in the light of this, I want to apologize to Breezy Seven and Lorry Five Aussie Lily for not minding my own business and for the pile of things I have said about you both in anger. I want to extend that to others I have jumped on in my misguided attempts to play internet cop, but I will list a certain number of exceptions to the above (this part is the sort of):

I do not nor do I plan to apologize for defending myself from:

Peter Benoit

Pseudo-Thomas 7 (Which is really Peter anyway)

Gene Bourne (Who is Peter's plaything )

Caz and Lapiz Domino (Whom I have nothing against but I never instigated those conflicts)

and Elysabeth (With whom I never instigated the conflict.)

Also on my not apology list is Daniell who threatened me.

That being said, I will attempt, I am sure miserably, to stop focusing on the failings of others (unless they seem to be asking for that advice,)

Happy Hiram

PS: I would ask Lorry Five to please keep my account blocked as despite my apology, I doubt we will ever have anything civil to say to one another. I wish you happiness and peace, especially peace from me.

Are my trolls working for the philosophy Pollyannas or is it a coincidence that my most legitimate BA's are under attack?

My appeal to Yahoo for my latest question violated:

I answered this question described what they were doing well in intricate detail, praised the questioner and got best answer for it. I have three appeals for obviously acceptable answers that were reported and have gone days with no response. That fact that envy-trolls know when they can report proper questions and the system is down so they will stand points to the fact that those who make Answers impossibly subjective and abusive either work for Yahoo or are in collusion with employees. This question is as appropriate as any question could be, and allowing it to be reported constitutes Yahoo endorsing a bullying culture.

Hello Happy Hiram,

The answer on Yahoo Answers was reported and deleted by one or more trusted members of the Answers community:

"The compressed energy of this is amazingly well served by the paragraph form. I find it chilling and accurate. Nice to see you. You seem to shine always at my dark hour."

Peace, love and communication liars

[Edit: I do not per se remove old posts as I consider this my internet personal history book, I have apologized for the conflict with Lorry 5 and Breezy 7 and so I ask any readers to take this and the related posts with a huge grain of salt. They speak to my poor behavior as much or more than anyone else's. See the apology: http://hiramsrants.blogspot.com/2014/05/an-apology-sort-of.html ]

Well obviously there is no negotiating with people who say they want to hear all sides and believe in peace love and dialog.

At least Breezy managed to try and talk to me. But Lorry Five apparently means nothing she says she stands for.

Oh well, I will close my email and block her again.

Cest la guerre!

http://hiramsrants.blogspot.com/2014/04/peace-pact.html

Pseudo-Thomas

Thomas and I were friends. The troll squad in poetry drove him out of yahoo. Someone came back pretending to be him (but not responding to my emails.) the answers he posts below (from philosophy) include their own self-contradictions.

Thomas says:

I put others ahead of myself no matter what, even those who try to bring 

me down. Even those I may have had as a contact and get questioned 

for it, and suspected. I can't help that. The bible teaches us to love our 

neighbor, not to pick and chose. 

If those who dislike me or make fun, or blog lies about me without a shred 

of evidence would simply communicate with me, they might find I am a 

decent, caring man. A lot of it is I follow Jesus, so that suddenly makes 

me a racist or a suspect at least. I push it on no one, but wear my faith 

on my sleeve, . Do nothing out of boast but only for God's glory, 

and if I am wrong, I will promptly admit it and say "I am sorry." 

If no love from anyone is returned, I cannot control it. 

And Thomas says:

Lorry

Wisdom is the ability to be able to discern between a person who tries
to tear a person down (the hapless one*) without evidence or anything
substantive,

versus

A person who clearly puts others ahead of themselves and lifts others up
with encouragement (hugs) and admonishment if needed, but in a loving
way and not leaving the other person worse off than before you entered
into their space.

This will get deleted, but this idiot has me blocked, libels me with his web
site, that deserves to be sued, but hardly anyone reads it, and has no
ability to communicate direct with folks. He hides behind the internet, and
his MO is to hurt others. Well, not me. IMO he needs Jesus Christ badly,
but relies on his own self-will.

*The Hapless one is the name given to me by the people who drove the REAL Thomas out. This one quotes my use of the term Stockholm Syndrome with one hand and criticizes me while saying he will not do so AT THE SAME TIME.

[ A note to Peachy: Nobody reads these blogs. I post them to keep track of the drama in YA! In the past, the troublemakers have managed to fool me twice because I forgot what went down. 

Ironically, although I have less than a thousand readers in two years, but my poetry and that of others, and my raves blog talking about positive things and my pics of Halloween decorations or my garden get no views whereas the small number if readers I get all want to read THIS crap.]

Peace Pact???

[Edit: I do not per se remove old posts as I consider this my internet personal history book, I have apologized for the conflict with Lorry 5 and Breezy 7 and so I ask any readers to take this and the related posts with a huge grain of salt. They speak to my poor behavior as much or more than anyone else's. See the apology: http://hiramsrants.blogspot.com/2014/05/an-apology-sort-of.html ]

I would like to propose a peace pact between those who want to control Yahoo philosophy for their little (((thugs))) and myself. 

Acknowledge, in Yahoo Philosophy, that you really do understand that spamming the page with questions is offensive. 

That is all I want. I am not foolish enough to think I can turn a mob all by myself.

I just want you to admit you started this mess by your misbehavior.

I don't care to hear more defenses of what you know is wrong.

Also, since Lorry Five "Aussie" Lily claims to want to hear all views and that discussion can solve anything then WRITE TO ME, TALK TO ME and let's sincerely discuss this mess. Or keep trying to prove that sincerity can be proven in the forum of public opinion.