[OT] Do you believe in ghosts?

[Sodalis]

RyanL:
Besides, we already produced War and Peace, and we did it with much fewer monkeys and much less time.

they havent produced war and peace per se- but they reproduced parts of it using a classical conditioning of monkeys.

What they did was have ten monkeys look at the sentence and try and reproduce it. the monkey that came closest was rewarded. After like ten tries, they came like two letter off of reproducing the entire first sentence. they did this for a month and got the first chapter.

technically the monkeys were not typing randomly, but associate the keys with the symbols (letters) and so that sped up the process. they were reading and copying the book- not really typing randomly

But if this was completely random clicking of keys, it would take 32^bajillion years (depending on the number of characters in the book. counting 26 letter, space, return, comma, period, question mark, and quotation marks as characters) a page on average has 250 words, each word has average of 5 letters, so...

32^(5*250*#pages ) is the total probability that it will be reproduced at any given time given random clicking of keys...

 

[Wicht]

Interesting. Why is the Monkey Concept so hard to accept? If I write a program which randomly produces digits, it will most likely produce the first five decimal places of pi in a reasonably short time.

Because the Monkey concept ignores certain realities of probability. And your pi example is flawed because while a monkey might randomnly type out five letters in sequence that make sense, the probability of typing out a whole book is so improbable as to be impossible. Your program would for instance, to perform a similar task, (taking into account the fact there are only 10 numerical symbols and at least 40 symbols, including letters, numbers, periods, quotation marks, etc.) have to produce a number of pi that had four times as many symbols in it as the whole of War and Peace. It is simply not going to happen. Furthermore, it is generally accepted in probability that when a pattern shows evidence of design, it is not a random pattern.

However in the end it is a matter of faith. Those that accept evolution as fact have to accept by faith that anything is possible given enough time and those of us who believe in design don't.

 

[RyanL]

they havent produced war and peace per se- but they reproduced parts of it using a classical conditioning of monkeys.

What they did was have ten monkeys look at the sentence and try and reproduce it. the monkey that came closest was rewarded. After like ten tries, they came like two letter off of reproducing the entire first sentence. they did this for a month and got the first chapter.

technically the monkeys were not typing randomly, but associate the keys with the symbols (letters) and so that sped up the process. they were reading and copying the book- not really typing randomly

But if this was completely random clicking of keys, it would take 32^bajillion years (depending on the number of characters in the book. counting 26 letter, space, return, comma, period, question mark, and quotation marks as characters) a page on average has 250 words, each word has average of 5 letters, so...

32^(5*250*#pages ) is the total probability that it will be reproduced at any given time given random clicking of keys...

You're kidding? Someone actually tried it?

I thought I was making a clever reference to the human race.

 

[Sodalis]

actually, I think it was Shakespeare, and not War and Peace. But the same idea. Sit a couple of monkeys in a room long enough and they will produce works of art.

i was not sure what it was, but a smidgeon of a clue that it was shakespeare. When you said War and peace, i thought youknew about the experiment.

But yes- it was tried and they reproduced like the first chapter of whatever it was the Shakespeare wrote

And that does not mean i dont know what he wrote, but meaning that i dont remember what it was that was reproduced...

Besides, we already produced War and Peace, and we did it with much fewer monkeys and much less time.

and by monkeys, were you refering to humans? I went back and reread your post and that was the impression i got from your accentuated "monkeys".
Its actually true, a clever primate passed his genes fro a million generations until you see the person sitting before th emonitor today (if you believe in evolution...) and it was a random occurance- thus is the evolution of natural selection: random changes that bestow advantages for one individual over others...

So technically, nature is playing a cruel game of war and peace with us-

 

[enrious]

The evolution/monkey's writing Shakespeare is flawed because evolution removes mistakes. Were the monkeys to be punished everytime they pressed the wrong key for the next letter, they would be able to type up the works relatively quickly.

Anyway, I suggest anyone interested in learning about sleep paralysis pick up a book entitled, The Abduction Enigma or look at this article - http://www.csicop.org/si/9805/abduction.html

 

[kenjib]

Because the Monkey concept ignores certain realities of probability. And your pi example is flawed because while a monkey might randomnly type out five letters in sequence that make sense, the probability of typing out a whole book is so improbable as to be impossible. Your program would for instance, to perform a similar task, (taking into account the fact there are only 10 numerical symbols and at least 40 symbols, including letters, numbers, periods, quotation marks, etc.) have to produce a number of pi that had four times as many symbols in it as the whole of War and Peace. It is simply not going to happen. Furthermore, it is generally accepted in probability that when a pattern shows evidence of design, it is not a random pattern.

However in the end it is a matter of faith. Those that accept evolution as fact have to accept by faith that anything is possible given enough time and those of us who believe in design don't.

There is an additional serious error in the analogy as well. In the monkey example, there is a specific end result which we are expecting. It is precisely that expectation which makes the odds so unlikely.

However, with evolution, there is no end result or goal, therefore probabilities are entirely irrelevant. If things had happened differently, the state of life on Earth would be different from what it is now. There's nothing special about the genetic heritage of the human race and our current place in evolution.

What are the odds that life on Earth would exist in the form they are in now given the *exact* same conditions over time (including the history quantum irregularities)?

100%, since you would simply be describing history. Again, probabilities are irrelevant. People who accept evolution don't have to take on faith the notion that "anything is possible given enough time." They have to believe that what happened, happened, and if it hadn't happened something else would have. This is really not a very hard thing to believe.

I'm not saying that your viewpoint is wrong, only that you are misrepresenting the viewpoint you oppose.

 

[Rugger]

I love these kind of threads...it's amazing how creeped out one can get even sitting in an office cube under humming fluorescent lights....

I have one very distinct childhood memory that has never left me...and the one witness I had is now totally unreliable....


I was about 6 years old, and I remember waking up one night... and seeing a dark humanoid shape crawling above me, on the bottom of the bunk bed above me. I screamed at the top of my lungs, and my father ran in. He apparently saw what I did and yanked me off the bed, shouting at “it” to get out, to leave and not come back. After a few seconds it vanished. I spent the rest of the week sleeping with my parents.


Nowadays I am not sure exactly what to make of it. I have lots of evidence to go both ways: reality vs childhood fantasy.

-My father never told my mother about it...she looked at me funny when I mentioned it a few years ago.

-My father DID seem to remember it when I was 10 or 12 years old...but he clammed up. My folks got divorced when I was 10, and his memory has gone downhill since. If I ever asked him now, he would have NO idea, I’m sure.

-The fact that my mother never woke up always worried me...with two of us shouting, even a deep sleeper should have heard us.

-The memory of these events is one of the single most vivid childhood memories I have...very strange


There was an episode of the X-Files a few seasons back where a guy was the only one who could see a buzzing-shadowy figure crawling around his walls...and I'll tell ya what, it pulled up some major Deja Vu for me...

I definitely believe that there are forces out there beyond our perception...but what they are (religion, ghosts, aliens, whatever), I doubt we will ever know.

I have never had any other “odd” sightings...and I have visited a number of the most haunted places in eastern Pennsylvania over the years...it was something my high-school crew did for kicks way back when...


Keep the stories coming, folks!

-Rugger
“I lurk!”

 

[Wicht]

hehe - Kenjib - I was about to give you a lengthy response and then decided that it might be innapropriate for the forum. (moderators - you're welcome)

Kenjib, if you want to hear my response, email me.

 

[Rashak Mani]

No I DONT beleive or have met with Ghosts that I know of... some people are very white... but they seemed to be alive at the time I saw them.

 

[rampant insanity]

No I DONT beleive or have met with Ghosts that I know of... some people are very white... but they seemed to be alive at the time I saw them.

Not to be asinine, but "....I see white people...."

Anyways, I was mulling this over a cup of tea in the office yesterday when this idea struck me.

I remember distinctly someone mentioning the subjectivity of all "the sightings", and then I pondered, what if from time immemorial to our post-modern society, but we as people have just been calling them different things. Who the Norse called elves we may call grays. See what I'm getting at?

I haven't had the time (nor the true desire) to research, but hey let's just throw this out there.

Also as to monkeys......
Teaching monkeys to re-type Shakespeare's Hamlet (I think it was Hamlet), is not arguing one way or another for ID or Evolution. It's arguing for "we can teach monkeys to type".

However, I originally meant that if monkeys were locked in a room, and were free to do as monkeys pleased, without outside forces, then in the infinitude of time, a Russian novel would be produced.

While we're heading off on wild tangents, which did you like better? Hamlet or War & Peace? I personally prefer a beef roti with mild curry and a bottle of Sprite. No, Polymorph isn't broken.