Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 286 posts

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#201

Post by haberman »

LeafStorm wrote: post #147
haberman wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" Then Jesus told him, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." --John 20:29 This verse has always struck me as directly anti-science.

In this specific context, Jesus was talking to Thomas - though the other apostles had told Thomas that Jesus had returned, Thomas did not believe until Jesus came to him personally. So the verse isn't promoting "blind faith," it's criticizing those who insist on a direct revelation before being willing to accept the truth. I don't think it really applies to science (at least not empirical science), and it is definite…

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. If a bunch of disciples of a religious figure claimed that he had risen from the dead, is it really the virtuous thing to accept these claims without any evidence?

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#202

Post by andrewflnr »

burgerbrain wrote: post #186
andrewflnr wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean no offense, but that's probably because you're not religious. But most of us have had experiences we interpret as God having taken care of us, and instances where even when we suffered pain, it seems like someone was looking out for us and making sure stuff turned out well. I phrase this conservatively because I'm aware of the possibility of assigning motive to events that were actually "happenstance", assumin…

"I mean no offense, but that's probably because you're not religious." I was. Believe me, I was.... Anyway, if you ask someone "How do you know god exists?" and they respond "Because I have faith." or whatever, they are not using the "assurance based on a reliable track record." definition. Prior track record of what? God existing? In actuality , people use faith to describe the reason they believe in things despite…

> Prior track record of what? God existing?

Prior track record of his doing things in their life. My point wasn't the greek word, but that most people believe they have evidence of God's actions. I guess I may have overreached a bit, but I don't hear "just because" answers very often.

> When they believe that they have "evidence" the answer to the question tends to be something along the lines of "I _know_ that god exists because...".

Whether that's valid depends on what's in the ellipsis.

As for believing in spite of evidence, all I can say is that that's not what religious faith is supposed to be. The Bible tells us to be able to give reasons for our faith (1 Peter 3:15), and that it's useless unless backed up by actions (James 2:14). However, I have noticed that sometimes expecting Christians to pay attention to the bible is a foolish assumption...

My working definition for a while has been believing/acting on what you know to be true even when it feels or seems like it's not true, or when it's hard to act on it. It's about the same kind of faith that keeps me basically sane while tracking down a heisenbug in a program: faith that despite what it seems like, the computer really is behaving in some consistent way. Similar is the faith of a scientist that weird behavior will eventually be explainable by rational means, like that neutrinos going FTL will have some mundane explanation. Sometimes it seems like there's contradictory evidence, but if you stick it out it turns out ok.

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#203

Post by TheCowboy »

mostlyListening wrote: post #192

So if SOPA fails to pass and stops being an issue, will that boycott end or will it continue? Going by PG's reasoning (If these companies are so clueless about technology that they think SOPA is a good idea, how could they be good investors?") then it should continue until there are major changes the leaderships of those companies. Right?

That's a good question, and tough one to figure out. This applies to anyone who wants to deprive these companies of their support.

From my perspective, these attempts will not stop, and will take on new forms of bills. We have had to deal with bad bills since during the Clinton administration/Republican-controlled congress.

Some people call for 'Internet freedom' laws, but what is stopping the next congressional class from weakening or negating these laws without amending the Constitution?

My own view is that it will take a long time for these attempts to cease. Worst case, efforts will peter out until the generation who did not grow up with the Internet are no longer with us.

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#206

Post by bambax »

PG is quoted in the article as saying ”I don’t know exactly which companies had people on the list. But I know which will now: none of them.”

That's fine and admirable, but on the practical side, if he doesn't know who's who, how is he going to enforce this rule?

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#207

Post by Flenser »

bambax wrote: post #206

PG is quoted in the article as saying ”I don’t know exactly which companies had people on the list. But I know which will now: none of them.” That's fine and admirable, but on the practical side, if he doesn't know who's who, how is he going to enforce this rule?

From the article:

Graham told me in a followup email that he was indeed serious and had just given the list of SOPA supporters to the people in charge of the Demo Day invites

It's not PG who needs to know, it's the people he's put in charge of Demo Day.

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#208

Post by bambax »

Flenser wrote: post #207
bambax wrote: post #206

PG is quoted in the article as saying ”I don’t know exactly which companies had people on the list. But I know which will now: none of them.” That's fine and admirable, but on the practical side, if he doesn't know who's who, how is he going to enforce this rule?

From the article: Graham told me in a followup email that he was indeed serious and had just given the list of SOPA supporters to the people in charge of the Demo Day invites It's not PG who needs to know, it's the people he's put in charge of Demo Day.

Yes, I read that too, and that's my point: he doesn't make the invitations himself; just because you trust an organisation to do something doesn't mean you can dispense yourself from verifying they did what they were asked to do.

The "people in charge of the Demo Day invites" probably have enormous incentives to invite influential and powerful employees from SOPA-supporting companies, and would certainly face backslash they'd rather do without.

So what I think is happening is that PG just added "manage invitations to Demo Day" to his todo list... (all the most admirable BTW)

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#209

Post by bermanoid »

spindritf wrote: post #106
philh wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen the argument: if someone is so clueless about rationality as to be religious, how could they make a good scientist? And the "answer" is: nevertheless, there exist religious people who do good science. So I'm not convinced by the argument here. It makes too many unstated assumptions. I support this boycott, and this argument might make good rhetoric, but I wouldn't use it directly to evaluate investors.

> I've seen the argument: if someone is so clueless about rationality as to be religious, how could they make a good scientist? That's because the underlying assumptions are false. Being religious doesn't require one to be "clueless about rationality" and supporting SOPA doesn't requre the supporter to be clueless about technology -- they may as well hope to benefit from breaking the Internet. As every regulation (th…

Being religious doesn't require one to be "clueless about rationality"

Absolutely correct. You don't have to be clueless about rationality to be religious; you can also explicitly reject rationality, even though you understand it.

But if you don't reject it, then it's quite difficult to accept any of the Big Three religions and simultaneously convince yourself that you're embracing an evidence-based worldview. That's not to say a few haven't spun up enough cognitive dissonance to manage it, but it's exceedingly difficult and rare.

And as a rule, yes - to someone of the current generation, it does cast serious doubt on someone's scientific abilities when it comes to light that they are religious, especially since it's no longer as socially unacceptable to reject religious beliefs.

Re: Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed At YC Demo Day

#210

Post by burgerbrain »

andrewflnr wrote: post #202
burgerbrain wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I mean no offense, but that's probably because you're not religious." I was. Believe me, I was.... Anyway, if you ask someone "How do you know god exists?" and they respond "Because I have faith." or whatever, they are not using the "assurance based on a reliable track record." definition. Prior track record of what? God existing? In actuality , people use faith to describe the reason they believe in things despite…

> Prior track record of what? God existing? Prior track record of his doing things in their life. My point wasn't the greek word, but that most people believe they have evidence of God's actions. I guess I may have overreached a bit, but I don't hear "just because" answers very often. > When they believe that they have "evidence" the answer to the question tends to be something along the lines of "I _know_ that god e…

What I am saying is that in practice/reality, a religious person will more often than not use the word "faith" iff they don't think that they have evidence.
Post reply on HN