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Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle has absolutely nothing to do with human beings or measuring devices.  It is a fundamental property of the universe and to date there have been no evidence to suggest otherwise.

All science is from a human point of reference; uncertainty is a fundamental property of the perspective from which we observe the universe. That perspective is the limit of our possible knowledge, so we often generalize it to be the absolute truth, but it's not and that's the point.

Paolo: I realize math "works", of course, and that's it's not "broken". But you point out that mathematics is infinite, which means it cannot be complete, which is what I meant. Basically, no structure/system/organization/order (which are all fundamentally mathematical) can be absolute, there is always something that cannot be contained by it, something above/beyond/outside of it. Math is very useful, and works within specific points of reference, but it can never be the end-all arbiter of truth, nor can any structure/system/organization/order, which is what a great many people aspire towards.

Your examples (like Gödel's theorems and Scrödinger's cat) do not necessarily mean that the sciences are broken, but that our current understanding of them, the theories we've come up with so far have flaws. Actually Schrödinger used his famous thought experiment pretty much to say that quantum mechanics are damn confusing, and that our understanding of them is far from complete. In any case it's not really a paradox or proof of anything of the sort you describe.

While I'm not a physicist (or a mathematician), my understanding of these things is that they're not saying "we don't understand why this is", they're saying "we can't understand why this is". Uncertainty (e.g. Heisenberg's, which I probably should have mentioned above) as an intrinsic, inevitable property of the relationship between humans and the rest of the universe. The same goes for incompleteness: while again, I'm not a mathematician, my understanding is that it's demonstrating a fundamental property of mathematical systems. Granted, intrinsic and fundamental properties often turn out to be not-so-intrinsic-and-fundamental given enough time, but they're not intended as expressions of a lack of understanding. (It also seems to me that incompleteness is the one less likely to be overturned, and that's the only one you really need anyway, because every order can be expressed as a mathematical system--that's what makes it order--and therefore applies.)

Although I'm not sure inciting comparisons between Blade Runner and Star Wars is the best idea , it's always great to hear projects like this are still in progress.

It's a very contradictious religion alltogether.

Again, this is nothing unique. People are contradictory. And they can't be any other way. Instead of picking holes in something that's easy, why not try for something hard, something that's supposed to be logical and consistent and non-contradictory? Take physics, the study of the most fundamental, basic parts of the universe, and what do we humans have to say? Schrodinger's cat, entanglement, and more: it doesn't work. The universe is impossible. Take mathematics, the basis of all structure, organization, order, and what do we humans have to say? Godel's incompleteness: it doesn't work. Math is broken.

Push anything far enough, and you'll find everything is flawed. Nothing makes sense. But that only matters if you decide it does.

Ancient mythologies had arbitrary gods who killed you (or worse) for looking the wrong way. Or if they felt like it. Because the world was arbitrary and that was a pretty good explanation at the time.

evenwolf: that's why the world still sucks. Seriously, I agree, we can't live without labels, but I do think things go a lot better when people recognize labels for what they are.

There are actually only two religions in the world that have the concept of good and evil.

Ah yes, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Wait. (Of course, even beyond this, the question becomes: how do you define a religion? It's a label; it's meaningless.)

sick, desperate, disoriented and crazy

Those things generally preclude people from acting as efficiently as you describe. Also, most people in that condition are only looking for a visceral release, not a true solution (and usually want to die, too, so they don't really care about what happens afterward).

Labels are bullshit, tools of definition (which is to say division, which is to say valuation, which is to say bullshit).

Writing fanatics off as evil and the rest of us fine is making the same mistake they are.

Oh my God, "Collaborators" (secret jury episode) is one of my *favorite* episodes. People who have just been through four months of occupation, oppression, torture, etc., get the chance to strike back at the "traitors" who were responsible? How is that not understandable (if irrational)? And Tyrol (not to mention Anders) were clearly uncomfortable with it (Anders quits, Tyrol refuses to vote), while the people gung-ho were two day players, Tigh, and Starbuck. Tigh murdered his own wife for collaborating just before everybody got rescued, so if the rest of the traitors don't die after the rescue then her death was meaningless, so he has to believe that they have to die in order to justify his own actions to himself. And Starbuck spent four months getting mind-raped... (Starbuck's monologue to Anders in that episode, about how she "sees the world in different colors", and "I want to stab your eyes out for just looking at me" is one of my favorite pieces of dialogue from the series. She's like the poster child for PTSD.)

Apollo is the worst character on the show (of the main cast, anyway). That's why I said I kind of ignore him, although he has moments of brilliance (e.g. standing up to the coup d'etat in season one, his speech at the end of season three).

To everyone else: sorry for hijacking this thread (what a way to come back from a year's absence).

First, "Black Market", the Apollo + prostitute episode, is, along with "The Woman King", one of two episodes that do not exist for me. They're absolutely, irredeemably terrible (and the people behind the show have admitted it).

Your summary of the Kara/Lee relationship is pretty much accurate, and while I noted it was disgusting (and, yes, occasionally distracting) for the most part I wasn't bothered because it was realistic. People are stupid, especially about relationships, especially when you're as fucked up as Kara Thrace and Lee Adama are. The premise of the show was always to take the worst of humanity--the military's rejects on an about-to-be-decommissioned relic of a ship--rather than the best, which was what Trek focused on.

the hundreds of relationship subplots are almost all absolute crap, because they constantly ignore all of the characterization that occurs outside of these little romantic adventures, and because it's contrived and cliched and it never goes anywhere and it's just drama for the sake of drama. They don't even seem to care about continuity - for one of several examples, why the fuck doesn't anyone seem to care about Apollo's dead brother anymore?

Unfortunately I really don't know what you're talking about here. For your example, the only people who ever cared about Zak Adama were Adama, Lee, and Kara, and most of those issues got resolved early in season one, and since then they've had several years of post-apocalyptic issues accumulating which are slightly more pressing...? More generally, while the writers have occasionally dropped the ball (Adama going whackjob at the end of season three, for example; and it's all the writers, the actors are impeccable so far as I'm concerned), I find the characterization usually consistent (and often awesome, as in Baltar, Tigh, Roslin, season four Tyrol, and more.) Also, I kind of ignore Lee, because his character is a. one that doesn't work on television very well, and b. often stupid.

you have to admit that all the interpersonal drama is absolutely terrible

Absolutely awesome, you mean! Seriously, the characters make the show. I guess you can point to the Quadrangle of Dooooom in season three, but I saw that as just a big flip of the bird to "shippers" and in that context found it hilarious(ly disgusting).

Firefly (+ Serenity) is of course also great, but I see it as a different sort of show.

If you want Star Trek without technobabble and with relateable characters... Battlestar Galactica. The show-runner is a former Trek writer who got into some rather public disputes with the Trek producers over these sorts of things, and Battlestar was him doing it his way, basically. (And it turned out very, very well.)

How about you get to the root of it: people are just trouble.

People are people. Christians aren't any different from anyone else, really, much as they'd like to be.

(Ironically, in my first post in this thread I was originally going to make a sarcastic comment about how clearly a gunmen shooting up a church is the church's fault, but I decided that you must have been being sarcastic in the first place, because no one would make that kind of blanket statement seriously. *sigh*)

When times are dire people look for scapegoats. The US is facing a perilous economic situation, a government that's so incompetent and brutal it's become nothing but a bitter joke, and (in the next decade or so, likely) the long-delayed fall of American hegemony. There's a lot of people out there screaming at the dark, hoping to blame everything on liberals, gays, blacks, Jews, whatever's an easy target (you said it: "people [. . .]  who don't fit the status quo"), whatever they can that's not themselves. I'm afraid this kind of thing is going to get worse before it gets better.

If I thought it'd do any good I'd pray.

The upper-left-most (in terms of the sprite, not the char) leg/foot/protrusion/whatever doesn't appear to move--it looks like the lower-left leg just kind of merges into it for a frame. It's very distracting to my eye since almost everything else in the sprite is moving.

Hearing "Ron Gilbert", "Monkey Island", "Adventure/RPG" makes me all fuzzy inside, but it's the "Diablo" part I worry about. The game will need bucketload of awesomeness to compensate for a 1 millions mouse clicks, item, gold and XP grinding gameplay.

According to Gilbert, adventure puzzles are intended to replace grinding. (Though to what extent exactly the game will be Diablo-esque then I'm not sure, since that's really all Diablo is...?)

Am I the only one who finds that umlaut really stupid?

Well, it's intended to be a parody of its absurd use in heavy metal bands/songs; but it's certainly debatable whether the effect is achieved or it simply comes across as the same stupidity.

Pretty much all of it. Halo on the PC is very mediocre.

TF2 really isn't that different from old-skool shooters apart from its art style...

Half-Life 2 wins purely on the strength of "Surface Tension".

That's Half-Life 1.

Seems like any other FPS with a new setting and magic.

Yeah, and then an examination of Objectivism, failed utopias, and the dangers of absolute loyalty to any ideology.

Pretty typical fluff, really.

Ah, I knew there was something off about the demo graphics, couldn't quite put my finger on it as it were but I think ildu hit it.

You don't need AA ever, but it helps make things look purdy.