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# And your small-text has appeared now
I can see where he's coming from but I'd rather the word 'gene' get quantified instead of applying the same ambiguities to a new word.
(I helped save b3ta! gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:27, archived)
# Not likely, most of his argument(s) falls to shit if you do.
He's a pseudo scientific fraud. Not to say his critics are any better.
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:32, archived)
# Genes have a semi-existence, depending on the extent of their success in an unmodified state.
Identifying their limits means predicting what form they will survive in, which is a thing best established by waiting (forever) to find out. Besides, they'll mostly only be stable for a while, and then be superseded. So it's a necessary word for a thing that definitely exists as a (semi-)coherent entity but can't be precisely delineated.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:34, archived)
# Semi-existence? FUCK ME!
*urge to kill grows*

It's(genes) a convention for discussion and
has no basis in reality, FFS. Semi my ass.
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:39, archived)
# These are my annoying words, BTW, not Dawkins'.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:42, archived)
# ARRRRGH!! He's got your mind bent.
PLSFIXKTHX! Sorry, but that is silly talk.

Hit the biochemistry books. You'll hurt
yourself thinking like that. Timecubes hoooo!
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:46, archived)
# I do actually regret saying "semi-existence"
it's not very objective of me.
Some things are briefly stable - windspeeds, orbits - and it's a subjective judgment whether or not a particular one is stable enough to be declared to exist. I suppose the thing to do with a gene or a meme is to declare some arbitrary context, the same way that you might say windspeed as measured over the course of a minute, which would be different from the speed measured over an hour. Either could be used when talking about the speed "now". Stable states definitely exist in an objective way, but they exist as part of a continuum. The pockets of stability aren't just in our imaginations, but the limits of the pockets are. Come to think of it, most things are like this a bit. Objects, for instance. We just have a lot of very customary conventions for assuming where edges go.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:51, archived)
# Noted.
Don't take my over the top reactions as more than that.
Sloppy language of that sort can get me ranting for hours. [/;-D

on edit: Much better and more useful. That's more like tool making, not assigning the screwdriver as hammer and nail.
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:54, archived)
# That's alright.
I apologise for doing all my writing in the form of edits, it's a compulsion.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 4:00, archived)
# As is mine to jump at false premisses.
My apologies if I upset you in any way.
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 4:24, archived)
# genes are just strings of amino acids
at what length of string a noticeable characteristic occurs should be pretty measurable, even if some are much longer than others.

As long as you've got a point of reference (for example, how the celsius scale has 0 degrees as the freezing point of water) then I can't see why it would be difficult.

I was working in a forensic lab when the human genome got released and sat around with my boss (who located the gene that causes alzheimers when he was younger) and we got pissed and read out pages to each other "G, C, T, G, G, A, G" etc. Yes, we're funny funny guys. Anyway, surely some number of amino acids could be used as a standard form of measurement?
(I helped save b3ta! gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:46, archived)
# If you wish to weigh potatoes perhaps.
You used that "gene that causes alzheimers" bit just to
watch my head explode didn't you? ARGH FUCK KILL!!!!!
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 3:51, archived)
# FINE
"Locus that highlights a predisposition to alzheimer's disease"

What the fuck would I know anyway? I was the admin manager and I was only a year or two out of high school.
(I helped save b3ta! gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 4:00, archived)
# Exactly why you were told it the first way. (a guess, but from long experience)
Won't beat up on your second revision, even though it is still in error.

I AM NOT A CUNT, REALLY, THEY ARE MAKING ME THIS WAY!!!


(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 4:05, archived)
# I think it's a part of that whole "remaining conversational" thing.
You know, like not saying meme.
(I helped save b3ta! gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 4:15, archived)
# I have not used it this eve... yet.
I might not, as I also find it a rather meaningless term.

edit: SHIT DUDE, I did, but from a lyric that goes "Me me..."
www.b3ta.com/board/9193353
(I helped save b3ta! Tahkcalb ω∞ for sigs, Tue 17 Feb 2009, 4:16, archived)