As someone who has never used story mode/easy mode options, I agree with you completely.

Nine Sols, Celeste, Hades. Some of my favorite ‘hardcore’ games with great stories and great difficulty options. The only result of their presence is letting more people play the games who wouldn’t have otherwise. I don’t feel like my experience is cheapened in any way if others use the options.

And even if I don’t use them now, maybe there comes a day when my hands can’t keep up anymore, and I’ll be very grateful to be able to keep participating in my favorite hobby. Just an unambiguous good imo

If that’s the case, it’s sad then that he apparently doesn’t seem willing to return the good will and unconditional support, if he’s refusing to help them with rent. Abandoning the one person who would always have your back…

As graceful an exit as any troll can hope for. Cheers to you as well

I have already abundantly shared my understanding and specifically addressed your concerns. Now it is clear that you simply like arguing and care little about what is being discussed.

I think we are likely beyond the point of productivity, but the ‘scientific method’ isn’t capitalized btw. This error is perfectly emblematic of the error in your thought process as a whole

I myself am a physicist lol, I assure you that we do not believe in our work in the way you suggest. This is why it has been so outlandish and perplexing for you to continually insist that I “believe” in every science themed idea but irrationally hold religion to some even higher standard. I’m sorry my friend, but I stand by my conclusion that you have simply made some mistakes along the way while learning about all of this. It happens to all of us, the important thing is having a willingness to reexamine.

But yes, many of the hypotheses regarding ‘before’ the big bang etc. are currently on the same level as the hypothesis of a god (or prime mover). As I have continually affirmed over the course of our discussion that is all correct and definitionally compatible with atheism and the scientific method. I think perhaps we have reached the end of what we can discuss, unless you are willing to take into consideration how the scientific community actually thinks, rather than trying to insist they use your personal definitions of their words

Sure, and so as an atheist and an otherwise “scientific person”, I do accept that god is a valid hypothesis. And I will remain an atheist until any evidence pops up to support that hypothesis.

At some point I think you may have gotten confused by terminology. It is indeed similar to various other scientific ideas, which are believed only after being tested. You do not accept every hypothesis as being the truth until proven otherwise. That is the essential difference between conducting science and exercising one’s imagination.

I’m unconvinced by your claim that science and religion are the same. Can you prove that?

Yes, really! I endorse Azimir’s explanation fully.

To potentially address some confusion:

If you said there are no gods, that would be a claim that requires proof. You would then have the burden of proving that there are no gods. Exceptionally difficult, as one could be hiding anywhere.

If you claim there is at least one god, then you have the burden of proving that.

Where would you land if you believed neither claim could be proven? Well, it turns out, you could actually be either an atheist or a theist! All we have learned so far is that you are agnostic.

This is where the story ends for the agnostic atheist. They have no reason to believe either claim, and therefore they do not believe there is at least one god, and therefore they are an atheist.

The agnostic theist however has additional work they must perform in order to become a theist from this position. They must believe in at least one god to be a theist, but they have no evidence that would compel such a belief. So they must take it on faith.

This leads to additional questions such as: is faith a good reason to believe in things? Can’t you use faith to believe in literally anything, thereby making it useless?

This is generally why the atheist is involuntarily forced to withhold belief. I phrase it that way because often people forget how beliefs work, they are compulsions. They can’t choose to look past these thoughts and believe in a god any more than you could choose to set aside your better judgement and believe, and I mean really believe, in unicorns.

I understand if you also can’t choose not to be offended by the unicorn comparison, btw. I didn’t like hearing it the first time when I was young and involved with the church. It made me think “surely that’s a step too far, and these two concepts are incomparable. Billions of people worship, they can’t all be that wrong”. It inspired me to go look and see what all of my fellow religious people had to offer in that regard. And to be honest, I still love hearing from them, but the truth is so far nobody has any evidence whatsoever. Most religious people themselves will even admit that. So it really does just come down to faith in the end.

The overwhelming majority of atheists are agnostic. Actually I cannot say I have ever once heard of a gnostic atheist, i.e. someone who would want to “prove no gods exist”. You (and afaict, all atheists) agree that that would be absurd, because for all we know some god is hiding under a rock somewhere. We can’t claim certainty until we’ve checked under every rock.

Agnostic atheism is where people generally land when they realize that none of the theists have found anything, either. Why believe in something prior to the point of there being any valid reason for the belief?

To further illustrate, do you believe in unicorns? No, right? Does that mean you say you can prove there aren’t any? Also no, right? Same situation with agnostic atheists.

Sorry if I’m over-explaining, it’s a commonly misunderstood topic

Hopefully things go more smoothly than for Endwalker's launch! The login issues were so bad they ended up giving all players some free subscription time.

Supposedly their systems are better prepared now, but we’re still expecting massive queues no matter what. Probably will be impossible to get in if you only have a few hours to play and you work normal hours

I was unemployed for a bit, and also underemployed at various points in my life

Hiking/running/swimming is a great way to pass time. Looking for new spots to do these things, taking note of nearby restaurants and other things. Planning larger trips based on what I find. Sometimes just setting aside an hour for no purpose other than to walk by some shops or other parts of town I’m not familiar with.

Volunteering is good and also can help when applying for jobs just by the merit of giving you something to fill the time with. I’ve done trail cleanups, tabling, soup kitchen type stuff. Did some work with a mental health hotline.

It really all depends on your circumstances and what you want to get out of your time moving forward, you know?

They could use pull-away pants that button up the back maybe

What did you do on the platform out of curiosity? I felt similarly when I left other social medias.

Discord I mainly use to keep an eye on early access games and dev updates, and occasionally ask or answer questions. Although I did get into it after deleting other social media so I may be subconsciously avoiding the more toxic parts of the experience

Yeah this same conversation happens every time one of these headlines comes up and gets misinterpreted. The conclusion is usually that apple has longer than average hardware support across the board

I’m not sure exactly how it works tbh! But this was also one of the findings of the National Weight Control Registry when studying people who successfully lost weight and kept it off.

78% eat breakfast every day. 75% weigh themselves at least once a week. 62% watch less than 10 hours of TV per week. 90% exercise, on average, about 1 hour per day.

Some more tidbits:

98% of Registry participants report that they modified their food intake in some way to lose weight. 94% increased their physical activity, with the most frequently reported form of activity being walking.

If I had to speculate, my guess is that having breakfast results in a better workout. And then a better workout makes you more likely to comply with your meal plan, which then results in better long term weight results

I assure you that it’s just a matter of your perception. Every study ever performed reveals people have a notoriously bad internal concept of the quantity of their intake, frequently being off by more than double. The problem is even further exacerbated when trying to estimate someone else’s intake

You can be thin eating any type of food. It’s generally just far easier to over-consume junk food, but if she’s not eating too much it won’t inherently lead to weight gain

Absolutely captivating read, I almost backed away just from the sheer length of it but now I’m sending it to others lol. Vivid and powerful, you can really feel the knot twisting around in her stomach. Interesting too that it was written so long ago, and looking back at her perspective now seeing how the social phenomenons she wrote about have evolved

Personally I want the AI to simply not be there lol. What is even the point of it? You have to completely fact check it anyway by using the exact same search techniques as before.

It’s a solution that doesn’t work, put in place to solve a problem that nobody has. So yes it does suck lol

Tysm for posting I absolutely love seeing your selections when they pop up in my feed :D I wish I could articulate my thoughts in a more poetic way lol but this one goes so hard