Religion vs. Belief vs. Science

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/uk/8511951.stm
Short story this, but something I felt a need to make comment on.

"Dr Capon, himself a former lecturer in computer science, says atheists are misleading the public when they claim science and religion are incompatible.

He believes that some popular science and nature programmes also repeat this line too easily, ignoring the fact that many scientists hold spiritual beliefs. "

I understand his sentiment, but disagree with his premise. You see, I'd draw a distinction between spiritual beliefs, and religion. To my mind, there is room for 'spirituality' and 'science'. Every time you look really closely at the world, you can see an intricate beauty there. You can be moved by just how cool some of the scientific principles are.
You can even hold an untestable hypothesis, such as 'Does God Exist?'.
Scientists can fall in love.

But religion? Well, that's where it starts to go a bit wrong - religions aren't about spirituality any more than science is. It's really easy to hold a spiritual belief.
What religions do though, is aim to direct that spiritual belief. That's not intrinsically bad, but what is is that it naturally tends to accumulate dogma. Rules about what is, or isn't. And this dogma becomes part of the 'faith', and rejects scientific analysis.
That's where religion and science become incompatible - when the pope calls homosexuality unnatural, it's not the 'word of god' it's the word of one man. Word that _should_ get exposed to scrutiny. Religious texts are much the same - treat the Bible as literally true, and you're an idiot. There's all sorts of reasons that's a bad idea, and not least that the version you've probably been reading has been (mis)translated quite a few times. But y'know, I'm pretty sure God isn't credited as an author, either. So certainly, you can treat the Bible as something to read, contemplate, enjoy and ... perhaps draw wisdom and meaning from.
But you could say the same about a lot of books. They don't need to be 'literal truth' either.

So yes. I think they're setting up an unwinnable fight here - they've built a sandcastle, and the tide is coming in, because people are ever more able to understand and think for themselves.
I think religion - rather than belief - has been good for humanity as a whole. It provided a structured system of education, legality and control - a bit like a parent, watching over a child as it grows up. Until the child understands, the parent has to assert authority and guide them.
But the day comes when the child grows, and is ready to stand on their own feet and make their own choice.
The day when people outgrow religion is coming - there are already many who have made their own choices and took their own steps. There are many more who have yet to do so.

It's not a tragedy though, nor is it a schism. You love your parents past when you leave home, and you don't begrudge children the shelter they still need. But the time comes to move on, grow, and stand on your own feet, make your own choices - in belief and spirituality, as much as in life.

Buzz Vs. Facebook.

Ok, so my one true blog remains livejournal - I have a facebook account, because people I know have a facebook account, and facebook is better suited to 'one liners'.

But I like discussions too.

One of the discussions recently, is Google Buzz - for those that somehow managed to miss it, Google have enabled a 'status update broadcast' feature, within gmail.
It hooks into google reader, and a few other things I don't really use (I think I see a twitter/flickr icon there too?)

But I've just seen a few people on facebook rabble rabbling over the 'security and privacy' of Buzz. It's really not that exciting - by default, Buzz populates follower feeds when you first sign up to it - which means if you send gmails back and forth to someone (who is also on gmail) a lot, then people might be able to see them as a 'contact' on Buzz.

That's all. You can turn this off, too, but by default Buzz has open follower lists.

The other is location tagging on posts - this is a feature you have to turn on, so again, something I think there's just no reason to get excited about.

So sure, if you don't already have a Facebook, then you have reason to grumble at the idea. But I hate to break it to you, but Facebook's default privacy really isn't all that great either - do you recall recently, they changed their privacy statement?
I'd invite you all to review it:
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=%20322194465300
"Certain categories of information such as your name, profile photo, list of friends and pages you are a fan of, gender, and networks you belong to are considered publicly available, and therefore do not have privacy settings"

*shrug*. From what I've seen of Buzz so far, I'm thinking I prefer it to Facebook. Then again, I prefer LJ to either, and still have a facebook account, simply because it's become clear that what I'm looking for, isn't the same as what everyone else is looking for.

5 years of EVE.

So, today is the 5th Anniversary of when I started to play EVE. I thought I'd take a little time to ramble about it, because to some it seems incomprehensible that someone might spend 5 years playing a game. Here's the thing though - I've been a chess player for longer than I've been an EvE player. I've played tabletops roleplay games for longer than I've played EVE too, and probably spent more money doing Live Action Roleplay than I have on EVE subscriptions.

Playing a game isn't intrinsically wrong - I'd make the argument that the time I've spent playing EVE, others have spent watching their daily dose of soap operas, and I've gained better value out of my time.

You see, people see EVE and see a 'flying spaceships game'. Truth is, that's only a very small part of it. EVE is a massively multiplayer real time strategy game. I've always been a big fan of strategy games - I like the mental challenge that they present, especially when I'm going up against other players - a computer opponent is really no match for a human player.

EVE is ... well, probably the best strategy game I've ever encountered, simply because it's not automatically putting you 'in charge' - you get command and control of one ship - your own. You get a resource stream - your own - and you trade off time to accumulate more resources. Those that think of the game in only those terms - because that's all they've ever seen in other games - are missing the real beauty of it. They accumulate some resources, get bored, move on.
And y'know, that's pretty much why I've got bored with every other game out there, to date.

EVE on the other hand - you're playing a strategy game. You don't automatically get to be 'general' - you have to 'prove' your leadership in order to get people to follow you.
You have pilot morale and skill level to think of - in game skills, and 'hard skills' you need to be aware of capabilites of everyone you're flying with and take best advantage of it.
It has logistics - that resource stream I mentioned, how do you best aggregate it and make good use of it. Where do you base and deploy, how to you keep ships fueled, and starbases operational. How do your organise the construction of capital ships, when you _need_ multiple people to be involved to do it effectively?
You have market dynamics and economics - the market is almost entirely player driven. Anything you buy on the market, another player has taken the time to build and has set a price on it. The price fluctuates... based on all manner of factor, but not least is emerging turmoil in key production areas - 'rich' producers in deep space will slow production when they come under attack, and the economy will shift as a result.
It has diplomacy and politics - I have never seen a game where 'realistic' diplomacy and politics have been implemented. EVE manages it, because it doesn't try and do it, it just sets a playground up, where it makes a difference.
Same's true of propaganda and spying - in EVE, these things matter. They're real and relevant.
You've got intelligence to think about - what you know, what you don't, and what you need to know. How to deal with the unknowns.

And in all that, in working together with other people you get to know them really very well indeed. Because you have to - because it's important to how the game unfolds to know that one person is a bit impulsive, where another is calculating. To know that one person is good at being friendly and personable, and so is a better person to conduct diplomacy than the other guy who's just there to blow up other spaceships.

It really is quite a breathtaking amount of depth and freedom, in a way you don't get anywhere else, barring perhaps real life itself. But I think I would get in trouble in real life if I were looking 'play' real life the way I 'play' internet spaceships.