Thanks for the discussion of the monty hall problem. [snip] >

Sure. Welcome back. I hope you are well. The Rogoff page is a duller place without you.

My take on Monty Hall is as follows. If you stick with your original choice, no matter what, heaven and earth cannot move the fact that your probability of being correct is 1/3, because it is as though you never had any extra information. The extra information leaves only one other viable alternative, however, which must carry the rest of the probability

1 - 1/3 = 2/3

norse god odin?

never heard of that.

see, if i examine some issue, for example existence of universal consciousness (that is an issue i have examined and tried to understand) i can talk about that. if i have not examined an issue then i would say i am kind of ignorant about it - don't know much about it.

i have examined issue of atheism. and i can talk about that.

now, <fsr> has talked about atheism emphatically in this forum. once he said that science has proved 'god' does not exist. <shams> said it was not so. i too quoted physicist leonard mladinow , "science does not and can not prove that god is an illusion"

i also mentioned research of neuroscientist rudy tanzi.

<quantum.conscious:>

The drawback with your system of belief is that most westerners associate change of consciousness with mind altering drugs.

Does the Indian flag really have the top view of an opium poppy capsule on it??

The drawback with your system of belief is that most westerners associate change of consciousness with mind altering drugs. >

does not sound like this belief has been examined well by you or these 'westerners' (whoever they are) .

btw, in india , i am considered western minded but i don't get into all that eastern/western dichotomy.

and at the moment i am not much interested in explaining my belief system (i could do that later if i find someone genuinely interestred instead of just showing passing interest. for now : altering consciousness is a very simple (simple to understand but not that simple to put in practice) concept at one level - it means being free from anger, jealousy, depression, self-absorption , pride etc. so <viktor frankl> can be considered as someone having expanded awareness/consciousness and <jesus> having unbounded awareness/consciouness. and what viktor frankl had, everyone can evolve to have. and so on.)

Sorry for slow response, I'm having a tough time time staying awake. It should have fallen like a slinky?

<I find it interesting that on Sept. 10th, 2001 Don Rumsfeld stated that the Pentagon couldn´t account for a whopping $2.3 Trillion. Of course the next day this was forgotten and the Pentagon got an even bigger budget to siphon off for their secret programs.>

That very story has been addressed on these pages before.

<keypusher: Here's where Rumsfeld got the $2.3 trillion figure. >

<In fiscal 1999, a defense audit found that about $2.3 trillion of balances, transactions and adjustments were inadequately documented. These "unsupported" transactions do not mean the department ultimately cannot account for them, she advised, but that tracking down needed documents would take a long time. Auditors, she said, might have to go to different computer systems, to different locations or access different databases to get information. http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Apr...;

$2.3 trillion was eight times the 2001 defense budget, not four times as I said.

Here are Rumsfeld's actual words.

<The technology revolution has transformed organizations across the private sector, but not ours, not fully, not yet. We are, as they say, tangled in our anchor chain. Our financial systems are decades old. According to some estimates, we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions. We cannot share information from floor to floor in this building because it's stored on dozens of technological systems that are inaccessible or incompatible.

We maintain 20 to 25 percent more base infrastructure than we need to support our forces, at an annual waste to taxpayers of some $3 billion to $4 billion. Fully half of our resources go to infrastructure and overhead, and in addition to draining resources from warfighting, these costly and outdated systems, procedures and programs stifle innovation as well. A new idea must often survive the gauntlet of some 17 levels of bureaucracy to make it from a line officer's to my desk. I have too much respect for a line officer to believe that we need 17 layers between us....>

http://www.911myths.com/html/rumsfe...

In conclusion, the Pentagon did not "lose" $2.3 trillion in 2001, or at any other time.>

ok. thanks for the response.

about the other points of your posts , i don't think they can be answered satisfactorly at the level you asking them .

The collapse of the first tower actually does not seem to be in a straight line down at all- at least at the start. The pictures show the top of the tower tipping as one large piece, I presume at the point where the plane impacted- like you said you might expect.

http://911research.wtc7.net/wtc/evi...

<Are you trying to say that the tower would have fallen on its side?> That's a step farther than my layman's knowledge of physics is capable of assuming, since obviously it would be a complicated fall and I can't imagine all the forces involved. What I said in the beginning is what I meant; the fall should have occurred with an expanding asymmetry. Even if there was some inherent force to counterbalance the asymmetry, there would in that case have been at least visible oscillation.>

Building structures are designed to damp oscillations. See the below video for why that is done.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxTZ...

If a building oscillates at high frequency, there is a chance that wind will destroy it. Also the collapse of the buildings happened so fast that I doubt there was much time for the structure to respond in any resonant frequency.

Greece faces an acid test as soon as next month when it must give parliamentary approval for over 11 billion euros in extra spending cuts for 2013 and 2014 in exchange for more EU/IMF aid.

That looks like a tough task even if a new government can be formed in time, given the success of anti-bailout parties.