Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit | pjaoko's commentslogin

Has it been proven that it "likely isn't real"?

How about: maybe some things lie outside of the purview of empiricism and materialism, the belief in which does not radically impact one's behavior so long as they have a decent moral compass otherwise, can be taken on faith, and "proving" it does exist or doesn't exist is a pointless argument, since it exists outside of that ontological system.

> maybe some things lie outside of the purview of empiricism and materialism

Maybe? So your whole premise is based on a maybe! It was a simple question, don't know where or how morality and behavior comes into play..


It's much harder to prove the non-existence of something than the existence.

Just show the concept either is not where it is claimed to be or that it is incoherent.

I say this as someone who believes in a higher being, we have played this game before, the ethereal thing can just move to someplace science can’t get to, it is not really a valid argument for existence.

what argument?

The question wasn't about which is harder, it was asking for proof.

The burden of proof lies on those who say it exists, not the other way around.

The burden of proof lies on whoever wants to convince someone else of something. in this case the guy that wants to convince people it likely is not real.

The original poster stated

> "The human brain is mutable, the human "soul" is a concept thats not proven yet and likely isn't real."

The soul is "a concept that's not proven yet." It's unproven because there's no convincing evidence for the proposition. By definition, in the absence of convincing evidence, the null hypothesis of any proposition is presumed to be more likely. The presumed likelihood of the null hypothesis is not a positive assertion which creates a burden of proof. It's the presumed default state of all possible propositions - even those yet to be imagined.

In other words, pointing out 'absence of evidence' is not asserting 'evidence of absence'. See: Russell's Teapot and Sagan's Dragon (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot)


Do you exist?

Before we start discussing whether it's "real" can we all agree on what it "is"? I doubt it.

We can't even agree on what "is" is...

> CSS also sucks because 10px isn't 10 pixels, 10cm isn't 10 centimeters, and 50% isn't 50% of the screen.

This really isn't about CSS, it's about screen hardware - and the thousands of constantly evolving products in the market.


With the actual layout models, I see it more of an evolution thing. For someone starting on CSS today, you do not have to learn all 8 now if you don't want to, just master the grid. It was designed to be the last one to rule them all.


HTML (Hyper-Text Markup Language) is a specific kind programming language, a markup language. It is nowhere close to a general purpose (Turing complete) programming language. Maybe you meant the web stack (HTML, JavaScript, CSS)?


It's a (computer) language, it is also a formal language. A programming language is a language in which you can write programs, which are descriptions of algorithms. You don't describe algorithms in HTML, hence it is not a programming language.


Thats correct. Computer language is the top category. Markup and Programming languages are subcategories.


> Maybe you meant the web stack (HTML, JavaScript)

HTML5 doesn't refer specifically to HTML, rather it's "HTML + JavaScript + CSS". There's hardly a website nowadays that can be used without JS.

By using the name HTML5 as an umbrella name for a programming language API plus some declarative bits, the W3C tacitly admitted that the declarative push has been a mistake - I explained "why" in my previous comment.


HTML5 refers specifically to the latest, living version of HTML, the markup language. CSS and JavaScript have their own specifications, and version numbers. The term your looking for is the web platform [1].

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_platform


On a technical forum in a post that contains, both the words "CSS" and "HTML"? Sorry, but no "HTML5" refers to the version 5 of the Hypertext Markup Language.


HTML5 is the HTML of today, that's what I meant originally. I'm not sure what you're afraid of, nobody is attacking you, I'm simply explaining what I had in mind, and why it's not unreasonable to use words in a more inclusive, close to contemporary practice meaning.

The fact is, JavaScript is ubiquitous in web programing and the web is unthinkable without it, it's so pervasive on the front end that it's been repurposed for backend use precisely because it makes a lot of sense to use one programming language for one project. Pure HTML is unsuitable for backend use and it sticks like a sore thumb in the front end.

Younger developers are likely missing on the history of the entire web endeavor but in order to get a feel for it, I'd recommend to focus on practical meaning rather than on trivial semantics.

The big point I was driving at is this: The damage has been done, instead of a clean rendering API we've got this hybrid monstrosity which locked us to a couple / triple browser rendering engines which, due to cutesy BS, are complex beyond comprehension, beyond security analysis or normal competition. This is what an obsession with fancy names leads to.


nah. the technical semantics is absolutely the point when we're talking about code. HTML is thing distinct from javascript and CSS and it's very useful to be precise about it in our context.


> If you like programming exclusively with globals and no warning when you have conflicting variable names

Tailwind is built on top of CSS. It is basically a library of hundreds of tiny "global", documented CSS classes.


> It's a source of stress to add a class to the system with a simple, short and readable name and have to worry it is used someplace else.

That is the whole point of CSS classes: re-use. A CSS class is not meant to be used in only one very specific place. For that, you can select an element's ID or an elements HTML path, to style just that one thing.


> Being an insane brand means literally nothing if people can trivially switch to competitors, which they can.

Logically speaking, yes it is easy to switch between OAI and Gemini, or Coke and Pepsi. But brand loyalty is more about emotions (comfort, familiarity,..) rather logical reasoning.


Completely agree. Readability is actually in the word itself read + ability. The ability of both the code and the reader.


> Rust's rich type system and ownership model will guarantee me memory-safety and thread-safety, which eliminate many classes of bugs at compile-time.

With PHP, you don't have to worry about compile-time bugs, because there is no compile time.


…and instead you get runtime bugs which is somehow better?


you also get runtime bugs with rust and everything else, so i just don't get the "somehow better" line of comparison


The idea is that if something would have been a compile-time error (ex: using a method that doesn’t exist), but you don’t see that compile error because you don’t have a compiler, the error is still there. It’s just that you won’t see it until the associated code happens to run. Essentially the compiler can catch whole classes of bugs early on. Just because it’s annoying to be told your code has bugs doesn’t make that better than having bugs and just not being told.


16 billion passwords from Apple, Facebook, Google and more leaked. Why has no one heard of it?


Looks like we did hear about it back in January and March.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44322961


Because it's apparently unconfirmed and was first reported on some truly sketchy sites. There hasn't been a peep (yet) from the companies affected.


Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: