Morality altered by brain stimulation

[Sasaki Kojiro]

to what end, though? As with the Hadron Colider, I don't believe the questions of risk or application are really addressed. The latter was a complete waste of money (found nothing) and might have detroyed the planet.

You don't always know what the end is going to be. Sometimes knowledge is just knowledge and lays unused for 50 years, then becomes useful. How much of our current technology relies on an understanding of fundamental physics?

"was a complete waste of money" --> they haven't packed up their bags and left it though...

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

You don't always know what the end is going to be. Sometimes knowledge is just knowledge and lays unused for 50 years, then becomes useful. How much of our current technology relies on an understanding of fundamental physics?

I know that not all knowledge is immidiately useful, such is obvious, but your example of Physics is a very bad one, as the practical applications are immidiately apparent and, in any case, Newton had a clear purpose, to demonstrate the underlying order of the Universe created by God.

"was a complete waste of money" --> they haven't packed up their bags and left it though...

It's a glorified experiement to try to find a theoretical "God partical" that has failed to materialise, with a side order of, "may destroy the planet". The fact that they haven't abandoned it means nothing with regard to it's utility, rather it points to a lot of people not wanting to look like fools and be out of work.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I know that not all knowledge is immidiately useful, such is obvious, but your example of Physics is a very bad one, as the practical applications are immidiately apparent and, in any case, Newton had a clear purpose, to demonstrate the underlying order of the Universe created by God.

I don't quite see what you're getting at. Knowledge can be an end of itself is what your first bit seems to acknowledge, but you were suggesting it didn't earlier.

It's a glorified experiement to try to find a theoretical "God partical" that has failed to materialise, with a side order of, "may destroy the planet". The fact that they haven't abandoned it means nothing with regard to it's utility, rather it points to a lot of people not wanting to look like fools and be out of work.

They hope to find many things, and they have been slowly ramping up the speed of it, I think they've only gone up to half power so far? It was never going to destroy the planet, I don't get where that whole thing came from.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I don't quite see what you're getting at. Knowledge can be an end of itself is what your first bit seems to acknowledge, but you were suggesting it didn't earlier.

Knowledge is merely the accumulation of facts, if it does not engender wisdom it is intrinsically useless, because you can't understand how to use it. While some knowledge might be worth knowing without an obvious practical application knowledge is not "an end of itself" in any acknowledged philosophical sense I kinow.

They hope to find many things, and they have been slowly ramping up the speed of it, I think they've only gone up to half power so far? It was never going to destroy the planet, I don't get where that whole thing came from.

There is a 1:150 million chance it could trigger a quantom singularity and destry the solar system, it's highly unlikely, but possible. Now you might say, "well that's not going to happen" and you'd almost certainly be right, but the fact is that it could and the sheer hubris of the scientists involved in building the thing without first getting the consent of every man woman and child on the sodding planet is astounding.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Knowledge is merely the accumulation of facts, if it does not engender wisdom it is intrinsically useless, because you can't understand how to use it. While some knowledge might be worth knowing without an obvious practical application knowledge is not "an end of itself" in any acknowledged philosophical sense I kinow.

But we don't know if there are any obvious practical applications. There could be dozens that we just don't know enough right now to make sense of. We accumulate facts and then someone makes sense of them. So the pursuit of knowledge is a worthwhile goal. I wouldn't be surprised if just the process of building the thing taught them enough to eventually be worth the money.

And information about how the universe works is interesting, and therefore useful.

There is a 1:150 million chance it could trigger a quantom singularity and destry the solar system, it's highly unlikely, but possible. Now you might say, "well that's not going to happen" and you'd almost certainly be right, but the fact is that it could and the sheer hubris of the scientists involved in building the thing without first getting the consent of every man woman and child on the sodding planet is astounding.

Isn't that black hole destroy the solar system stuff just rumor?