Cure Cancer from the Comfort of Home!

The following was written by a friend at rationalskepticism.org , and I thought I’d pass it on. If you’d like to join in, but can’t stand the thought of associating with us godless heathens, there are plenty of other teams, or you can go it alone.

“Hello! Do you leave your computer on, even when you aren’t using it? How about your Playstation 3? Well, your computer could be curing 1)Cancer, as well as:

2)Huntington’s disease,
3)Alzheimer’s disease,
4)Mad cow disease,
5)Osteogenesis imperfecta,
6)Parkinson’s disease,

Your computer could also be working on new ways of making antibiotics! How is all of this possible, you ask? Simple! With Folding@home!

Q: What is Folding @ home?
A: Folding@home is a distributed computing project — people from throughout the world download and run software to band together to make one of the largest supercomputers in the world. Every computer takes the project closer to our goals. Folding@home uses novel computational methods coupled to distributed computing, to simulate problems millions of times more challenging than previously achieved.

Some members of this forum have joined a computing team called, “Atheists, Skeptics, and Humanists – ASH Folding.” We would LOVE to have you donate your computer’s spare time to help science! The program is written in such a way, that it will use all of your computer’s processor while running (you can choose to use a different %), but will immediately back off on it’s demands should you run another program. I can run world of warcraft with F@H running, and while it will slow down the speed at which my computer runs F@H, there is no impact on the play of WoW.

We have a very long post here on these forums discussing our team, team number 182116, @
http://www.rationalskepticism.org/general-science/folding-home-team-182116-t616.html
but this post is specifically dedicated to recruiting more members!

You can learn more about folding @ home at:
http://folding.stanford.edu/

Clients: There are a few different programs that you can use to help folding@home!

1)The basic F@H program can be found at:
http://folding.stanford.edu/English/Download
This program will utilize only one string maximum, so if you have a quad core computer for example, it may only utilize 12% of your CPU, even at 100% usage. This method is mostly for older computers, and doesn’t earn you many points, but DOES still help the advance of science!

2)SMP: This is a more advanced version of folding@home. It has the ability to fully utilize your computer’s power, while still maintaining the ability to back off whenever you are using the computer. This program can be found at the bottom of the following page:
http://folding.stanford.edu/English/DownloadWinOther
It’s official name on that page is [i]“Windows XP/2003/Vista/2008/7 SMP2 client console version Read this Install Guide first! (and Passkey Information)”[/i]

There are 3 important to know things about SMP.

a)You will need to obtain a passkey. To do this, go to:
http://folding.stanford.edu/English/FAQ-passkey
It will walk you through the easy process. This will ensure that others cannot use your name to get points.

b)When you install it, you must say “yes” when it asks if you want to alter the advanced options. When it asks if there are any special parameters you want to add, type: “-smp -verbosity 9″ (without the quotes). This will tell the program you want the specialized SMP jobs that give you far more credit.

c)Once you have completed 10 SMP jobs (with at least an 80% rate of making the 3 to 6 day deadline), you will begin earning BONUS points on every job that you do. The amount of points is determined by how fast you finish the job.

3)GPU: This program runs on your video card instead of your CPU. If you have a decent video card, you can run a GPU program WHILE running a basic or SMP client. This program type generates a lot of points, although there is no bonus point system, so you will see the most immediate return on points from a GPU, but over the long term it’s more difficult to know which is more productive.

You can find the GPU downloads at:
http://folding.stanford.edu/English/DownloadWinOther

Unless you have a state of the art video card, download “GPU2″. If your video card is top of the line, download “GPU3″.

If you have any more questions, please visit our team’s thread! I hope to see you folding with us soon!”

Mr Ratzinger’s coming to visit

The current incumbent of the bishopric of Rome, Joe “the rat” Ratzinger, is going to visit the UK in September. We, apparently, are so thrilled that we are going to pay a fortune for the privilege.  Whoopee!!

It has been inaccurately reported that Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens are lying in wait ready to arrest him the moment he arrives. (In fact they are merely looking on with interest while some lawyers investigate the possibility of him being arrested.) Some people think that he can’t be held responsible for the criminal actions of some of his priests, and I would agree, but they are overlooking the fact that he took part in the conspiracy to cover up child abuse in several countries including Britain. The conspiracy is what he should, but won’t, be arrested for. The ConDem government are seeing to that, by making sure the rules won’t apply to Ratzinger.

It seems that avoiding embarrassment is more important than protecting children, for governments as well as religions.

Homophobia

Most of my childhood took place in the 1960s and early ’70s. In those days it was considered OK to hate “queers” and use that word as a term of abuse, and the only gays (though that word hadn’t yet been co-opted) that one saw on television were outrageously camp, thus rendering them “harmless”. (If you saw one you could avoid him in plenty of time). It is little wonder that, deep in the recesses of my mind, I became tainted with homophobia.

It has been suggested, by some “straight” people,  that I should be ashamed of this taint. I disagree. In order to fight against bigotry, one must first identify even the smallest trace of it. Knowing where it begins, one can engage one’s brain and realise the stupidity of bigotry.

When he appeared on BBC’s Question Time, the British Nazi Party’s Nick Griffin said that if he saw two men kissing he’d ‘feel weird’. To a small extent I would agree with him, but unlike Griffin I don’t think such sights should be in any way discouraged. That weird feeling is my problem, and Griffin’s, and anyone else’s that feels the same way. Gays and lesbians should be afforded the same rights, at all levels of society, as everyone else. If that becomes the norm the emotionally damaged and bigoted among us, unwilling to think, will be the exceptions being stared at.

I would, and should, be ashamed if I just accepted the heritage of my youth, and turned my discomfort into hatred, rather than confronting it.

Religion’s Undeserved Respect

Funny little word, respect. It can mean different things depending on the context. For example, there’s the respect one gives to people you don’t know, that you’ve never even met before, until you encounter them in a doorway perhaps, and you hold the door open for them or, if they perform this small service for you, you thank them politely. This kind of respect is just good manners.

Then there is the kind of respect you afford someone for their achievements, whether it be in sport, music, science or any other field. This kind of respect needs no explanation,though individual examples might!

You might respect an institution, such as a religion. If you haven’t noticed already, I’d better tell you now that I don’t! That doesn’t mean I don’t respect people who happen to be religious, though in some cases I cannot do so, and in fact I have many theist friends. It is the dogma they profess to believe that I despise, but the nicer kind of theist, who have predominantly featured in my life, tend to filter that dogma through a strong sense of empathy and a healthy conscience.

If any of my examples automatically deserve respect it is the first one. Good manners help to lubricate a society in which we are ever more closely pushed into one another’s path. We cannot, however, expect any more respect as our due. It must not only be earned, but freely given too, so when I’m told I must respect religion my hackles are raised.

If any one, religious or not, wants respect, they should behave in a way that engenders respect. Not from other people, but from themselves. The rest, if their conscience is clear, will follow.

Of course, some might say that little picture at the top of the screen is disrespectful. Well, you don’t have to come here, and I promise not to display it in a church!