i should add - see if you can take a look at the "execution plan". that's probably where the slowdown is. (assuming the system specs are all the same (including os))

it will vary widely depending on a number of things, including database indexes, system tables, machine specs, operating system, machine specs, recent table usage, table size, whether an execution plan is cached etc.

* machine specs - obviously, memory, cpu, hard drive bandwidth and seek time, etc.
* operating system - this will determine the memory paging, process threading, disk caching, etc.
* indexes - an execute statement on indexes vs not an indexes will make orders of magnitude difference, especially for larger tables
* recent table usage - determines whether the database is paged into memory.
* table size - determines how much of the tabe is paged into memory, and how many comparisions it will need to do to get a resultset, etc.
* system tables - contains optimization parameters that will effect performance and execution plan creation, such as how many rows are expected in the table. if these are off from reality, the database could use a poorly performing execution plan. system tables can also effect paging and other global parameters that effect performance.
* whether an execution plan is cached - determines whether the database will have to re-design an execution plan

all these things are going to add so much variance that it's gong to totally swamp any chance of apples-to-apples comparision.

to do a real comparision you really have to look at it on the logical level rather than the empirical level. what database algorithms will optimize better? etc.

all in all, you're probably just not doing it right. they should be about the same, except in exceptional cases.

okay so there's a public safety issue, and the traffic is prioritized, great. then the program at the other end receives the info and sends out a text message to first responders. and guess what? text messages are treated as low priority, so the overall delay is actually _increased_.

to make matters worse, let's say the public safety thing is spamming the alert, (maybe a design flaw in the program, maybe not), well that spamming is now prioritized, over, again, text messages, maybe even ip telephony, etc.

now you're causing congestion in times when congestion is the last thing you need.

and then a first responder finally gets on sight, and they don't know a medical procedure, so they look it up on the web, but guess what, web traffic takes the slow lane. or maybe its a video hosted by comcast - which isn't paying time warned the royalties it needs to not get throttled.

there's no telling before hand what information is needed, over what channels, over what protocols, and by who.

yes, all bits are of different value. but you don't know what that value is. that's the whole point of net neutrality.

My argument is deductive. That's better than inductive.

That's not because of any limit of science, but because it's impossible to answer the question "should" without stating a goal. once you state the goal, the answer is trivial, provided you know the science. e.g. should i remove the squirrel form under my porch? i don't know. do you want it under you porch? yes = leave it, no = remove it. see how that necessarily needs two parts? for a more complicated problem you'd need science. e.g. should we vaccinate? that's a moral question. should you inject a needle into everyone containing a dormant virus? well that depends... what's your goal? okay, lets say our goal is to avoid physical pain. then science tells us the answer is no. what does religion tell us? nothing. it doesn't tell us if it's going to hurt or not. science tells us that. you want to minimize pain in the long run? science tells us we should do it then. religion, again, tells us nothing.

i believe someone already pointed out this is false.

no, as much as i personally think the big bang theory is incredibly presumptions, it doesn't take it on faith.

dark matter/energy is a placeholder term for excess gravitational effects that have been observed and measured

firstly, this is the annoyingly common "god of the gaps" argument. secondly, a whole lot of that is just plain wrong and a whole lot is a bad question.
* gravity - yes it does. there's a problem of joining general relativity with quantum physics. that's a mathematical problem, not an empirical one.
* consciousness is a word we use to give ourselves pride. it's really not meaningful / useful beyond that.
* why we even exist is already assuming way too much and making some serious philosophical blunders. firstly, it's assuming teleology. and anthropocentric teleology at that.
* purpose of the universe - same problem, teleology. and anthropocentric teleology at that.

yes it is. there are many facets to that question. do you want to talk about sperm and egg cells? astrology? proto-life? be more specific and yes, since is very interested in that.

a lot. but usually, there's a funeral, and your body slowly decays or maybe is cremated. here's an experiment: take a plant, don't water it. observe.

again, not meaningful

you have a WHOLE LOT to learn about the philosophy of science. As, sadly, do most people in America. that is why it does not get the respect it deserves today. the era of enlightment, it got a lot more respect. and you know what we now call that era? the era of enlightment. but yeah, you have a lot to learn. pick up a book on it. maybe an introduction book, maybe some of the greats - popper, newton, descarte, russel, aristotle... there's plenty to read.

yeah... you got a few things wrong there. not even worth it.
though i do agree that the universe has "always" existed. that's a tautology. to say there was a time the universe did not exist... well, time implies universe, so that's self-disproving.

PoS more precisely is concerned with how to discover truth. Religion falls cleanly into this territory and is found GREATLY wanting. So while it is not concerned with $DIETY, or $OTHER_DIETY or $YET_ANOTHER_DIETY, the epistemological foundations it constructs says "no".

you are incouragable and offensive.

you said look it up in a dictionary and then you gave a WRONG definition of agnosticism and atheism and then i CORRECTED you and now instead of admitting that you were wrong and that the whole situation is, well, rather IRONIC, you are having a hard time dealing with it and becoming more aggressive.

no details there... that's plain as day.

it's a technique that you often use, maybe, but it so far doesn't seem to be very good at doing anything other than confirming beliefs that you already hold. i.e., to server as specious justification for confirmation bias.

actually mathematics does not depend on depend on mathmatical axioms that simply have to be presumed to be true. firstly, it's pure tautology. it's usefullness comes precisely from its tautological nature. secondly, you can postulate any set of axioms, and you don't have to postulate them to be true, you can postulate them to be false. and then you can work mathematically with an arbitrary set of presumed false axioms. but again, it's tautological. that's different than presumed true.

can i prove or show supporting evidence for that fact that 1+1=2? yes. very easily.

this is 1 dot: *
this is another dot: *

put them together,
* *
and that's two dots.

Q.E.D.

is that how you typically respond to new information that disagrees with what you've stated? or should i feel special?

oh, and two more links for you buddy:

agnostic theism - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A...
agnostic atheism - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A...

so yeah, tone down the rhetoric a bit. get your facts straight first.

...though i should add that "gnostic", while it literally means "of knowledge" (greek), is popularly associated with "gnosticism", which was a colletion of ancient religion movements that shunned the "material" world in favor of the "spiritiual" world. so the phrase "gnostic atheist" does justifiably give a bit of cognitive dissonance. the atheistic positions are more commonly referred to strong/weak or positive/negative, rather than gnostic/agnostic. "positive" atheism is meant in the sense of "positivism" - that the lack of existence of deities is empirically demonstrable. for instance, by the principle of parsimony, burden of proof, that it is self-disproving because of contradictions, or evidence of absence ("In some circumstances it can be safely assumed that if a certain event had occurred, evidence of it could be discovered by qualified investigators. In such circumstances it is perfectly reasonable to take the absence of proof of its occurrence as positive proof of its non-occurrence."). "negative" or "weak" atheism is not believing in the existence of any dieties, but not positively asserting that there are none. this would be your agnostic atheist. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N...