My violin doesn't have a keyboard, so that doesn't really help...

I don't want to start an overly long discussion that leads nowhere, but I don't see anything of what you said as being contradictory to what I stated in my two posts (espcecially the second post).

What we do may be the spirit, but the stuff that makes us do what we do (i.e. culture) is, or at least could be, also based on genetics. My point is that, no matter how indirect, in the end it all comes from the genes and external influences. It's true that the external influences cannot be disregarded, but neither can genetics. Without our genes being as they are, the "human spirit" might be completely different.

In science, there is no room for a magic essence such as a "soul" or "pure spirit". It's all based on causality. External factors and our genes determine the outcome, not some abstract concept called "spirit".

On further thought the quote is actually is a contradiction in terms. The human spirit is by very definition something about humans (as opposed to monkeys, aliens, plants...). What makes humans into humans? Their genes of course. You might argue that the human spirit is a cultural thing, but then I would say that culture also is shaped by genetics. I'm not saying that culture is 100% predetermined by genetics, but I'm saying that without human genes being what they are, human culture most likely would be different from what they are.

It might be a (rhetorically speaking) good quote from a great movie - but that doesn't make it true.

Please note that I'm not willing to state the exact opposite either. However, to my knowledge we have no reason to believe that "spirit" is not something determined by genetics, just as we don't have evidence that it is determined by genetics.

Thank you, now I understand. And I could of course have googled the answer myself, if I'd have thought of that.

In any case, let me say that that tricks is extremely lame. Oh well.

I too found the description confusing as hell, and your attempts at clarifying it were hardly better (no offense). Let me try and see if I got this right:

1) magician shows 6 cards, you pick one
2) magician replaces his 5 cards in the hand with 5 different ones, all of which he knows what they are
3) you put the card back
4) since the magician knows the new 5 cards, he can easily see which one is not one of the ones he replaced.

I'm guessing this must be it, but why someone wouldn't just outright say so and instead hide the truth in some convoluted sentences I'll never know.

Wish I had modpoints... yeah yeah, mod me redundant...

Wow, I have been saying the same exact thing for a while, nice to see someone else agreeing with me :)

twice