> once you take land out of agricultural use, it is never used for agriculture again.... > Once a building is there, that's it.
Tell that to the guy who found either Pompeii or Herculanium (I cannot remember which, probably the latter, since Pompeii was big enough to have been remembered) by plowing into a building. I expect that this occurred, and maybe still occurs, regularly in Europe near abandoned towns (like ~1/2 of all English towns from right before the Black Death) and cities.
Anyway, it is hardly the case that we are strapped for farmland. Otherwise, abandoned farmland without industry on it, or with abandoned plants, would turned back into ag land, rather than recreational areas.
Plants as in steel plants, above, just to disambiguate.
> "Can God create something so heavy that even He cant move?"
1) That is "can't move IT"
2) The usual answer is that He would not. "So heavy that even He cannot move it" is the string of nonsense syllables, like "This Statement is false.", not God creating something.
> They are the only known evidence for the existence of God.
Except for Babel Fish. Which proves that He cannot exist. QED.
And that Black is White, and that herd of zebras is nothing about which one should worry.
Re:Existence of g*d cannot be disproven
on
Why Myths Persist
·
· Score: 1
> Since there is no known way to disprove the existence of g*d,
Spell it out like an adult. G-O-D. Meaning an office, not necessarily any proposed occupant thereof, whether the YWHW/Elohim of the Hebrews, Maiden/Mother/Crone of Wicca, or the Great Old Ones (or the Elder Gods) of HPL.
> I wouldn't consider it sound reasoning that g*d must exist or the ze doesn't.
That is, "It" doesn't. English has had a gender-neutral form for a long time now, and we do not need the "Herstory" crowd making up a new one, especially one that sounds like something from Steve Martin's take on Inspector Clouseau.
> Once the entire universe is explored (technically possible), if > no life other than that found on (sourced from) Earth is found > then that would be a pretty darn convincing argument that God > does, in fact, exist.
No, it would not. Just that once, the Universe got lucky.
And let's face it: if we, in travelling the Universe, discover a cliff face upon which is written, in 30 cubit high letters of ever-burning fire, in ca 1200BC Semetic script, the 10 Commandments in a suitably stripped form to match what religious scholars would guess the original text of 10 Words, it still wouldn't be adequate evidence for many people. After all, some natural law allows the letters to burn forever on the rock (and are we certain it is forever, rather than just for the forseeable future?), just as a section of brain cells that can be stimulated to induce a feeling that God is present implies that it was all an accident of evolution, rather than a necessary organ placed there so that creatures could experience the Presense of a Real God, which can be mechanically or electrically stimulated because it is a physical construct.
BTW, since YHWH is a spirit and mind unbounded by Creation (at least in most sects' views) then any physical form is irrelevent to His Image, whereas the way that it understood morality and ethics would. Dr Zoidberg is at best, a 2. The Borg (especially a successful Borg) would be closer to an 7. Daleks would be a 9. Assuming a 0-10 scale (with 0 for the aliens being humans of known lineage who left somehow, like Romulans to our Vulcans, or the Romans from Ranks Of Bronze), of course.
This should nothave been modded as Funny, but as Informative.
I used to work with a *Dave* Bowman, and he had the worst Murphy field around computers that anyone had ever seen or heard of. One time he crashed a server for two days by just running a(n?) "ls" command.
> 9) Billions wasted inventing pointless crap, like ball-point > pens that write upside down in zero gravity
Invested entirely by the pen company, themselves. They saw an application, and decided to see what they could do because it might be interesting. When they produced the first few, the GAVE them to NASA, used the fact in ads, and sold the other million pens produced to the general public.
> Obviously, your claim is going to fail in a billion years > when the Sun heats up to the point life on Earth will end.
Actually, in only 100 million years, it will have heated to the point that one molecule of CO2 or methane will be enough to cause a runaway greenhouse effect even if everything else is controlled, and the whole Earth painted bright white.
Although by that time, we might be willing to spend a few 100,000 years moving the Earth's orbit to a more comfortable region, ala Niven.
> > how corruptable is the loss prevention fellow... > > He's probably making minimum wage, maybe slightly > more, so I imagine he's not corruptible at all.
Of course, well paid employees are always incorruptable. Like Enron executives. Just ask any of their shareholders left with pretty pieces of paper (if lucky) and an offsetting loss for their taxes, when the execs' fraud reduced the company to worthless.
Sorry, people are never above, beneath, or beyond suspicion, and worse for those who do not believe in Original Sin, rightly so.
O - Continuously Observe the suspect (to ensure they don't drop or discard the goods)
P/N - Not Pay
E - Attempt to exit
So if the suspect does not conceal it, but brazenly walks out with it, no crime has occurred? Or, is it a different offense than shoplifting?
Likewise, if the suspect walks behind another shopper, he/she is free and clear? So it is unlawful detain someone if they are organized like a gang of pickpockets, with Thief 1 taking the goods, concealing them just long enough to dump off to Thief 2, who then passes it to Thief 3 (or more), with changes or direction and such guaranteeing that no human could manage continuous observation?
Or, is it more important to stop shoplifting accusations than shoplifting? It WOULD ruin their crime stats, after all. We know, thanks to Hot Fuzz, that British police will do things like this:-)
> Why the fuck can't I fast-forward a DVD the same way I could a VHS?
Because you saved too much money on the player, or bought it too long ago? I can FF, FFF, and FFFF on my DVD (although the last eats a chapter too fast to tell if I am back to where I wanted to be before I fell asleep watching it).
Technically, I think that they are skipping frames rather than doing more per second, but it works out to the same thing.
This explains the whole interference of the Chinese government in disappearing Gedhun Choekyi Nyima and appointing Qoigyijabu as the 11th Panchen Lama: they have a long-term strategy of ensuring all hereditary Tibetan leaders are their puppets.
The Panchen Lama is not a hereditary position; he is a Tulku (reincarnating monk, keeping some or all of his previous soul/identity) just like the Dalai Lama. Since the Panchen Lama is the only person qualified to certify the next Dalai Lama incarnation, this means that the Chinese are guaranteeing that there will be no acknowleged Dalai Lama in the future, just one or more claimants, who will spend much of there time in disputes with the others, like with the dual Popes during the Avignon period, or the heirs to the Tsarist fortune, today.
Even if the Dali Lama came out and said we need to get rid of the old
system, the peasants of Tibet would have said "Reject hundred of years of tradition?
The Dali Lama has gone mad! Time for a new Dali Lama!"
How do you get a new Dalai Lama? There has only been one, who just shifts to a different body every so often.
At least according to the Buddhism that the peasants followed.
Yeah... China brought civilization and industrialization to Tibet, but they did it at a point of a gun just like Europe brought civilization to Africa. It is wrong and look how it turned out for a lot of places.
More like the way that the English and Spanish brought it to the (American) Indians, by replacing them. Certainly, that is what the Han imperialists (who claim to be Communists for now) want to happen. If they have to wait until Tibetian-descended people are all raised thinking that they are some variant of Han, they will accept that, but they would really like to replace them genetically, as well (of course, that is the correct behavior for any Darwinian).
> In the mid 70's, the American public wasn't terribly > interested in funding anything even remotely related to space.
In the mid 70's, the American public wasn't terribly interested in funding anything not related to casual unprotected sex, and various addictive drugs. Getting more, not stopping it. An [fill in the blank] Liberation.
Plus, NASA made Apollo 12 and 13 boring as Hell (until the unfortunate problem with the fuel cells), and 14 was a return to normalcy. Even though surveys said people liked the idea of a Space Program, they were not that interested in communicating that support to Congress.
Finally, I think that the Vietnam War drained all the ambition from the US public. I would point out that no amputees were returned by the North Vietnamese, and no one in the media mentioned that as odd, just to start.
> how is this going to sit with the religions of the world that truly think we are the only ones 'god' created?
Well, I expect that that the various American Indian tribes will just assume that they are another brand of those blasted white people that the Great Spirit created before getting the bugs works out of the process, just like black people.
> But now it is entirely possible for anyone to create
> high-quality music,
From what little of it that I have heard, I doubt that statement:-)
> photography, and (almost, we're
> still working on this one) movies with digital tools,
> and to distribute this art, along with their novels,
> short stories, poetry, theatrical scripts, and just
> about anything else you can think of, over the
> internet for little to nothing.
It was always possible, and the Internet had little to do with it; the problem comes when someone wants to be able to do this and make a living at it. Without copyright, Elton John might still make a living off of his concerts, but Berny Taupin gets nothing for writing all the lyrics to EJ's best songs, Burt Bacharach has to depend on his piano playing, and so on for more obscure cases.
> Actually, it's not even legal for a U.S. Citizen to buy a Cuban cigar.
And it's not even legal to exceed the posted speed limit, either, although driving that slowly (except at night in the rain) is a good way to cause an accident on most interstates.
My cousin lives about 1/2 hour from the border, and every so often drives to Canada and has a cigar or two. As long as someone doesn't buy them by the gross, or import them back into the USA, no one really cares.
It comes from an early Anglo-Saxon verb meaning to strike. The acronym theory is nonsense; the word is older than the use of Latin to euphemize; certainly it started before the separation from any Dutch tongue.
> Why do you accept this kind of sensorship in the US ?
This is not censorship. Walmart sells the bowdlerized versions, any other outlet can sell the unexpurgated version if they chose, and most do. If you buy at Walmart, you know what you are getting and what you are losing -- not that the customers necessarily think that missing the Anglo-Saxonisms is necessarily that bad.
> readers of slashdot would prefer unsensored music and TV.
Then they shouldn't buy their rap music and porn at Walmart, and I expect that few do. Those who try, and complain that they cannot, are either too stupid or are trolls.
> if it wasnt for the rock museum and drew carey i dont think anyone would care about that city.
All Pittsburghers would. Without it, we would have to drive all the way to Chicago to find a city whose sports teams we can hate, whereas Cleveland is a nice 3 hours away.
Also, Angel/Buffy fans would care, because there is another Hell Mouth, there.
Slashdot Mirror
Except for the really smart ones, who will learn how to ride and pillage again.
But money buys you guns, which lets you take as much food as you need (even if you have to get it via anthropophagy) from those who have it.
Always assuming that farmers aren't willing to sell.
Witness the Ukraine, under Stalin.
> once you take land out of agricultural use, it is never used for agriculture again. ...
> Once a building is there, that's it.
Tell that to the guy who found either Pompeii or Herculanium (I cannot remember which, probably the latter, since Pompeii was big enough to have been remembered) by plowing into a building. I expect that this occurred, and maybe still occurs, regularly in Europe near abandoned towns (like ~1/2 of all English towns from right before the Black Death) and cities.
Anyway, it is hardly the case that we are strapped for farmland. Otherwise, abandoned farmland without industry on it, or with abandoned plants, would turned back into ag land, rather than recreational areas.
Plants as in steel plants, above, just to disambiguate.
> I do have faith that I will succeed though
No, obviously from your post, you had faith that you would fail. And you DID fail. Therefore God exists, QED.
Now, aren't you feeling phullish? Beware of flying mistletoe, lest you die from its contact.
> "Can God create something so heavy that even He cant move?"
1) That is "can't move IT"
2) The usual answer is that He would not. "So heavy that even He cannot move it" is the string of nonsense syllables, like "This Statement is false.", not God creating something.
> They are the only known evidence for the existence of God.
Except for Babel Fish. Which proves that He cannot exist. QED.
And that Black is White, and that herd of zebras is nothing about which one should worry.
> Since there is no known way to disprove the existence of g*d,
Spell it out like an adult. G-O-D. Meaning an office, not necessarily any proposed occupant thereof, whether the YWHW/Elohim of the Hebrews, Maiden/Mother/Crone of Wicca, or the Great Old Ones (or the Elder Gods) of HPL.
> I wouldn't consider it sound reasoning that g*d must exist or the ze doesn't.
That is, "It" doesn't. English has had a gender-neutral form for a long time now, and we do not need the "Herstory" crowd making up a new one, especially one that sounds like something from Steve Martin's take on Inspector Clouseau.
> Once the entire universe is explored (technically possible), if
> no life other than that found on (sourced from) Earth is found
> then that would be a pretty darn convincing argument that God
> does, in fact, exist.
No, it would not. Just that once, the Universe got lucky.
And let's face it: if we, in travelling the Universe, discover a cliff face upon which is written, in 30 cubit high letters of ever-burning fire, in ca 1200BC Semetic script, the 10 Commandments in a suitably stripped form to match what religious scholars would guess the original text of 10 Words, it still wouldn't be adequate evidence for many people. After all, some natural law allows the letters to burn forever on the rock (and are we certain it is forever, rather than just for the forseeable future?), just as a section of brain cells that can be stimulated to induce a feeling that God is present implies that it was all an accident of evolution, rather than a necessary organ placed there so that creatures could experience the Presense of a Real God, which can be mechanically or electrically stimulated because it is a physical construct.
BTW, since YHWH is a spirit and mind unbounded by Creation (at least in most sects' views) then any physical form is irrelevent to His Image, whereas the way that it understood morality and ethics would. Dr Zoidberg is at best, a 2. The Borg (especially a successful Borg) would be closer to an 7. Daleks would be a 9. Assuming a 0-10 scale (with 0 for the aliens being humans of known lineage who left somehow, like Romulans to our Vulcans, or the Romans from Ranks Of Bronze), of course.
> Unfortunate choice of last name.
This should nothave been modded as Funny, but as Informative.
I used to work with a *Dave* Bowman, and he had the worst Murphy field around computers that anyone had ever seen or heard of. One time he crashed a server for two days by just running a(n?) "ls" command.
> 9) Billions wasted inventing pointless crap, like ball-point
> pens that write upside down in zero gravity
Invested entirely by the pen company, themselves. They saw an application, and decided to see what they could do because it might be interesting. When they produced the first few, the GAVE them to NASA, used the fact in ads, and sold the other million pens produced to the general public.
Result: PROFIT !!!
> Obviously, your claim is going to fail in a billion years
> when the Sun heats up to the point life on Earth will end.
Actually, in only 100 million years, it will have heated to the point that one molecule of CO2 or methane will be enough to cause a runaway greenhouse effect even if everything else is controlled, and the whole Earth painted bright white.
Although by that time, we might be willing to spend a few 100,000 years moving the Earth's orbit to a more comfortable region, ala Niven.
> > how corruptable is the loss prevention fellow...
>
> He's probably making minimum wage, maybe slightly
> more, so I imagine he's not corruptible at all.
Of course, well paid employees are always incorruptable. Like Enron executives. Just ask any of their shareholders left with pretty pieces of paper (if lucky) and an offsetting loss for their taxes, when the execs' fraud reduced the company to worthless.
Sorry, people are never above, beneath, or beyond suspicion, and worse for those who do not believe in Original Sin, rightly so.
So if the suspect does not conceal it, but brazenly walks out with it, no crime has occurred? Or, is it a different offense than shoplifting?
Likewise, if the suspect walks behind another shopper, he/she is free and clear? So it is unlawful detain someone if they are organized like a gang of pickpockets, with Thief 1 taking the goods, concealing them just long enough to dump off to Thief 2, who then passes it to Thief 3 (or more), with changes or direction and such guaranteeing that no human could manage continuous observation?
Or, is it more important to stop shoplifting accusations than shoplifting? It WOULD ruin their crime stats, after all. We know, thanks to Hot Fuzz, that British police will do things like this :-)
> Why the fuck can't I fast-forward a DVD the same way I could a VHS?
Because you saved too much money on the player, or bought it too long ago? I can FF, FFF, and FFFF on my DVD (although the last eats a chapter too fast to tell if I am back to where I wanted to be before I fell asleep watching it).
Technically, I think that they are skipping frames rather than doing more per second, but it works out to the same thing.
The Panchen Lama is not a hereditary position; he is a Tulku (reincarnating monk, keeping some or all of his previous soul/identity) just like the Dalai Lama. Since the Panchen Lama is the only person qualified to certify the next Dalai Lama incarnation, this means that the Chinese are guaranteeing that there will be no acknowleged Dalai Lama in the future, just one or more claimants, who will spend much of there time in disputes with the others, like with the dual Popes during the Avignon period, or the heirs to the Tsarist fortune, today.
How do you get a new Dalai Lama? There has only been one, who just shifts to a different body every so often.
At least according to the Buddhism that the peasants followed.
More like the way that the English and Spanish brought it to the (American) Indians, by replacing them. Certainly, that is what the Han imperialists (who claim to be Communists for now) want to happen. If they have to wait until Tibetian-descended people are all raised thinking that they are some variant of Han, they will accept that, but they would really like to replace them genetically, as well (of course, that is the correct behavior for any Darwinian).
> In the mid 70's, the American public wasn't terribly
> interested in funding anything even remotely related to space.
In the mid 70's, the American public wasn't terribly interested in funding anything not related to casual unprotected sex, and various addictive drugs. Getting more, not stopping it. An [fill in the blank] Liberation.
Plus, NASA made Apollo 12 and 13 boring as Hell (until the unfortunate problem with the fuel cells), and 14 was a return to normalcy. Even though surveys said people liked the idea of a Space Program, they were not that interested in communicating that support to Congress.
Finally, I think that the Vietnam War drained all the ambition from the US public. I would point out that no amputees were returned by the North Vietnamese, and no one in the media mentioned that as odd, just to start.
> How was the shuttle "wrong"?
It was sold as a DC-3. It was designed to be a DC-2. Post-Proxmiring, what NASA got was a Curtiss Jenny with an enclosed cabin.
> and i don't know about you, but there's no way i'd go
> into space not knowing if shit was going to work or not.
You are probably not a test pilot, are you?
BTW, do you drive on highways? Fly commercially? They have disasters, too, so "knowing if shit was going to work or not" is not always enough.
> Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos.
Which one?
> how is this going to sit with the religions of the world that truly think we are the only ones 'god' created?
Well, I expect that that the various American Indian tribes will just assume that they are another brand of those blasted white people that the Great Spirit created before getting the bugs works out of the process, just like black people.
> But now it is entirely possible for anyone to create > high-quality music, From what little of it that I have heard, I doubt that statement :-)
> photography, and (almost, we're
> still working on this one) movies with digital tools,
> and to distribute this art, along with their novels,
> short stories, poetry, theatrical scripts, and just
> about anything else you can think of, over the
> internet for little to nothing.
It was always possible, and the Internet had little to do with it; the problem comes when someone wants to be able to do this and make a living at it. Without copyright, Elton John might still make a living off of his concerts, but Berny Taupin gets nothing for writing all the lyrics to EJ's best songs, Burt Bacharach has to depend on his piano playing, and so on for more obscure cases.
> Actually, it's not even legal for a U.S. Citizen to buy a Cuban cigar.
And it's not even legal to exceed the posted speed limit, either, although driving that slowly (except at night in the rain) is a good way to cause an accident on most interstates.
My cousin lives about 1/2 hour from the border, and every so often drives to Canada and has a cigar or two. As long as someone doesn't buy them by the gross, or import them back into the USA, no one really cares.
> look up origins of the word "fuck" sometime
It comes from an early Anglo-Saxon verb meaning to strike. The acronym theory is nonsense; the word is older than the use of Latin to euphemize; certainly it started before the separation from any Dutch tongue.
> Why do you accept this kind of sensorship in the US ?
This is not censorship. Walmart sells the bowdlerized versions, any other outlet can sell the unexpurgated version if they chose, and most do. If you buy at Walmart, you know what you are getting and what you are losing -- not that the customers necessarily think that missing the Anglo-Saxonisms is necessarily that bad.
> readers of slashdot would prefer unsensored music and TV.
Then they shouldn't buy their rap music and porn at Walmart, and I expect that few do. Those who try, and complain that they cannot, are either too stupid or are trolls.
> if it wasnt for the rock museum and drew carey i dont think anyone would care about that city.
All Pittsburghers would. Without it, we would have to drive all the way to Chicago to find a city whose sports teams we can hate, whereas Cleveland is a nice 3 hours away.
Also, Angel/Buffy fans would care, because there is another Hell Mouth, there.