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  1. Re:Or they're terrified on Study Finds the Pious Fight Death Hardest · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's only messed up if there is a belief that original sin means that you are guilty for the sins of Adam/Eve -- that is, their sin has created some type of guilt on the part of their descendants.

    Another thought is simply that the the sin of Adam/Eve was an "upward fall" whereas the sin is a consequence of free will and full humanity -- if people did not have the ability to choose between right and wrong, then they would not be fully human. Here original sin is the state of being able to sin, which is inherited just as humanity is inherited.

    Another thought on original sin is simply that is an insignificant blemish, and therefore of no importance (though it still exists).

    Another thought is that the sin of Adam/Eve, has caused humanity to have a tendency towards sin -- and thus the original sin is simply a bias in behavior.

    Original sin really is not a single belief any more than Christianity itself is a single set of beliefs, or that slashdot "thinks" anything in particular. Instead, it is a collection of related beliefs that are often lumped together into one -- "original sin".

  2. Re:Big arrows on Clear Public Satellite Imagery Tantamount to Yelling Fire · · Score: 1
  3. Re:Chinese puns on Chinese Subvert Censorship With a Popular Pun · · Score: 1

    This results in tons and tons of words sounding exactly the same, and the only way to know them apart is by context.

    There called "homonyms". Owe, halve ewe never scene them?

    And then there is this: http://www.exploratorium.edu/exhibits/ladle from Anguish Languish: http://www.justanyone.com/allanguish.html

  4. Re:Duh on French Police Save Millions Switching To Ubuntu · · Score: 1

    Isn't that supposed to be 11?

  5. Re:This seems strangely familiar on Microsoft Shoots Own Foot In Iceland · · Score: 1

    The key is "transfer". The agreement between Ford and A says that A can not transfer the leases to anyone other that the initial leasers. If A transfers any leases and allows others to use the cars as you suggest, then A is in violation of the contract between Ford and A. Right or not, this is how many sublicensing schemes work.

  6. Re:"When are you going to crash?" on Wolfram Promises Computing That Answers Questions · · Score: 1

    It isn't.

  7. Re:Lojban on Wolfram Promises Computing That Answers Questions · · Score: 1

    is the answer to this question "no"?

    It isn't.

  8. Re:People are special. on Wolfram Promises Computing That Answers Questions · · Score: 1

    The brain plus infinite pencils and paper is Turing complete. The brain does not have infinite storage.

  9. Re:Not like The Pirate Bay on Big Swedish Filesharing Server Seized · · Score: 1

    Over the last hundred years, there has been a drastic increase in productivity of the workforce how many farmers do we have now versus then?). As a result, the cost of labor has increased, which is why people like teachers get paid more, but don't really have the same level of productivity increase as the rest of the workforce. The latter is true for all labor-based disciplines to some degree (why do you think that doctors don't make house calls any more?), which includes artists. And so, when the cost of art goes up, then the demand for art will go down. That's were you get the line "the means for Artists to make money is evaporating." Of course, this is over a very long time, and there are compensating factors (like reduced middle-men costs, or the rise of advertising), but the point stands.

  10. Re:Not like The Pirate Bay on Big Swedish Filesharing Server Seized · · Score: 1

    And there are a couple important differences.

    Creative works are expected to be for the public good (at least in the US, see the constitution), while medical records are not. Thus there is a difference in the expected distribution of the creative work and of the medical records.

    Second, most creative works are actually actively being spread as widely as possible (in order to increase revenue) while medical records are actively kept secret (to increase privacy). Creative works are even allowed to be publicly, indiscriminantly performed, such as on TV or radio, with full permission of the originator, as opposed to the originators of medical records (patients). Once you have made something public (through public performance), there is a greater argument for further distribution.

    There is more to the parallel than the fact that they are files that originate somewhere and are spread around.

  11. Re:Good thing it's a beta on UAC Whitelist Hole In Windows 7 · · Score: 1

    Sorry, we do. The default account created with an install is an admin account. The default for a new account is admin. An admin account is one where the group is set to wheel. The applications folder is owned by the group wheel, which means any admin can do anything in the Applications folder. The Finder will sometimes do something special here, but not always, and outside the Finder is no protection, except generally installers ask for permission too, as the Installer program wants to work that way. However, if you create a regular user, then the group is not wheel, and that user can not modify the Applications folder. Instead, the Finder asks for an admin name/password so that permissions can be bypassed (the "sudo mechanism").

  12. Re:Selective memory on Is Salacious Content Driving E-Book Sales? · · Score: 1
  13. Re:alt.stories.erotica on Is Salacious Content Driving E-Book Sales? · · Score: 4, Interesting

    My father taught FORTRAN in the 80's, and one of his assignments was to write a program that printed a (text) calender for any given year, bonus points for extra features. One student turned in a program that printed an ASCII graphic for each month -- they were to be looked at sideways on the old 132 character wide fanfold paper -- and the pictures were high-quality center-fold style girls. The student got his bonus points.

  14. Re:The Volt is the least of GM's problems on GM Cornered Into Defending the Volt · · Score: 1

    Personally, I call anything > 25 mpg a gas sipper.

    Damn, this does not even meet the required average (27.5 MPG) here in the US (for passenger cars). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_Average_Fuel_Economy

  15. Re:Moron Scientists Moron Legislators on Illinois Declares Pluto a Planet · · Score: 1

    Rather than to repeat the previous posters about the planet, I will mention that the "Brontosaurus" was renamed because it was discovered that the "Brontosaurus" was another name for the Apatosaurus. When there were two names for the same animal, the first name published is the one that wins. So, really, the name of the "Brontosaurus" did not change, it stayed Apatosaurus, and the redundant name was discarded. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apatosaurus

  16. Re:Same sort of retards who on Illinois Declares Pluto a Planet · · Score: 1
  17. Re:Never gonna happen on Illinois Declares Pluto a Planet · · Score: 1

    I will repeat the reply I gave to the previous poster.

    You are thinking that they are rigorous enough to think of overhead as being at zenith, as opposed to overhead meaning that it is above one's head. Think of the sun at noon. It is overhead, but not at zenith, except in certain special cases.

  18. Re:They missed something. on Illinois Declares Pluto a Planet · · Score: 1

    You are thinking that they are rigorous enough to think of overhead as being at zenith, as opposed to overhead meaning that it is above one's head. Think of the sun at noon. It is overhead, but not at zenith, except in certain special cases.

  19. Re:Four Inner Planets, Four Outer Planets on Illinois Declares Pluto a Planet · · Score: 1

    Interesting. In the early 90's, my father talked about how Pluto didn't really match up with how the other planets were: it was solid yet out beyond the gaseous planets, it had high eccentricity and inclination (it is closer than Neptune sometimes!), etc., etc. It in general really didn't work right as a planet, but people called it one anyway, because there were only planets, asteroids, and comets up to that time, and Pluto certainly wasn't an asteroid or comet.

  20. Re:Pff this is ridiculous on Illinois Declares Pluto a Planet · · Score: 1

    That's stupid, we know it is really 4/1.25 = 3.2.

  21. Re:73 years old? on Bionic Eye Gives Blind Man Sight · · Score: 1
    Couldn't see anything:

    Ron, who has not revealed his surname, told the BBC: "For 30 years I've seen absolutely nothing at all, it's all been black, but now light is coming through. Suddenly to be able to see light again is truly wonderful.["]

  22. Re:Out of copyright monopoly? on "Authors Guild" Skims Half of Google Book-Rights Settlement · · Score: 1

    The summary is bad. The article was about books with copyright holders, not books out of copyright.

  23. Re:Summary and blogspam link laughably incorrect on "Authors Guild" Skims Half of Google Book-Rights Settlement · · Score: 1

    Do note that the settlement was for books with copyrights, and so are not ones you can get from Project Gutenberg.

  24. Re:An was an even Bigger mistake: on Null References, the Billion Dollar Mistake · · Score: 1

    The appropriate comparison to numbers would be NaN, in my opinion. Should we allow such a thing? Depends on what you are doing.

  25. Re:There was a bigger mistake: on Null References, the Billion Dollar Mistake · · Score: 1

    Memory is cheap. Fixing bugs do to bad NUL termination is not.