It's a cool place if you're into hardware, but Akihabara's main draw is availability and variety rather than price. Electronic and computing equipment is generally quite expensive in Japan.
It would be a mistake to attribute *too* much wisdom and social enlightenment to the founding fathers. After all, at least some of them kept slaves and I don't know of any were troubled by the systematic holocaust perpetrated against the aboriginal population. It's likely that their enlightenment was enlightenment only when it's compared to the average white middle class mindset of that era. That's not an attempt to criticize them or demean their achievements, it's just putting things into a proper historical perspective.
If you're say a Buddhist or athiest being tried by a judge who has the 10 Commandments on the wall [...]
...then you should remember that US law is in fact based on the Ten commandments, as are all legal systems descended from those of Europe, totally regardless of whether or not this is alluded to on any nearby monuments or wall decorations. Adherents of other faiths are subject to those laws just the same as everybody else.
FWIW, I'm no bible basher and have variously considered myself an atheist and an agnostic at different times in my life. But I'm not blind to the (perhaps few) positive effects the Christian religion has had in the development of our culture, and it irks me to see people so eager to sweep it all away and rewrite history in the purely ideological interests of cultural relativism. If we were to let them have their way we would be left with no shared culture at all. So keep the faith. The Ten Commandments are worth hanging on to.
Thomas Jeffersen specifically noted that the 'Hindoo', the 'Mohammeden' and the 'Infidel'
If true, I didn't know. Yes, I was mostly talking out of my hat. However I very strongly doubt that the protection of Hindus was uppermost in Jefferson's or Adams' minds, under the circumstances. Very likely these were afterthoughts.
As for molding reality to fit worldviews - we're *all* guilty of that. No exceptions.
No, you're just not making sense IMHO. Here it is as I see it:
The founding fathers were all Christian - even the atheists were "Christian" atheists;o) In those times other religions (bar Judaism, possibly) just weren't on the menu for white Europeans. And those that were fleeing religious persecution were actually only fleeing the persecution of one Christian sect against another. So when they drew up a constitution that prohibited state involvement in religion, what they *meant* was that the State shouldn't choose one form of Christianity over another. Christianity was all they knew about so this should be obvious.
Any question about the propriety of state involvement in religion is therefore moot in the Alabama case, if one attempts to read beyond the letter of the law, to understand what the founding fathers intended when they framed the constitution. All forms of Christianity (and Judaism too for that matter) acknowledge the Ten Commandments as the basis of law. There is simply nothing in that monument that the founding fathers would have found offensive.
Those doing the complaining are only dogmatic liberals and johnny-come-latelies who would twist the meaning of the constitution to fit their own world view. A world view where God has no authority, nothing is forbidden and everything is permitted.
I applaud Chief Justice Roy Moore for his principled stand against these heathens.
The guy who invented this technique is called Dayton Taylor, and I seem to remember that it was written up on Slashdot some time before the Wachowsi brothers movie first appeared on our radar. That's how old Slashdot is. Doesn't it seem a long time ago now!
IIRC the inventor had originally envisaged its main application as being for televised sports games, to give a new twist to "action replay" of crucial moments. And it may have appeared in some TV commercials before appearing in any film. I doubt he realized back then that it would one day become a mainstream movie special effect. Or a Japanese comedy stage act.
Imagine [...] a computer that would glow different colors based on how much of its processing power was being used. When it turned red, you'd know that a crash was imminent.
a story about three companies which are trying to replace the Light bulb
Q: How many companies does it take to replace the light bulb?
A: Three.
1. One firm to dream up a replacement technology and patent it without actually specifying how it is to be achieved.
2. One firm to actually develop a replacement technology and bring it to market.
3. And a firm of lawyers to sue the second firm on behalf of the first firm.
4. ???
5. Profit!
In SOVIET RUSSIA, Beowulf cluster of lighbulbs invents YOU!
This is just a sideshow, winged shuttle technology will never make space access cheap enough to make a difference. Plus it only gets you into LEO anyway, and there are already plenty of ways to get payloads into LEO.
The TV shows "Yes Minister" and "Yes, Prime Minister" starred Paul Eddington as Jim Hacker (You may recgnize him from the 1970's sitcom "The Good Life", I'm sure that one was sold abroad) and Nigel Hawthorne (The Madness of King George, Demolition Man).
Even with Sky satellite TV in the house, my wife and I spend most of our TV hours tuned into BBC1 & 2. Apart from the lack of annoying commercials, the BBC have consistently out-done all the commercial channels in terms of the quality of its programming. Way to go, BBC. We love you!
Others have mentioned Dr Who, Black Adder and Monty Python's Flying Circus. Here are some other BBC classics, just a few favourites that spring to mind:
Period Drama: Elizabeth I; I, Claudius Drama: Casualty Comedy: Fawlty Towers; Steptoe and Son; Only Fools and Horses; One Foot in the Grave; Red Dwarf; Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Palestinian freedom fighters are fighting for... their freedom. Duh.
But you insist on calling them terrorists, and thereby blind yourself to their openly stated purpose.
Yes of course they want Israel out of their lands and out of their lives. Considering what's been done to them, wouldn't you?
I admit there are a few extremists in organization like Hamas and Islamic Jihad but this is only to be expected among a people that have been brutally oppressed for decades. Remove the oppression and the extremism will die off.
If it were anywhere else in the world they would surely have succeeded in regaining their autonomy by now. But American money has propped up the Israeli regime and kept the Palestinians in the gutter. It is greatest crime of the postwar age.
unless a large number of people vote "Pathfinder/Sojourner site".
If we could get sufficiently high res pix to see the pathfinder rover itself we'd probably see that it's up on bricks with the tyres missing and the radio's been stolen.
Slashdot Mirror
Could somebody with mod points please mark the parent as insightful? Thanks.
It's a cool place if you're into hardware, but Akihabara's main draw is availability and variety rather than price. Electronic and computing equipment is generally quite expensive in Japan.
I imagine not many people know this. I suppose it would be considered very inconvenient in the eyes of some.
I'm just...stunned. Thanks, that was very interesting reading indeed.
It would be a mistake to attribute *too* much wisdom and social enlightenment to the founding fathers. After all, at least some of them kept slaves and I don't know of any were troubled by the systematic holocaust perpetrated against the aboriginal population. It's likely that their enlightenment was enlightenment only when it's compared to the average white middle class mindset of that era. That's not an attempt to criticize them or demean their achievements, it's just putting things into a proper historical perspective.
FWIW, I'm no bible basher and have variously considered myself an atheist and an agnostic at different times in my life. But I'm not blind to the (perhaps few) positive effects the Christian religion has had in the development of our culture, and it irks me to see people so eager to sweep it all away and rewrite history in the purely ideological interests of cultural relativism. If we were to let them have their way we would be left with no shared culture at all. So keep the faith. The Ten Commandments are worth hanging on to.
If true, I didn't know. Yes, I was mostly talking out of my hat. However I very strongly doubt that the protection of Hindus was uppermost in Jefferson's or Adams' minds, under the circumstances. Very likely these were afterthoughts.
As for molding reality to fit worldviews - we're *all* guilty of that. No exceptions.
No, you're just not making sense IMHO. Here it is as I see it:
;o) In those times other religions (bar Judaism, possibly) just weren't on the menu for white Europeans. And those that were fleeing religious persecution were actually only fleeing the persecution of one Christian sect against another. So when they drew up a constitution that prohibited state involvement in religion, what they *meant* was that the State shouldn't choose one form of Christianity over another. Christianity was all they knew about so this should be obvious.
The founding fathers were all Christian - even the atheists were "Christian" atheists
Any question about the propriety of state involvement in religion is therefore moot in the Alabama case, if one attempts to read beyond the letter of the law, to understand what the founding fathers intended when they framed the constitution. All forms of Christianity (and Judaism too for that matter) acknowledge the Ten Commandments as the basis of law. There is simply nothing in that monument that the founding fathers would have found offensive.
Those doing the complaining are only dogmatic liberals and johnny-come-latelies who would twist the meaning of the constitution to fit their own world view. A world view where God has no authority, nothing is forbidden and everything is permitted.
I applaud Chief Justice Roy Moore for his principled stand against these heathens.
Or they could just suspend a raw chicken above it and see how long it takes to cook from the microwave emissions.
The guy who invented this technique is called Dayton Taylor, and I seem to remember that it was written up on Slashdot some time before the Wachowsi brothers movie first appeared on our radar. That's how old Slashdot is. Doesn't it seem a long time ago now!
IIRC the inventor had originally envisaged its main application as being for televised sports games, to give a new twist to "action replay" of crucial moments. And it may have appeared in some TV commercials before appearing in any film. I doubt he realized back then that it would one day become a mainstream movie special effect. Or a Japanese comedy stage act.
Here's the first one and here's the second one.
Mine does that already. Maybe I need bigger fans.
Q: How many companies does it take to replace the light bulb?
A: Three.
1. One firm to dream up a replacement technology and patent it without actually specifying how it is to be achieved.
2. One firm to actually develop a replacement technology and bring it to market.
3. And a firm of lawyers to sue the second firm on behalf of the first firm.
4. ???
5. Profit!
In SOVIET RUSSIA, Beowulf cluster of lighbulbs invents YOU!
Yeah well, it doesn't work just substituting "Mars" for "Moon". Mars doesn't orbit Earth, for one thing.
I agree absolutely.
This is just a sideshow, winged shuttle technology will never make space access cheap enough to make a difference. Plus it only gets you into LEO anyway, and there are already plenty of ways to get payloads into LEO.
Space elevator is the way to go.
What, you mean like... BCHHHHHHHHHHH!
In SOVIET RUSSIA, Overlords welcome YOU!
You mean patent infringers will be whacked across the rear end with a cane? I'm not quite sure what you're suggesting.
The TV shows "Yes Minister" and "Yes, Prime Minister" starred Paul Eddington as Jim Hacker (You may recgnize him from the 1970's sitcom "The Good Life", I'm sure that one was sold abroad) and Nigel Hawthorne (The Madness of King George, Demolition Man).
Even with Sky satellite TV in the house, my wife and I spend most of our TV hours tuned into BBC1 & 2. Apart from the lack of annoying commercials, the BBC have consistently out-done all the commercial channels in terms of the quality of its programming. Way to go, BBC. We love you!
Others have mentioned Dr Who, Black Adder and Monty Python's Flying Circus. Here are some other BBC classics, just a few favourites that spring to mind:
Period Drama: Elizabeth I; I, Claudius
Drama: Casualty
Comedy: Fawlty Towers; Steptoe and Son; Only Fools and Horses; One Foot in the Grave; Red Dwarf; Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Palestinian freedom fighters are fighting for... their freedom. Duh.
But you insist on calling them terrorists, and thereby blind yourself to their openly stated purpose.
Yes of course they want Israel out of their lands and out of their lives. Considering what's been done to them, wouldn't you?
I admit there are a few extremists in organization like Hamas and Islamic Jihad but this is only to be expected among a people that have been brutally oppressed for decades. Remove the oppression and the extremism will die off.
If it were anywhere else in the world they would surely have succeeded in regaining their autonomy by now. But American money has propped up the Israeli regime and kept the Palestinians in the gutter. It is greatest crime of the postwar age.
"phack you" is also good, but sounds different.
whichever, you need a comma before the "cok soker" bit.
"faha queue" works a lot better. Check it out.
Show me ONE nation, or ethnic group, that DOESN'T suffer from substance dependence problems. They're *all* at it.
Puny humans.
If we could get sufficiently high res pix to see the pathfinder rover itself we'd probably see that it's up on bricks with the tyres missing and the radio's been stolen.
Well I suppose it's possible attitudes would have changed there since America's response to 9/11. They did everywhere else.