You make it look like someone doing elementary chemistry experiments in Texas would need a permit. That can't be right, but you sure make it look convincing.
As somebody who went to school in Texas: no, it's quite right. Science departments in schools all apply for those permits. If you want to have chemistry equipment at home, you have to, too.
Which has nothing to do with being "bad for your lungs" and more to do with growing up in a sheltered, sterile environment such that your body doesn't get used to the pollen.
Rarely a good idea- common sense says it can't be good for the lungs.
Common sense is frequently wrong. How about all of the pollen you inhale on a regular basis? How about the burning hot particles you inhale every time you smell a hot cup of tea or coffee?
Yes, the anonymous person is accusing the person who calls himself "Archangel Michael" of being an egotist. That seems perfectly reasonable. Am I missing something?
Genuine question - are you weeping for the future?
Nope! The information age has made it easier to see the entire world's issues than ever before, but realistically, overall I think civilization is in the best shape it's ever been in. Don't get me wrong, there are still plenty of issues, and we've got a long way to go before things are perfect, but I think we'll get there eventually. We're certainly far better off now than, say, the people who lived back during the US revolution, or back during medieval times in Europe.
Why does the law get this decision? Because they "can't decide for themselves"? Why can't they? Who is the government, or even some random person who finds out, to tell them they can't?
Not that I'm saying it's a good thing, but that's what the government does. They tell you what you can and cannot legally do. That's the entire point of government. Who are they to do so? Well, they're the government.
You do not have full freedom of speech.
In what way are you prohibited from saying what you want?
they can coerce you into fighting, and dying, for that same country
The draft was discontinued in 1973, and you't not required to register for selective service until you're 18.
You must attend public school(and your parents are forced to pay for this, too).
That's a deceptive way of putting it -- everybody is forced to pay for it, through their income taxes.
So why does the government get to decide what you can do with your body, the one "property" they cannot take away from you(I'm starting to wonder if I should add "yet" to this. I get the feeling if left alone, they'll find a way...)?
No, they already do that, too. Familiar with the death penalty?
No, he admitted that the point to his life (all of ours, really) is to contribute to the propagation of his species. Why is that so hard for you to accept?
Why does there even need to be a point? Am I allowed to decide my own purpose rather than having one forced on me?
But, yes, it's true that Christians are against homosexuality. No, it's NOT true that Christians are against homosexuals. Christianity is one of the most "gay-friendly" religions out there
I can just ignore most of that post, but wow, really? First of all, there are many Christians who have no problem with homosexuality (unless you're going to make the argument "no true Christian accepts homosexuality!", in which case apparently you're the sole authority of what "Christian" means and there's no point in even making that argument, because you could just change it at will).
Second, saying "I hate who you are but don't have anything against you" is feel-good double-talk. I guarantee you that no gay person will ever say, "Well, I know you think I'm going to be tortured eternally, you think I'm an abomination, and you want to use the law to prevent me from being with who I love, but that's all ok because you say you're not against me." That's bullshit.
And finally... Christianity is "gay-friendly"? Seriously? How many religions can you name that condemn homosexuality as much as modern Christianity does? Can you name any non-Abrahamic religions?
but don't let that stop you from bashing them for being against the act.
Of course it doesn't. The problem here is that there's nothing wrong with the act, either. You deserve to be bashed just as much as if you said that eating shellfish or wearing clothing made from mixed-blend fibers was an abomination.
What's sad is that Christians have something you will never have.
No, what's sad is Christians who are so deluded by their faith that they cannot imagine what life would be like without it, and so they make up stories about how horrible life must be in order to convince themselves that they made the right choice.
The truth is that I know I have to treasure what I have right now, because eventually I won't be here any more. I have to do my best to leave the world a better place than when I entered it, and I will (hopefully) live on by being fondly remembered for the impact I had on the world and people around me. I don't have to fear not being good enough to enter any "paradise" because I know that's just a fable, and I can do more than my life than spend it trying to appease some invisible omnipotent friend.
I'm not bitter at the ideal, "true" Christian who acts like you described. They sound like nice people. I'm bitter at the real kinds of Christians who actually exist -- the ones who use technology to spread their doctrine of fear and ignorance, tell nonbelievers how horrible they are, and try to use the government to enforce laws that are solely based on their ancient religious texts.
You completely ignored what he meant because you got offended.
He didn't say that atheists are immoral or incapable of spirituality. He said there is no moral component to atheism -- and there isn't. All "atheism" implies is the lack of belief in deities. There is no sort of moral prescription in there, either overt or implied. You are certainly capable of determining your own moral code, but you could do that regardless of your religion. You could just as easily be an atheist who believes that your country's laws decide what is right or wrong, or you could follow a godless spiritual philosophy that declares you have to behave in a particular way in order to eventually reach enlightenment.
I'd go so far as to say that most people determine their own moral code, even if they attribute it to their religious teachings -- have you ever noticed how most highly religious people never say that they disagree with their holy text's moral code? Nobody ever says, "I don't care about homosexuality and think it's great, but my bible says it's evil, so I have to persecute you anyway." Strangely, their holy text always agrees with their personal opinions.
You mean the N64 and Gamecube weren't massive failures?
How do you define "failure"? If the measure of success or failure is purely how many more or fewer units you've sold than your competitors, then sure. On the other hand, Nintendo made a lot of profit on both systems, and plenty of good games were produced for both of them. Considering that they're still in business and doing very well with basically the same business model they've always had, I don't think they could be considered massive failures, if even failures at all.
Do you really, honestly, truly believe that the US Government needs its own CAs and can't simply ask Verisign/Symantec to hand over a valid CA for a domain they want?
The USG doesn't want to use Verisign/Symantec's CAs. If it was using them, then it would be possible for Verisign/Symantec to sign something and make it look as though it was signed by the USG. That's why they need their own.
(believe it or not, the government does things with SSL other than impersonate web sites so that they can do MitM attacks on civilian communications)
I'll switch as soon as I find a viable NAT solution for IPv6. I *like* devices in my home network to be hidden behind a single IP address for privacy and convenience. I am not willing to allow these devices to use public IP.
Here's the thing: it's never going to happen. NAT is a hack, and one of the major purposes of IPv6 is making it unnecessary. Really, there is no point to it.
Here is your problem: you don't want people outside your network to be able to access computers inside your network.
Here is the solution: configure your router to drop all incoming connections (in fact, that's probably the default).
There is no added convenience to NAT; it adds extra complexity to routing and makes it a pain to host servers, especially if you have multiple servers that want to listen to the same port. The added privacy (requests all coming from a single IP) is an illusion; anybody who actually wants to tell the connections apart can do packet inspection to look for the characteristics of different computers.
From the perspective of the developers, you're wanting them to spend a considerable amount of time implementing a feature that is completely pointless for reasons that are just as "religious" as you accuse them of being.
If you liked Amarok 1.4, you might give Clementine a try, which is a fork of Amarok 1.4. There hasn't been a lot of development on it recently, but it works pretty well anyway. The interface is certainly much better than Amarok 2.x's.
For what it's worth, a few years ago one of Nokia's internal Qt developers came and gave a presentation on it to my company. He told us that they all pronounced it "Q T", and the "cute" pronunciation was created and pushed by their marketing department.
your code monkeys forced a stealth patch onto skyrim's TESV.exe
They didn't "force" a "stealth patch." You say you used to like Steam, but apparently you aren't aware that by default Steam automatically downloads & installs game patches as soon as they're available. If you don't want it to do that, there's a checkbox in the game properties to tell it to not automatically keep the game up to date. If you had that unchecked in the first place, you wouldn't have gotten the patch, no "forcing" involved.
disabling the large address aware patch
No, it installed a new TESV.exe that was protected by Steam's DRM. The original one wasn't, which made it trivially easy to pirate Skyrim. To be fair, the damage is already done, but I'm sure they're legally obligated to put their DRM on Skyrim -- just like every other game that gets released through Steam. The fact that you got an unencrypted binary that you could modify was a fluke. How many other games have you bought through them had modifyable binaries?
Give me one reason why I ever again should buy from your huckster business
Because they sell good games at reasonable prices and have the least intrusive DRM in the business? Yeah, it sure would be nice if they had no DRM, but almost none of the big releases come without DRM nowadays. Why were you buying games from them before?
this week you made it abundantly clear that you are nothing but a shitstain.
No, they made it clear that they care more about DRM than letting users modify their binaries, which you should have already known. Blame Bethesda for releasing buggy games that the community has to patch, not Steam.
Basically, Nintendo of Europe is the cool branch nowadays. NoA is primarily concerned with pushing party games. For more evidence, see Xenoblade, The Last Story, and Pandora's Tower, which aren't receiving an American release at all.
I use a lot of C++/Qt though and that's snappy, haven't run into a Java/Qt application yet - examples?
Unfortunately, there aren't very many out there. The ones I've had experience with are generally specialized proprietary applications. I know there's an open source 3D modeling application called Moonlight|3D, and I don't know how powerful it is compared to other applications, but the interface is pretty snappy, at least.
For Java/SWT examples, there's also VirgoFTP (an FTP client) and Deinonychus (a mail client).
Slashdot Mirror
You make it look like someone doing elementary chemistry experiments in Texas would need a permit. That can't be right, but you sure make it look convincing.
As somebody who went to school in Texas: no, it's quite right. Science departments in schools all apply for those permits. If you want to have chemistry equipment at home, you have to, too.
No, but if you're streaming it, it will take longer than 24 seconds, unless you like to watch in ultra-fast-foward.
Ok, so it'll take an hour to exceed your monthly cap instead of 24 seconds. Do you have a point or are you just being pedantic?
Sure, you could. But what are you trying to do? Torrent a DVD to your mobile device?
I might just want to stream a movie in HD from Netflix to my mobile device. Is that so terribly wrong?
Which has nothing to do with being "bad for your lungs" and more to do with growing up in a sheltered, sterile environment such that your body doesn't get used to the pollen.
Rarely a good idea- common sense says it can't be good for the lungs.
Common sense is frequently wrong. How about all of the pollen you inhale on a regular basis? How about the burning hot particles you inhale every time you smell a hot cup of tea or coffee?
Yes, the anonymous person is accusing the person who calls himself "Archangel Michael" of being an egotist. That seems perfectly reasonable. Am I missing something?
Genuine question - are you weeping for the future?
Nope! The information age has made it easier to see the entire world's issues than ever before, but realistically, overall I think civilization is in the best shape it's ever been in. Don't get me wrong, there are still plenty of issues, and we've got a long way to go before things are perfect, but I think we'll get there eventually. We're certainly far better off now than, say, the people who lived back during the US revolution, or back during medieval times in Europe.
Why does the law get this decision? Because they "can't decide for themselves"? Why can't they? Who is the government, or even some random person who finds out, to tell them they can't?
Not that I'm saying it's a good thing, but that's what the government does. They tell you what you can and cannot legally do. That's the entire point of government. Who are they to do so? Well, they're the government.
You do not have full freedom of speech.
In what way are you prohibited from saying what you want?
they can coerce you into fighting, and dying, for that same country
The draft was discontinued in 1973, and you't not required to register for selective service until you're 18.
You must attend public school(and your parents are forced to pay for this, too).
That's a deceptive way of putting it -- everybody is forced to pay for it, through their income taxes.
You may also be interested in knowing about emancipation of minors.
So why does the government get to decide what you can do with your body, the one "property" they cannot take away from you(I'm starting to wonder if I should add "yet" to this. I get the feeling if left alone, they'll find a way...)?
No, they already do that, too. Familiar with the death penalty?
No, he admitted that the point to his life (all of ours, really) is to contribute to the propagation of his species. Why is that so hard for you to accept?
Why does there even need to be a point? Am I allowed to decide my own purpose rather than having one forced on me?
But, yes, it's true that Christians are against homosexuality. No, it's NOT true that Christians are against homosexuals. Christianity is one of the most "gay-friendly" religions out there
I can just ignore most of that post, but wow, really? First of all, there are many Christians who have no problem with homosexuality (unless you're going to make the argument "no true Christian accepts homosexuality!", in which case apparently you're the sole authority of what "Christian" means and there's no point in even making that argument, because you could just change it at will).
Second, saying "I hate who you are but don't have anything against you" is feel-good double-talk. I guarantee you that no gay person will ever say, "Well, I know you think I'm going to be tortured eternally, you think I'm an abomination, and you want to use the law to prevent me from being with who I love, but that's all ok because you say you're not against me." That's bullshit.
And finally... Christianity is "gay-friendly"? Seriously? How many religions can you name that condemn homosexuality as much as modern Christianity does? Can you name any non-Abrahamic religions?
but don't let that stop you from bashing them for being against the act.
Of course it doesn't. The problem here is that there's nothing wrong with the act, either. You deserve to be bashed just as much as if you said that eating shellfish or wearing clothing made from mixed-blend fibers was an abomination.
What's sad is that Christians have something you will never have.
No, what's sad is Christians who are so deluded by their faith that they cannot imagine what life would be like without it, and so they make up stories about how horrible life must be in order to convince themselves that they made the right choice.
The truth is that I know I have to treasure what I have right now, because eventually I won't be here any more. I have to do my best to leave the world a better place than when I entered it, and I will (hopefully) live on by being fondly remembered for the impact I had on the world and people around me. I don't have to fear not being good enough to enter any "paradise" because I know that's just a fable, and I can do more than my life than spend it trying to appease some invisible omnipotent friend.
I'm not bitter at the ideal, "true" Christian who acts like you described. They sound like nice people. I'm bitter at the real kinds of Christians who actually exist -- the ones who use technology to spread their doctrine of fear and ignorance, tell nonbelievers how horrible they are, and try to use the government to enforce laws that are solely based on their ancient religious texts.
You're a bloody ignorant idiot. [rant omitted]
You completely ignored what he meant because you got offended.
He didn't say that atheists are immoral or incapable of spirituality. He said there is no moral component to atheism -- and there isn't. All "atheism" implies is the lack of belief in deities. There is no sort of moral prescription in there, either overt or implied. You are certainly capable of determining your own moral code, but you could do that regardless of your religion. You could just as easily be an atheist who believes that your country's laws decide what is right or wrong, or you could follow a godless spiritual philosophy that declares you have to behave in a particular way in order to eventually reach enlightenment.
I'd go so far as to say that most people determine their own moral code, even if they attribute it to their religious teachings -- have you ever noticed how most highly religious people never say that they disagree with their holy text's moral code? Nobody ever says, "I don't care about homosexuality and think it's great, but my bible says it's evil, so I have to persecute you anyway." Strangely, their holy text always agrees with their personal opinions.
You mean the N64 and Gamecube weren't massive failures?
How do you define "failure"? If the measure of success or failure is purely how many more or fewer units you've sold than your competitors, then sure. On the other hand, Nintendo made a lot of profit on both systems, and plenty of good games were produced for both of them. Considering that they're still in business and doing very well with basically the same business model they've always had, I don't think they could be considered massive failures, if even failures at all.
Do you really, honestly, truly believe that the US Government needs its own CAs and can't simply ask Verisign/Symantec to hand over a valid CA for a domain they want?
The USG doesn't want to use Verisign/Symantec's CAs. If it was using them, then it would be possible for Verisign/Symantec to sign something and make it look as though it was signed by the USG. That's why they need their own.
(believe it or not, the government does things with SSL other than impersonate web sites so that they can do MitM attacks on civilian communications)
I'll switch as soon as I find a viable NAT solution for IPv6. I *like* devices in my home network to be hidden behind a single IP address for privacy and convenience. I am not willing to allow these devices to use public IP.
Here's the thing: it's never going to happen. NAT is a hack, and one of the major purposes of IPv6 is making it unnecessary. Really, there is no point to it.
Here is your problem: you don't want people outside your network to be able to access computers inside your network.
Here is the solution: configure your router to drop all incoming connections (in fact, that's probably the default).
There is no added convenience to NAT; it adds extra complexity to routing and makes it a pain to host servers, especially if you have multiple servers that want to listen to the same port. The added privacy (requests all coming from a single IP) is an illusion; anybody who actually wants to tell the connections apart can do packet inspection to look for the characteristics of different computers.
From the perspective of the developers, you're wanting them to spend a considerable amount of time implementing a feature that is completely pointless for reasons that are just as "religious" as you accuse them of being.
For what it's worth, I've been using DirectNIC for years and have never had a problem with them. They are also not on the list of SOPA supporters.
If you liked Amarok 1.4, you might give Clementine a try, which is a fork of Amarok 1.4. There hasn't been a lot of development on it recently, but it works pretty well anyway. The interface is certainly much better than Amarok 2.x's.
For what it's worth, a few years ago one of Nokia's internal Qt developers came and gave a presentation on it to my company. He told us that they all pronounced it "Q T", and the "cute" pronunciation was created and pushed by their marketing department.
There already are several sub-$100 Android tablets out there. Here's one, for example: http://www.amazon.com/Sylvania-SYTAB7MX-7-Inch-Screen-MiniTablet/dp/B0065DVTHO/ref=sr_1_8?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1323185519&sr=1-8
Spoiler alert: the reason they're not sweeping the nation is because they're crappy. Quality does matter.
Remove all access to people from Thailand until they join THIS century/millennium.
Really? Why is it ethical to punish the people for something their government does?
By that logic, Americans REALLY have it coming...
Sigh.
your code monkeys forced a stealth patch onto skyrim's TESV.exe
They didn't "force" a "stealth patch." You say you used to like Steam, but apparently you aren't aware that by default Steam automatically downloads & installs game patches as soon as they're available. If you don't want it to do that, there's a checkbox in the game properties to tell it to not automatically keep the game up to date. If you had that unchecked in the first place, you wouldn't have gotten the patch, no "forcing" involved.
disabling the large address aware patch
No, it installed a new TESV.exe that was protected by Steam's DRM. The original one wasn't, which made it trivially easy to pirate Skyrim. To be fair, the damage is already done, but I'm sure they're legally obligated to put their DRM on Skyrim -- just like every other game that gets released through Steam. The fact that you got an unencrypted binary that you could modify was a fluke. How many other games have you bought through them had modifyable binaries?
Give me one reason why I ever again should buy from your huckster business
Because they sell good games at reasonable prices and have the least intrusive DRM in the business? Yeah, it sure would be nice if they had no DRM, but almost none of the big releases come without DRM nowadays. Why were you buying games from them before?
this week you made it abundantly clear that you are nothing but a shitstain.
No, they made it clear that they care more about DRM than letting users modify their binaries, which you should have already known. Blame Bethesda for releasing buggy games that the community has to patch, not Steam.
Basically, Nintendo of Europe is the cool branch nowadays. NoA is primarily concerned with pushing party games. For more evidence, see Xenoblade, The Last Story, and Pandora's Tower, which aren't receiving an American release at all.
http://www.taxact.com/ is great and works in any standard web browser.
I use a lot of C++/Qt though and that's snappy, haven't run into a Java/Qt application yet - examples?
Unfortunately, there aren't very many out there. The ones I've had experience with are generally specialized proprietary applications. I know there's an open source 3D modeling application called Moonlight|3D, and I don't know how powerful it is compared to other applications, but the interface is pretty snappy, at least.
For Java/SWT examples, there's also VirgoFTP (an FTP client) and Deinonychus (a mail client).
Do you have an example?
Deinonychus and VirgoFTPare a mail client and FTP client, respectively, that are written in Java/SWT and are both pretty snappy.