Don't take offense at what follows. I'm a LotR fan too; I'm just tired of whiny Tolkien geeks.
Can you name the seven sons of Fëanor? His mother? His father?
No, no, and no.
His significance, even?
Didn't he make the Silmarils or something?
I really wanted to like PJ's version of LOTR, but it was too fast.
That's because it was, wait for it, a MOVIE. You can't put everything from the book in the movie, unless you want a 36 hour film. Now, I know that you'd love that, but the rest of us wouldn't. They can't make enough money from people like you to justify a 36 hour movie. Sorry.
Too bad about Tom B.
Why? Tom Bombadil and the even more ridiculous Goldberry might be the biggest flaws in all the books. Every time I reread the series, I skim over the whole Bombadil fiasco until they get to Bree. When I heard they were leaving T.B. out of the movie, I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
If it weren't for the ubiquitous cellphones: 1) another plane would have crashed in washington 3) People would not have been able to say their last words to their loved one before they jumped from the burning tower.
Well, gee, if it weren't for airplanes, people wouldn't have needed cell phones in these cases. What's your point?
What is the federal government supposed to be, if not to defend the land from outside forces and to defend people from destroying each other's individual freedoms?
The point is that it sounds like they untimately want to be an "independent" nation. If that's true, then why should they expect protection by a foreign power (the United States)?
In the literary version, he decides to pursue his own agenda, but it is basically the same as Sauron's.
IMO, he's still pursuing his own agenda in the movie. He's just telling Sauron what he wants to hear. Remember, when Saruman asks Lurtz who he serves, Lurtz answers "Saruman"; and Saruman looks pleased.
If we assume he wasn't the son of God and that he was proclaiming that he was,
Jesus said he was the "Son of Man".
Jesus could not have been a good moral teacher if he was a liar, and he could not be insane if he is a good moral teacher. Therefore, he was(is) the son of God.
Except that the only evidence you have that he taught anything is in the Bible, which I already said you can't use, because it leads to a circular argument. Not to mention that the earliest gospels were probably written a good 40 years or so after he died.
First of all, I don't wish a terrorist attack on Madison. I wish that if there is a terrorist attack, it hits Madison rather than some place which is supporting our very real need to protect ourselves against these terrorists.
We don't have any more "need" now than we ever did. And if you've been following the news, it appears that even without the Patriot Act, the intelligence community had enough information to stop the attacks, but someone at the CIA didn't bother to pick up the phone to the FBI. Or was it the other way around?
First of all, the white house and congress responded to the peoples' justifiable anger.
Yeah...with a knee-jerk "We Got To Do Something " reaction.
As far as perpetual war, it is our opponents, the Islamists, who have in fact *declared* perpetual war against us.
1) Occams's razor - Much of the material universe displays a dizzying amount of order
Two objections: 1) What do you mean by 'order' and can you cite examples of things that have a dizzying amount of it? 2) Occam's razor is not about choosing the simplest explanation. Occam's razor says, "Do not multiply entities unnecessarily". In other words, choose the explanation that requires the fewest outside influences.
2) If you are a naturalist, and you sincerely believe that all that is here is on the basis of time and chance, then how can it be possible that reason and logic are valid?
Didn't understand this at all. What do reason and logic have nothing to do with whether there is or is not a god?
The fact that the universe exists and that we have free will is enough evidence to convince me that there is an intelligent creator
Two questions: 1) Why does the universe require an intelligent creator? 2) How do you know you have free will? Maybe we're all just following a big script.
With SETI@Home I have no idea what the probability or the payoff is.
The payoff is the chance (albeit a small one) of detecting another civilization; which arguably could be the most significant discovery ever made. What more do you want?
Heck, every one person has to download a few hundred KiB of data every few hours.
Every few hours? Jesus, it takes months for my machine to complete a data unit. Of course, I actually turn my computer off when I'm not using it. (GASP!):)
We have no concrete evidence whatsoever that any intelligent extraterrestrial life exists, not to mention intelligent life that transmits radio signals in our general direction.
So we shouldn't bother to look?
Given the number of stars and galaxies in the universe, it's rather unlikely that there B>isn't other life out there somewhere. Whether they are trying to talk to us is another question.
As one of the people unsatisfied with CD quality sound, I am heartened that the industry is (finally!) stepping up to the bar and trying to produce genuinely musical sound.
Great for you! For the rest of us who only have two non-superhuman ears that can only hear 20Hz-20KHz, CDs are good enough.:)
If you had a sound at the upper end of healthy human hearing: 18kHz - you would have fewer than 3 samples for each wavelength. Not enough to accurately describe the waveform.
Nope. If you want to reproduce up to 18KHz, then sampling at anything over 36KHz is enough to reproduce the signal exactly.
I think that from an intellectual and reasoned perspective it is challenging to hold to an atheistic world view.
No, it's very easy. You simply have to disbelieve in something that there is no evidence for. Do you think it's challenging to hold the view that there is no purple giraffe reading over your shoulder right now?
Slashdot Mirror
including steven hawkings? in his book he pointed out that no one can guess what happened before the big bang, and he put it down to God,
Er, no he didn't. In fact, he thinks the universe may be self-contained, without a beginning or end; which would eliminate the "need" for a creator.
In all the years I have used mozilla I have encountered few bugs. I am suprised there are so many.
They're not all unique. I filed a bug for 1.2 that ended up having somewhere around 100 other reports marked as duplicates.
Don't take offense at what follows. I'm a LotR fan too; I'm just tired of whiny Tolkien geeks.
Can you name the seven sons of Fëanor? His mother? His father?
No, no, and no.
His significance, even?
Didn't he make the Silmarils or something?
I really wanted to like PJ's version of LOTR, but it was too fast.
That's because it was, wait for it, a MOVIE. You can't put everything from the book in the movie, unless you want a 36 hour film. Now, I know that you'd love that, but the rest of us wouldn't. They can't make enough money from people like you to justify a 36 hour movie. Sorry.
Too bad about Tom B.
Why? Tom Bombadil and the even more ridiculous Goldberry might be the biggest flaws in all the books. Every time I reread the series, I skim over the whole Bombadil fiasco until they get to Bree. When I heard they were leaving T.B. out of the movie, I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
the fufme drive becoming a reality.
If it weren't for the ubiquitous cellphones: 1) another plane would have crashed in washington
3) People would not have been able to say their last words to their loved one before they jumped from the burning tower.
Well, gee, if it weren't for airplanes, people wouldn't have needed cell phones in these cases. What's your point?
I want to know where all these people are that can't use a phone without pissing everybody off.
Northern Virginia.
Pedant alert!
A nautical mile is 6000 feet
6076.1 and change.
A statute mile is ~ 5200 feet
5280.
What is the federal government supposed to be, if not to defend the land from outside forces and to defend people from destroying each other's individual freedoms?
The point is that it sounds like they untimately want to be an "independent" nation. If that's true, then why should they expect protection by a foreign power (the United States)?
It looks like just about the damn sweetest flying thing I've ever seen,
:-b
I think it's ugly as all hell.
In the literary version, he decides to pursue his own agenda, but it is basically the same as Sauron's.
IMO, he's still pursuing his own agenda in the movie. He's just telling Sauron what he wants to hear. Remember, when Saruman asks Lurtz who he serves, Lurtz answers "Saruman"; and Saruman looks pleased.
If we assume he wasn't the son of God and that he was proclaiming that he was,
Jesus said he was the "Son of Man".
Jesus could not have been a good moral teacher if he was a liar, and he could not be insane if he is a good moral teacher. Therefore, he was(is) the son of God.
Except that the only evidence you have that he taught anything is in the Bible, which I already said you can't use, because it leads to a circular argument. Not to mention that the earliest gospels were probably written a good 40 years or so after he died.
First of all, I don't wish a terrorist attack on Madison. I wish that if there is a terrorist attack, it hits Madison rather than some place which is supporting our very real need to protect ourselves against these terrorists.
We don't have any more "need" now than we ever did. And if you've been following the news, it appears that even without the Patriot Act, the intelligence community had enough information to stop the attacks, but someone at the CIA didn't bother to pick up the phone to the FBI. Or was it the other way around?
First of all, the white house and congress responded to the peoples' justifiable anger.
Yeah...with a knee-jerk "We Got To Do Something " reaction.
As far as perpetual war, it is our opponents, the Islamists, who have in fact *declared* perpetual war against us.
So we should reduce ourselves to their level?
Have you ever examined the evidence for Christianity?
No, because there isn't any.
Do you even know the message of Christianity?
Yes.
There is a substantial amount of evidence that Christianity is true.
Name one.
He's way ahead of you. Jesus. But even then people didn't believe.
Do you have any evidence that Jesus was really the son of God? And you can't use the Bible, because that quickly leads to a circular argument.
1) Occams's razor - Much of the material universe displays a dizzying amount of order
Two objections:
1) What do you mean by 'order' and can you cite examples of things that have a dizzying amount of it?
2) Occam's razor is not about choosing the simplest explanation. Occam's razor says, "Do not multiply entities unnecessarily". In other words, choose the explanation that requires the fewest outside influences.
2) If you are a naturalist, and you sincerely believe that all that is here is on the basis of time and chance, then how can it be possible that reason and logic are valid?
Didn't understand this at all. What do reason and logic have nothing to do with whether there is or is not a god?
The fact that the universe exists and that we have free will is enough evidence to convince me that there is an intelligent creator
Two questions:
1) Why does the universe require an intelligent creator?
2) How do you know you have free will? Maybe we're all just following a big script.
What evidence would be sufficient to convince you of God's existence?
Hmm. Short of Him/Her/It appearing in person, it would be difficult.
With SETI@Home I have no idea what the probability or the payoff is.
The payoff is the chance (albeit a small one) of detecting another civilization; which arguably could be the most significant discovery ever made. What more do you want?
Heck, every one person has to download a few hundred KiB of data every few hours.
:)
Every few hours? Jesus, it takes months for my machine to complete a data unit. Of course, I actually turn my computer off when I'm not using it. (GASP!)
We have no concrete evidence whatsoever that any intelligent extraterrestrial life exists, not to mention intelligent life that transmits radio signals in our general direction.
So we shouldn't bother to look?
Given the number of stars and galaxies in the universe, it's rather unlikely that there B>isn't other life out there somewhere. Whether they are trying to talk to us is another question.
People have consistently picked these formats over CD in double blind listening tests.
Can you provide a cite please, otherwise I'm calling 'bullshit'.
As one of the people unsatisfied with CD quality sound, I am heartened that the industry is (finally!) stepping up to the bar and trying to produce genuinely musical sound.
:)
Great for you! For the rest of us who only have two non-superhuman ears that can only hear 20Hz-20KHz, CDs are good enough.
If you had a sound at the upper end of healthy human hearing: 18kHz - you would have fewer than 3 samples for each wavelength. Not enough to accurately describe the waveform.
Nope. If you want to reproduce up to 18KHz, then sampling at anything over 36KHz is enough to reproduce the signal exactly.
Yeah, but at 44.1 KHz sampling, a 22050 Hz tone can, at best, be represented as a triangle wave - not a nice smooth sinusoid.
No, you're wrong. You can reproduce any signal *exactly* provided you sample at at least twice the frequency of the signal.
I think that from an intellectual and reasoned perspective it is challenging to hold to an atheistic world view.
No, it's very easy. You simply have to disbelieve in something that there is no evidence for. Do you think it's challenging to hold the view that there is no purple giraffe reading over your shoulder right now?