That's an important little detail that I didn't see in that article. How warm the Earth is right now isn't that scary. What's scary is how fast it's heating up. What's even scarier is a look at historical global temperatures. All the graphs I've seen show gradual warming for 10,000 to 100,000 years, followed by a cold spike. Remember that during the last ice age, glaciers covered North America down to about the latitude of Manhattan. Buy real estate in Florida now! It's only going to get more expensive! Even if humans aren't the only thing warming the planet, we're at least contributing. And I'd like to avoid the natural backlash as long as possible.
Ah. The concept of atheism I was working from is the misconception in the overview of that link. I'll read that when I have more time and get back to you.
Also, I don't consider agnostism mutually exclusive to anything. I just meant more one thing than the other. (Any religous person who doesn't admit to being at least a little agnostic gives me the willies.) And like I said, I was operating from a misconception.
Doesn't sound to me like you've got a problem with religious people, sounds like you've got a problem with hypocrits. Who doesn't? I'll admit that these people tend to find sanctuary in a church environment (depending on the church.) But without religion, there'd still be hypocrisy. I don't think religion causes it. As for the issues, they're less religious doctrine than political opinions. (I personally don't like the idea of abortion laws at all, and I think that capital punishment hinges on the ridiculous assumption that the justice system is never wrong.) Opinions are, or course, much easier to spread if you're in a position of power. Like, say, bishop or president.
"...look how many people have killed/been killed EXCLUSIVELY because of religion."
To make sure there are no miscommunications, here are the implications I'm reading from your post: 1. Without religion, those disasters wouldn't've happened. 2. Religion causes people who would normally be peaceful to turn violent.
Point 1: Let's not get religion and politics mixed up here. (And greed for money & power.) The inquisition, the holocaust (... what religion was Hitler?), the crusades, the WTC attack, the Taliban, all were about politics. Had religion not existed, the same leaders would've found another justification. And people don't need religion to be lemmings. Mention patriotism, enough money, or even "bringing civilization to the barbarians" and you'll get plenty of people willing to kill each other.
Point 2: I don't think I'm any more likely to kill someone because I go to church. Now, if I go to church AND play FPSs . . . I guess it's only a matter of time before I buy a gun and look for a clock tower. 8^)
Well, at the very least atheism is a belief structure. If someone doesn't give religion a second thought, you call them agnostic. It takes faith to be an atheist. (As a point of reference, I'm a protestant.) Plus, I don't think it's fair to site religion as a cause of violence. Of all the muslums in the world, how many bomb airplanes? Of all the christians in the world, how many kill people "to save their souls"? Of all the atheists in the world, how many kill people they don't like? Probably the same percentage. It's just the justification that people use. You hear about religion a lot because it's the most hypocritical justification for violence. (Most religions specifically forbid violence.) There are just simply violent people out there, and they'll grab onto whatever justification they can, even if it involves twisting their own religion into something it isn't.
commander Rick D. Husband, pilot William C. McCool, payload commander Michael P. Anderson, mission specialist David M. Brown, mission specialist Kalpana Chawla, mission specialist Laurel Clark, mission specialist Ilan Ramon.
Hasn't anyone thought of where this energy is coming from!?! We'd be slowing down the rotation of the Earth! Not to mention flinging the Moon into deep space! To think that people laughed when I got my "Conserve Terrestrial Angular Momentum" T-shirts.
I want to know which game to stay clear of. Man, when are game developers going to learn the value of a fun cap? Making a game too fun kills people! They should pass a law limiting the amount of fun that can be incorporated into video games.
You know, I actually remember TV commercials for TVs that demonstrated the picture. "Look at this great picture!" Not sure how that was supposed to impress anyone when the picture CAN'T be any better than the set that you see the commercial on. In fact, it'd look downright lousy on any set owned by their target audience.
Dude, Galaxy Quest ROCKS! Wrath of Khan is probably my favorite Trek movie, but it can't compete with Alan Rickman saying, "By Grabthar's Hammer, what a savings."
My company has a guy with a Theater degree managing electrical engineers. (Not my group, thank God.) I've never had to deal with him, but we get a steady flow of his underlings walking into our area bitching, "It's like explaining things to my mom!"
I think what he means by that is after Blizzard was being a jerk (siccing lawyers on that group that did the battle.net clone), it's nice to a bigger bully return the same level of respect.
Slashdot Mirror
Dude, I want a flag with that casette and cross bones logo. That'd look great over my computer desk. (I could pretend I'm l33t.)
http://www.meteorcrater.com/Mcrater.htm
That's an important little detail that I didn't see in that article. How warm the Earth is right now isn't that scary. What's scary is how fast it's heating up. What's even scarier is a look at historical global temperatures. All the graphs I've seen show gradual warming for 10,000 to 100,000 years, followed by a cold spike. Remember that during the last ice age, glaciers covered North America down to about the latitude of Manhattan. Buy real estate in Florida now! It's only going to get more expensive! Even if humans aren't the only thing warming the planet, we're at least contributing. And I'd like to avoid the natural backlash as long as possible.
Well, whether I agree with you or not, I definitly see where you're coming from.
Ah. The concept of atheism I was working from is the misconception in the overview of that link. I'll read that when I have more time and get back to you.
Also, I don't consider agnostism mutually exclusive to anything. I just meant more one thing than the other. (Any religous person who doesn't admit to being at least a little agnostic gives me the willies.) And like I said, I was operating from a misconception.
Doesn't sound to me like you've got a problem with religious people, sounds like you've got a problem with hypocrits. Who doesn't? I'll admit that these people tend to find sanctuary in a church environment (depending on the church.) But without religion, there'd still be hypocrisy. I don't think religion causes it. As for the issues, they're less religious doctrine than political opinions. (I personally don't like the idea of abortion laws at all, and I think that capital punishment hinges on the ridiculous assumption that the justice system is never wrong.) Opinions are, or course, much easier to spread if you're in a position of power. Like, say, bishop or president.
"...look how many people have killed/been killed EXCLUSIVELY because of religion."
To make sure there are no miscommunications, here are the implications I'm reading from your post: 1. Without religion, those disasters wouldn't've happened. 2. Religion causes people who would normally be peaceful to turn violent.
Point 1: Let's not get religion and politics mixed up here. (And greed for money & power.) The inquisition, the holocaust (... what religion was Hitler?), the crusades, the WTC attack, the Taliban, all were about politics. Had religion not existed, the same leaders would've found another justification. And people don't need religion to be lemmings. Mention patriotism, enough money, or even "bringing civilization to the barbarians" and you'll get plenty of people willing to kill each other.
Point 2: I don't think I'm any more likely to kill someone because I go to church. Now, if I go to church AND play FPSs . . . I guess it's only a matter of time before I buy a gun and look for a clock tower. 8^)
It's bad luck to be supersticious. 8^)
Well, at the very least atheism is a belief structure. If someone doesn't give religion a second thought, you call them agnostic. It takes faith to be an atheist. (As a point of reference, I'm a protestant.) Plus, I don't think it's fair to site religion as a cause of violence. Of all the muslums in the world, how many bomb airplanes? Of all the christians in the world, how many kill people "to save their souls"? Of all the atheists in the world, how many kill people they don't like? Probably the same percentage. It's just the justification that people use. You hear about religion a lot because it's the most hypocritical justification for violence. (Most religions specifically forbid violence.) There are just simply violent people out there, and they'll grab onto whatever justification they can, even if it involves twisting their own religion into something it isn't.
commander Rick D. Husband,
pilot William C. McCool,
payload commander Michael P. Anderson,
mission specialist David M. Brown,
mission specialist Kalpana Chawla,
mission specialist Laurel Clark,
mission specialist Ilan Ramon.
Moron. It was 40 miles up moving at mach 6. How could it possiblly be terrorism?
Hasn't anyone thought of where this energy is coming from!?! We'd be slowing down the rotation of the Earth! Not to mention flinging the Moon into deep space! To think that people laughed when I got my "Conserve Terrestrial Angular Momentum" T-shirts.
I want to know which game to stay clear of. Man, when are game developers going to learn the value of a fun cap? Making a game too fun kills people! They should pass a law limiting the amount of fun that can be incorporated into video games.
You know, I actually remember TV commercials for TVs that demonstrated the picture. "Look at this great picture!" Not sure how that was supposed to impress anyone when the picture CAN'T be any better than the set that you see the commercial on. In fact, it'd look downright lousy on any set owned by their target audience.
Dude, Galaxy Quest ROCKS! Wrath of Khan is probably my favorite Trek movie, but it can't compete with Alan Rickman saying, "By Grabthar's Hammer, what a savings."
It's a classroom book, college freshman level. It's got great explanations of concepts with almost no math. Very good book.
It's a small paperback, so I don't think it's worth the >$50 price bn.com has for it. Check Amazon.com's used books or ebay.
Brisk wind in my face
Chute won't open, holy crap
Pants are filled with poop
My Grandma played the piano, and didn't like rings. (Too distracting while playing.) So when grandpa proposed, he gave her a piano.
My company has a guy with a Theater degree managing electrical engineers. (Not my group, thank God.) I've never had to deal with him, but we get a steady flow of his underlings walking into our area bitching, "It's like explaining things to my mom!"
Dude, eclipse season happens every six months. (When the Moon's orbital disk lines up with Earth's.)
Quite possibly the coolest RTS game in existence.
I just want to say that that was a Hell of an outfit to wear to a "let's be friends" talk.
Yeah, but Leia actually remembered her mother. I'm not sure if Luke ever knew either of his parents.
Didn't Leia say, "She died when I was very young." Wait, they're not going to make her a jedi-ghost, are they?
I think what he means by that is after Blizzard was being a jerk (siccing lawyers on that group that did the battle.net clone), it's nice to a bigger bully return the same level of respect.