Not a loss of life, but how long until one of these viruses propagates itself over a network, then within 30 minutes erases the computer's hard disk - ensuring it moves on, but at the same time lethally shutting down entire networks? That would have a very, very lethal effect on our society's functioning, with an even higher likelihood of loss of life.
Chances are I'll be modded flamebait, but for curiosity factor I once calculated what the population of the earth would be today if we assumed two humans (Adam & Eve) 6,000 years ago, and a 1% growth rate (very modest).
Today's population would be: 1.69540200147367e+26
Of course, there are obvious problems to this from the start - population growth fluctuates. Adam & Eve would have had more than just a fraction of a child (39 people after 300 years), etc.
Anyway, for evolutionists or creationists there's an important point here - you can't take straight population growth and assume it will continue constantly - which I think was your original point.
War, famine, food shortages, space shortages, culture and more all have an effect on population rates, and at different times in history too. I think that if people were to live hundreds or thousands of years, in many ways we would regulate ourselves (though not necessarily). For example, when space is small, living costs for property should increase, discouraging people from having more children than they can handle. People will have differing opinions. We thought education would remove prejudices, but it doesn't. Imagine hundreds of years of stubborness, wars could reach spectacular levels with feuds raging hundreds of years, with the same people behind pulling the strings. Population has been reduced in the past, it will happen again.
How can we predict one way or the other? How do we know, given 300 years, an individual won't change their view drastically? Or that it's rather certain types of people who engender change, rather than certain generations?
There's just too many variables and speculations to adequately predict. Someone can come up with an elaborate prediction of the future, but ultimately we all know something completely different could happen. All we can do is wait until afterwards, then review and comment on what took place.
Whether or not $521million is a small amount compared with what they have is irrelevant. Half a billion is a *lot* of money in anyone's books. And Microsoft will not want to just throw it away on legal issues. It may be that they have 8 times that stored up for legal issues, but you can bet that that is all to protect larger assets. They're not in the business of losing money.
Now, I don't think this will hurt them much at all - but it is still something they don't want. I've heard a story of a man who earned 25,000, and tithed 10% to his church each year. Then his pay was increased to 250,000 over the years. He described to his local church group how much harder it was to part with that money. So they prayed, "Dear Lord, please reduce our brother's paycheck". Anyway, joke aside - the more money you have, the harder it is to part with any of it. The less you have, often the less you care about material wealth.
I just don't see what's the point of demonstrating how little $512million is. Microsoft wants that money and they don't want to admit that they stole patents. Nothing more, nothing less. Though you seem to be responding to thoughts that this could help bring down the monopoly - I hope people don't think that, it obviously won't. Microsoft wants that money, but it won't kill them to lose it, not by a long stretch.
There's lots of different reasons for our view of Mary. For instance, concerning the efficacy of her prayers for us: have a look at the wedding at Cana (John 2:1-10). Jesus was not going to help the people there with their wine problem, because His time had not yet come. And yet, despite this, Mary was able to get Jesus to help them...
This is completely irrelevant. What I said is there's no reason for putting Mary in this lofty role, that's exactly what I meant. I read that story at the wedding, and I don't see anything special or unique. Mary did little persuading. Now Moses - there was a great man. God was going to destroy all the Israelites, yet Moses persuaded God not to. Surely that feat was greater? And then there was a mere gentile woman who begged Jesus to remove a demon from her possessed daughter. He said "I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." Yet she was able to persuade Him to heal her daughter (Matthew 15:24-28). Now I just don't see anything special with this wedding story to make me go, "wow, you are right, Mary was really special to be able to do that". Instead, she seems like a mother anxious to please the party crowd. She knows that her son can provide the wine they need, so with a caring spirit she does what she can to ensure that they have wine. Nothing special, just an ordinary every day person who knew her Son was God. Now here is what I need: verses that show that Mary deserves the lofty position you give her. What you have given me: an interpretation of a verse that is valid only when we have already established her lofty position, not as an affirmation of it. There are many different ways to interpret that wedding - so why should I accept your understanding?
There isn't any Biblical verse that clearly states that God is a Trinity, but we believe it nonetheless.
Precisely my point. There are no verses that say "God is a trinity". There are many, many, many verses which say that He is Word, Spirit and Father. The word trinity may never be used, but His triune nature is imprinted throughout the whole Bible so that we have no difficulty demonstrating this truth.
Where is a single verse that shows us that Mary deserves this role you place her in? I don't need it to say specifically that she is, but it does need to be very persuasive, not just an interpretation based on a preconceived notion (like the wedding story).
First of all, it's not a matter of "opinion" at all, but of historical fact. The Bible isn't a book of fiction; it tells us about things that actually happened in the real world. The early Christians knew very well that Mary had no other children, and they didn't need the Bible to tell them this.
And where does history say this? (I don't want Catholic records saying Mary was childless, but rather quotes from historians or Christians perhaps 0-200AD, close to the time). This is why it's extra-Biblical. The Bible has a few verses that make it sound like Jesus had brothers, so it is the strange thing that needs strong evidence to say that she didn't, not the other way around.
Second, where does the Bible say that it contains all truth?
Entirely unecessary. What proof is it if I say "I never tell a lie"? You can't know for sure by the statement itself. We know that the Bible is the sole Scripture for other reasons, it is not important - nor would it be helpful - if the Bible said it was the sole Scripture. Besides, that wouldn't happen, because most of the books were written by different people, separately from each other.
If Mary intended to have a normal marriage, including sexual intercourse, one would have expected her to react in the following manner: "How wonderful! Joseph and I will be the parents of the Messiah!" But instead, what she said is:
This is part of an article I wrote maybe half a year ago:
The first personality test I remember ever doing was something in high school designed to determine what kind of career would be good for me. I can't rememeber the results precisely, but I scored high on maths/science based careers. Computers are close, I suppose. But that test wasn't really designed to find out about me, just what I'd be good at.
A little while later I tried the Myer Briggs personality test, which is quite a common one. It has 16 possible outcomes. You answer a series of questions, and add up the values from the answers to come up with your personality type. I was INTP. You can find out about the other types there also.
After completing this test, I thought that it described me perfectly. An introverted thinker who was far from loving order. The description on this website seems to fit me pretty well. However, I later discovered the Chinese personality types which transformed my understanding of myself, and the Myer Briggs type is no longer adequate...
The Chinese talk about five personality types, and everyone is one of these types. It may sound small, like little variety, but you should be surprised by how accurately these describe the variety of human responses. The five types go in a circle, and beginning at an arbitrary point the order is wood, fire, earth, metal , water. There is so much to say about each type, and I wholeheartedly recommend this book. It describes each type well, and so much of it was me. I will give you a quick rundown anyway. You can find out a very brief and undetailed introduction of the types here. Wood, which is my type, are opionated, stubborn pioneers who are always moving to something new. Fire is one of the most common types. These are the passionate, talkative people who love to be with others. Earth are the most common type and value loyalty, don't much like change and provide the foundation for our society. Metal are organised people everywhere, they tend to be leaders inside an existing structure, often musically talented. Water are the introverted philosophers who don't much like human contact like everyone else.
Now the interesting thing here is that you express characteristics of the two types next to your own. Since I am a wood, I have fire on my left and water on my right, so I can often show traits from both of these. And here is why I was unsatisfied with Myer Briggs. It described me as an introvert, and that I believed. Chinese personality types showed me that wood is stuck between the most introverted and extroverted types - water and fire. And this rang true more for me than anything else. There are times when I just have to be with people, and there are other times when I just have to get away. It described me more fully than Myer Briggs could even come close to. Going around the circle clockwise (wood->fire->earth->metal->water->wood ) each type feed another. Wood feeds fire, giving fire people energy, rejuvinating them. Fire feeds earth, earth feeds metal and so on.
Take a look at this image. You can visually see the place of each personality type to another. You will see from wood an arrow going to earth, and from metal an arrow to wood. Every time oppresses another type, and is oppressed by a type. Wood people tend to oppress earth. Wood yearn for change and novelty, to upset the old, while earth thrives on stability and loyalty and don't much like change. Wood also hates authority and longs to break free, while metal loves authority and structure, and so restricts wood. There is so much to learn about each type. To find out what you are, look at the types I described above. You will probably find three
I had this exact problem, I think (the font was so small it was unreadable in some places).
It happened when I ran the computer display to a projector, and from the projector to the monitor. It displayed fine on the projector screen but not on the monitor.
But I have no idea why it happened or how to fix it.
I tried hard, trust me, so that it bent the paperclip I was using. Half the time I couldn't even pinpoint anything to push against, it would go in further than an inch.
Anyway, even if it is possible, I'd rather type something like: umount --force/mnt/cdrom than spend 5 minutes fiddling with a paperclip trying to find an elusive lever. (I know that there's a -f option to force, but that seems to be for NFS only, certainly didn't work for my cd-drive).
If it's in print on paper, then people's respect for what is written is raised higher than it perhaps deserved, regardless of the content or not.
If it's just another webbook, then only those in the know will pay attention. If it's published and on bookshelves, the it reaches a status that websites often cannot attain, and people will pay more attention. Anyone can whip up a website, but not everyone can put in the time and resources to publish a book.
This is incredibly annoying when I need to try to change a CD but the process insists on holding onto it. There should be a way to force the ejection of media through Linux (the little hole on my CD-Drive refused to acknowledge my requests).
Over the years they have evolved into slick, glossy (and thin) books with tons of valuable information and high-quality screenshots and maps... Guides make tough games easier.
This cracks me up. Game guides these days are rubbish - they use large fonts, thick borders and reprint the manual mostly, and provide very little extra information. They should be released a few months after the game comes out, after a patch or two so the game stabilises, and all the strategies have come out.
This is precisely why Linux desktop will first make inroads into businesses before the home. It's just not worth it yet, unless the home user understands the pro's and con's.
Just like mobile phones took off first in business, then in the average person's hands, so much Linux desktops take the same path. After all, businesses have a much easier time outlining what an employer is or isn't allowed to do.
Okay, well, it had nothing to do with the moons of Mars.
Hang on - what are you saying - that it was my original post about the moon that you metamoderated down? Just because it was not about the moons of mars it was still certainly on topic - it was about strange mathematical qualities of a moon - in the very same nature of the original story. How many hundreds of thousands of posts are made that are more 'offtopic' than that modded up?
Please excuse me if I misunderstand what you are saying here.
That in itsself should be enough for the parent comment, but I want you to understand why "creation science" is thought of so poorly even by theists.
Yes, they have been told by other organisations such as PBC that answersinegenesis and other organisations are money hungry institutes playing on the ignorance of those who listen to them.
But just because they try and present that position doesn't mean it's true. I like to understand what I believe - and that has led me to reject evolution. I'm not sure why you find that so hard to comprehend. I would love to get into a discussion about this in detail - talking about specifics instead of general insults - but I've committed myself to having a break from debates to get some rest.
I will say that insults like "God gave you a brain. Use it. Please don't presume that God is so stupid that He could not have designed live via evolution a billion years ago" to brothers in the Lord do not help - because I have been using my brain which led me to a rejection of evolution. And there are plenty of others like me. Are you one of those evolutionists that doesn't understand the creation model? I suppose we could talk about that, if you are interested. What do you think is the creation model's answer to natural selection - what does it have to say about it?
This parent topic was certainly offtopic, but the post I was complaining about being moderated was not offtopic, which do you dispute?
Whether or not you agree with me on creationism is irrelevant. The point of offtopic moderations is strictly for offtopic posts (which the parent post here was, but the post it linked to wasn't). Flame posts are restricted for posts deliberately designed for flaming - and while some may disagree with me, flaming was definately not my intention, and was not the result.
If you disagree with something in a post, or you think it is incorrect, you have two options:
1. Moderate replies that support your position or the correction
2. Post in response
Offtopic and flamebait should NOT be used for modding down posts just because you disagree.
I do not need your empathy regarding my "inability to believe in a God without buying in to the popular myths of your cultural ancestors over the millenia". You have examined the evidence and come to your conclusions. I have done the same. I am persuaded of what I believe because I happen to think the evidence supports it. That is not the issue at hand. Telling me that answersingesis, etc, all have the same arguments they used to, and that you once believed but now have been able to see the light do little to persuade me. The simple fact is, I have not yet met a single evolutionist who understands the creation model. I am interested in specifics regarding evidence and arguments, not general statements of discovery. I must understand why. There is nothing to respond to in your post except general statements such as "they are lies" - what more can I say to that, unless you point out a specific lie?
If you metamodded my parent post offtopic as fair, I couldn't care less. However, I am worried if you metamoderated the offtopic rating of this post then I would be worried.
I suppose I should have given context to my example, not many people assume multiple universes for the one object - especially since we have never been in another universe to see if it is possible.
Light is both a wave and a photon - something we consider impossible, yet it happens.
I have never heard a Christian claim that the earth is flat. The opposite, in fact:
"It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. " - Isaiah 40:22
Just because the Catholic church once held a mistaken view, does not mean that Christianity is constantly "inventing excuses".
I do have another question. What if in the intelligence organisation of a nation someone said "this army has 500 people" and someone in the same organisation said "this army has 17000 people" and they were both talking about the same army, and had looked at it at the same time. Can they both be correct?
Umm...let's think about this....maybe because the skeletal structure (that's a concrete observation by the way, no speculation) shares characteristics with both?
Unfortunately, that's not science. You are using logic and reason to speculate about it's ancestry and descendants. You cannot repeat or observe tests to prove scientifically that archaeopteryx is what it is said to be. It is based on reason, logic (faulty in my mind), but not science. It is extremely deceptive and wicked to accuse creationism of being unscientific when the fact is that *any* model dealing with origins is outside of science. That doesn't make it worthless, it just makes it unscientific. Philosophy uses logic and reason - we use it every day - and we employ scientific knowledge to support a model or theory that is, by and large, unscientific in and of itself.
and then my opponent just throws faith up in my face typically
I'm sorry to hear that. I have a couple of thoughts. First, those creationists I see defending our position on slashdot I almost never see throwing up faith (I say almost never because there may have been one occasion, I can't recall). I personally never resort to that position unless it fits within the account given. For example, the flood was clearly a miraculous intervention, so it is completely reasonable to assume that this supernatural event was filled with God's work - for example, collecting all the animals, shutting the ark door, creating the floodwaters, etc. However, I never believe that God created the earth with an old look to test us, or that He tried to hide anything. But this should not be used as a cause for complaint against us.
Consider when evidence that supports creation is given (and there is much for it). The evolutionary response is not to say "wow, maybe there is some evidence for creation", it is exactly the same as our response - "this is an exception, and we just don't understand the situation properly yet". Take, for example, mitochondrial DNA mutation rates. This shows very strongly that all humans descended from one woman around 6,000 years ago. A powerful evidence for creation, but the evolutionary response is that there's just a missing clue, because it's an impossible result.
The things that creationists are accused of are done also by evolutionists. We have been unfairly accused.
I'm curious though, how often do you encounter these christians who throw up the faith argument? I should very much like to see them do it next time you find them, because they are causing damage to our position. They misunderstand the meaning of the word "faith", which is our trust in God to do what He has promised, nothing to do with believing in things we cannot prove.
Point A, while interesting, is really not the same as the moon example I gave. The chances of Point A happening is probably close to 1/1, whereas the chance of humans having culture flourish very suddenly at the exact time the moon is the right size and distance to cover us during an eclipse, and 400 times smaller and closer no less, is extraordinarily unique. It is not a 1/1 chance. And as I said before, I'm not quoting it as evidence of creation on itself, it is merely a strange oddity, a source of fascination, and that's all I meant it to be.
Anyway, I'm just rambling and burning karma points now, so I'll quit.
Don't worry about it:) I've been on excellent karma for a long time, and these posts never drop me below. We have certainly gone off topic by now at any rate, even though I'm still convinced my first post was neither flamebait or off topic.
Your post is amusing to say the least. Why it is ironic for a creationist to quote Steven J. Gould to show the inherent bias in the scientific community is beyond me - this is *exactly* who creationists should quote, since you are more likely to accept it from your 'prophet' than from our mouths.
I am so sick to death of hearing catch all phrases like "creationism is not science". Where is the science in declaring that archaeopteryx is the descendent of dinosaurs and ancestor of birds? There is speculation, but it's certainly not science. Science deals directly with repeatable, observable data. Origins deals with unrepeatable, unobservable history. Therefore evolution and creation both fall outside of science. The fact that one of these two models is essential to science says nothing about the scientific nature of these models.
I have to admin, I'm *really* not in the mood for discussing evolution to you. As soon as someone shows their preconditioned bias towards mockery of creation, I know that discussions will get nowhere. I'm only now interested in discussing, where I can, with people who are willing to listen. Only then will I be willing to admit that I am wrong about creation, and only then will they be willing to admit they are wrong about evolution.
And I looked at the link in your sig - it mentioned nothing about the multitudes of evolutionists on slashdot who are not scientists, but post about their own personal understanding of the theory. I wasn't talking about actual scientists of evolution, sorry if I made that unclear. The initial comment was regarding creationists who are not scientists representing in their understanding the model presented by creationists who are scientists.
First of all my post was on topic. This is actually quite absurd, since it is no more off topic than a joke. I commented on how not just those two moons but also our moon had strange attributes. How does that fail to be on-topic? It's just anti-creation bias, nothing to do with on or off topic.
As for saying it's BS and therefore flamebait, that's just a copout. I was not presenting this as major evidence against evolution. It is merely an oddity, and very unexpected. Certainly not evidence on it's own, I never claimed it was.
It is because I never get the same BS from the same Creationist twice in a row.
How often do I hear evolutionists openly mock creationist arguments. So far I have found very few evolutionists who actually listen with some respect (Gleef is one such). You should understand that even if you don't agree with something, there are usually reasons why someone disagrees with you. Now here is the truth of the matter:
Just because someone gets it in their mind that they are a creationist and know everything there is, does not mean that what they say is a reflection of the current creationist position.
There are many different evolutionists with different ideas. The same problem exists. So instead of saying "there's never the same thing", I instead show them when they veer from what is actually taught, or answer their arguments when it is the official evolutionary line. You should do the same. If you want to see past the BS that uninformed creationists give, then forget everything you know about what they've told you and check out some of those websites I mentioned. I am amazed time and time again how many evolutionists think that we creationists reject natural selection. Are you going to be surprised too when I tell you we don't? Scientific American's 15 answers to creationist 'nonsense' is filled with arguments we don't use. It's just misinformed rubbish - but it influences the minds of many evolutionists who think that it's actually our position.
I'm sorry, but when a staunchly religious site starts by criticizing my philosophical "pre-suppositions"(sic) imparting a "fundamental bias" then my theologically open mind immediately assumes you are a bunch of hypocritical zealots. Or at least mentally challenged.
Do you know how common it is for an evolutionist to say that creationists are biased by their own presuppositions, yet they fail to realise that their own position is based on philosophical presuppositions? Consider these words of some leading evolutionists.
Richard Lewontin: "We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its contructs, in spite of its failure to fulfil many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomoenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Food in the door" - R. Lewontin, "Billions and Billions of Demons," New York Review (January 0, 1997): p.31
Stephen Gould: 'Our ways of learning about the world are strongly influenced by the social preconceptions and biased modes of thinking that each scientist must apply to any problem. The stereotype of a fully rational and objective "scientific method," with individual scientists as logical (and interchangeable) robots is self-serving mythology' - S.J. Gould, Natural History 103(2):14, 1994
Philosopher of science David Hull: ...science is not as empi
Bwahahaha:) You think you can hurt this "poor deluded creationist" by throwing insults as an anonymous coward? This is nothing more than a small source of amusement. I'm really confused as to what you were trying to achieve...unless it was just to get a reply.
Slashdot Mirror
Not a loss of life, but how long until one of these viruses propagates itself over a network, then within 30 minutes erases the computer's hard disk - ensuring it moves on, but at the same time lethally shutting down entire networks? That would have a very, very lethal effect on our society's functioning, with an even higher likelihood of loss of life.
Chances are I'll be modded flamebait, but for curiosity factor I once calculated what the population of the earth would be today if we assumed two humans (Adam & Eve) 6,000 years ago, and a 1% growth rate (very modest).
Today's population would be: 1.69540200147367e+26
Of course, there are obvious problems to this from the start - population growth fluctuates. Adam & Eve would have had more than just a fraction of a child (39 people after 300 years), etc.
Anyway, for evolutionists or creationists there's an important point here - you can't take straight population growth and assume it will continue constantly - which I think was your original point.
War, famine, food shortages, space shortages, culture and more all have an effect on population rates, and at different times in history too. I think that if people were to live hundreds or thousands of years, in many ways we would regulate ourselves (though not necessarily). For example, when space is small, living costs for property should increase, discouraging people from having more children than they can handle. People will have differing opinions. We thought education would remove prejudices, but it doesn't. Imagine hundreds of years of stubborness, wars could reach spectacular levels with feuds raging hundreds of years, with the same people behind pulling the strings. Population has been reduced in the past, it will happen again.
There's just too many variables and speculations to adequately predict. Someone can come up with an elaborate prediction of the future, but ultimately we all know something completely different could happen. All we can do is wait until afterwards, then review and comment on what took place.
Whether or not $521million is a small amount compared with what they have is irrelevant. Half a billion is a *lot* of money in anyone's books. And Microsoft will not want to just throw it away on legal issues. It may be that they have 8 times that stored up for legal issues, but you can bet that that is all to protect larger assets. They're not in the business of losing money.
Now, I don't think this will hurt them much at all - but it is still something they don't want. I've heard a story of a man who earned 25,000, and tithed 10% to his church each year. Then his pay was increased to 250,000 over the years. He described to his local church group how much harder it was to part with that money. So they prayed, "Dear Lord, please reduce our brother's paycheck". Anyway, joke aside - the more money you have, the harder it is to part with any of it. The less you have, often the less you care about material wealth.
I just don't see what's the point of demonstrating how little $512million is. Microsoft wants that money and they don't want to admit that they stole patents. Nothing more, nothing less. Though you seem to be responding to thoughts that this could help bring down the monopoly - I hope people don't think that, it obviously won't. Microsoft wants that money, but it won't kill them to lose it, not by a long stretch.
Oh well, that's just as good - I love those comics.
Still the other guy here, not the original AC :)
There's lots of different reasons for our view of Mary. For instance, concerning the efficacy of her prayers for us: have a look at the wedding at Cana (John 2:1-10). Jesus was not going to help the people there with their wine problem, because His time had not yet come. And yet, despite this, Mary was able to get Jesus to help them...
This is completely irrelevant. What I said is there's no reason for putting Mary in this lofty role, that's exactly what I meant. I read that story at the wedding, and I don't see anything special or unique. Mary did little persuading. Now Moses - there was a great man. God was going to destroy all the Israelites, yet Moses persuaded God not to. Surely that feat was greater? And then there was a mere gentile woman who begged Jesus to remove a demon from her possessed daughter. He said "I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." Yet she was able to persuade Him to heal her daughter (Matthew 15:24-28). Now I just don't see anything special with this wedding story to make me go, "wow, you are right, Mary was really special to be able to do that". Instead, she seems like a mother anxious to please the party crowd. She knows that her son can provide the wine they need, so with a caring spirit she does what she can to ensure that they have wine. Nothing special, just an ordinary every day person who knew her Son was God. Now here is what I need: verses that show that Mary deserves the lofty position you give her. What you have given me: an interpretation of a verse that is valid only when we have already established her lofty position, not as an affirmation of it. There are many different ways to interpret that wedding - so why should I accept your understanding?
There isn't any Biblical verse that clearly states that God is a Trinity, but we believe it nonetheless.
Precisely my point. There are no verses that say "God is a trinity". There are many, many, many verses which say that He is Word, Spirit and Father. The word trinity may never be used, but His triune nature is imprinted throughout the whole Bible so that we have no difficulty demonstrating this truth.
Where is a single verse that shows us that Mary deserves this role you place her in? I don't need it to say specifically that she is, but it does need to be very persuasive, not just an interpretation based on a preconceived notion (like the wedding story).
First of all, it's not a matter of "opinion" at all, but of historical fact. The Bible isn't a book of fiction; it tells us about things that actually happened in the real world. The early Christians knew very well that Mary had no other children, and they didn't need the Bible to tell them this.
And where does history say this? (I don't want Catholic records saying Mary was childless, but rather quotes from historians or Christians perhaps 0-200AD, close to the time). This is why it's extra-Biblical. The Bible has a few verses that make it sound like Jesus had brothers, so it is the strange thing that needs strong evidence to say that she didn't, not the other way around.
Second, where does the Bible say that it contains all truth?
Entirely unecessary. What proof is it if I say "I never tell a lie"? You can't know for sure by the statement itself. We know that the Bible is the sole Scripture for other reasons, it is not important - nor would it be helpful - if the Bible said it was the sole Scripture. Besides, that wouldn't happen, because most of the books were written by different people, separately from each other.
If Mary intended to have a normal marriage, including sexual intercourse, one would have expected her to react in the following manner: "How wonderful! Joseph and I will be the parents of the Messiah!" But instead, what she said is:
The first personality test I remember ever doing was something in high school designed to determine what kind of career would be good for me. I can't rememeber the results precisely, but I scored high on maths/science based careers. Computers are close, I suppose. But that test wasn't really designed to find out about me, just what I'd be good at.
A little while later I tried the Myer Briggs personality test, which is quite a common one. It has 16 possible outcomes. You answer a series of questions, and add up the values from the answers to come up with your personality type. I was INTP. You can find out about the other types there also.
After completing this test, I thought that it described me perfectly. An introverted thinker who was far from loving order. The description on this website seems to fit me pretty well. However, I later discovered the Chinese personality types which transformed my understanding of myself, and the Myer Briggs type is no longer adequate... The Chinese talk about five personality types, and everyone is one of these types. It may sound small, like little variety, but you should be surprised by how accurately these describe the variety of human responses. The five types go in a circle, and beginning at an arbitrary point the order is wood, fire, earth, metal , water. There is so much to say about each type, and I wholeheartedly recommend this book. It describes each type well, and so much of it was me. I will give you a quick rundown anyway. You can find out a very brief and undetailed introduction of the types here. Wood, which is my type, are opionated, stubborn pioneers who are always moving to something new. Fire is one of the most common types. These are the passionate, talkative people who love to be with others. Earth are the most common type and value loyalty, don't much like change and provide the foundation for our society. Metal are organised people everywhere, they tend to be leaders inside an existing structure, often musically talented. Water are the introverted philosophers who don't much like human contact like everyone else.
Now the interesting thing here is that you express characteristics of the two types next to your own. Since I am a wood, I have fire on my left and water on my right, so I can often show traits from both of these. And here is why I was unsatisfied with Myer Briggs. It described me as an introvert, and that I believed. Chinese personality types showed me that wood is stuck between the most introverted and extroverted types - water and fire. And this rang true more for me than anything else. There are times when I just have to be with people, and there are other times when I just have to get away. It described me more fully than Myer Briggs could even come close to. Going around the circle clockwise (wood->fire->earth->metal->water->wood ) each type feed another. Wood feeds fire, giving fire people energy, rejuvinating them. Fire feeds earth, earth feeds metal and so on.
Take a look at this image. You can visually see the place of each personality type to another. You will see from wood an arrow going to earth, and from metal an arrow to wood. Every time oppresses another type, and is oppressed by a type. Wood people tend to oppress earth. Wood yearn for change and novelty, to upset the old, while earth thrives on stability and loyalty and don't much like change. Wood also hates authority and longs to break free, while metal loves authority and structure, and so restricts wood. There is so much to learn about each type. To find out what you are, look at the types I described above. You will probably find three
Are you talking about John Calvin of the reformation? If so, where exactly does this quote come from, I'd very much like to know.
I had this exact problem, I think (the font was so small it was unreadable in some places).
It happened when I ran the computer display to a projector, and from the projector to the monitor. It displayed fine on the projector screen but not on the monitor.
But I have no idea why it happened or how to fix it.
And any time I've been on #linuxhelp on freenode I don't recall having seen RTFM.
This should simply be an option in fstab, default able to eject any time on a desktop system, default unable to on a server system.
You are definitely not the only one, I love this feature.
I tried hard, trust me, so that it bent the paperclip I was using. Half the time I couldn't even pinpoint anything to push against, it would go in further than an inch.
/mnt/cdrom
Anyway, even if it is possible, I'd rather type something like:
umount --force
than spend 5 minutes fiddling with a paperclip trying to find an elusive lever.
(I know that there's a -f option to force, but that seems to be for NFS only, certainly didn't work for my cd-drive).
If it's in print on paper, then people's respect for what is written is raised higher than it perhaps deserved, regardless of the content or not.
If it's just another webbook, then only those in the know will pay attention. If it's published and on bookshelves, the it reaches a status that websites often cannot attain, and people will pay more attention. Anyone can whip up a website, but not everyone can put in the time and resources to publish a book.
This is incredibly annoying when I need to try to change a CD but the process insists on holding onto it. There should be a way to force the ejection of media through Linux (the little hole on my CD-Drive refused to acknowledge my requests).
This is my greatest annoyance.
Cheaper than an SCO/Linux solution :)
Just like mobile phones took off first in business, then in the average person's hands, so much Linux desktops take the same path. After all, businesses have a much easier time outlining what an employer is or isn't allowed to do.
Please excuse me if I misunderstand what you are saying here.
Yes, they have been told by other organisations such as PBC that answersinegenesis and other organisations are money hungry institutes playing on the ignorance of those who listen to them.
But just because they try and present that position doesn't mean it's true. I like to understand what I believe - and that has led me to reject evolution. I'm not sure why you find that so hard to comprehend. I would love to get into a discussion about this in detail - talking about specifics instead of general insults - but I've committed myself to having a break from debates to get some rest.
I will say that insults like "God gave you a brain. Use it. Please don't presume that God is so stupid that He could not have designed live via evolution a billion years ago" to brothers in the Lord do not help - because I have been using my brain which led me to a rejection of evolution. And there are plenty of others like me. Are you one of those evolutionists that doesn't understand the creation model? I suppose we could talk about that, if you are interested. What do you think is the creation model's answer to natural selection - what does it have to say about it?
Whether or not you agree with me on creationism is irrelevant. The point of offtopic moderations is strictly for offtopic posts (which the parent post here was, but the post it linked to wasn't). Flame posts are restricted for posts deliberately designed for flaming - and while some may disagree with me, flaming was definately not my intention, and was not the result.
If you disagree with something in a post, or you think it is incorrect, you have two options:
1. Moderate replies that support your position or the correction
2. Post in response
Offtopic and flamebait should NOT be used for modding down posts just because you disagree.
I do not need your empathy regarding my "inability to believe in a God without buying in to the popular myths of your cultural ancestors over the millenia". You have examined the evidence and come to your conclusions. I have done the same. I am persuaded of what I believe because I happen to think the evidence supports it. That is not the issue at hand. Telling me that answersingesis, etc, all have the same arguments they used to, and that you once believed but now have been able to see the light do little to persuade me. The simple fact is, I have not yet met a single evolutionist who understands the creation model. I am interested in specifics regarding evidence and arguments, not general statements of discovery. I must understand why. There is nothing to respond to in your post except general statements such as "they are lies" - what more can I say to that, unless you point out a specific lie?
If you metamodded my parent post offtopic as fair, I couldn't care less. However, I am worried if you metamoderated the offtopic rating of this post then I would be worried.
Light is both a wave and a photon - something we consider impossible, yet it happens.
I have never heard a Christian claim that the earth is flat. The opposite, in fact:
"It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. " - Isaiah 40:22
Just because the Catholic church once held a mistaken view, does not mean that Christianity is constantly "inventing excuses".
I do have another question. What if in the intelligence organisation of a nation someone said "this army has 500 people" and someone in the same organisation said "this army has 17000 people" and they were both talking about the same army, and had looked at it at the same time. Can they both be correct?
Unfortunately, that's not science. You are using logic and reason to speculate about it's ancestry and descendants. You cannot repeat or observe tests to prove scientifically that archaeopteryx is what it is said to be. It is based on reason, logic (faulty in my mind), but not science. It is extremely deceptive and wicked to accuse creationism of being unscientific when the fact is that *any* model dealing with origins is outside of science. That doesn't make it worthless, it just makes it unscientific. Philosophy uses logic and reason - we use it every day - and we employ scientific knowledge to support a model or theory that is, by and large, unscientific in and of itself.
I'm sorry to hear that. I have a couple of thoughts. First, those creationists I see defending our position on slashdot I almost never see throwing up faith (I say almost never because there may have been one occasion, I can't recall). I personally never resort to that position unless it fits within the account given. For example, the flood was clearly a miraculous intervention, so it is completely reasonable to assume that this supernatural event was filled with God's work - for example, collecting all the animals, shutting the ark door, creating the floodwaters, etc. However, I never believe that God created the earth with an old look to test us, or that He tried to hide anything. But this should not be used as a cause for complaint against us.
Consider when evidence that supports creation is given (and there is much for it). The evolutionary response is not to say "wow, maybe there is some evidence for creation", it is exactly the same as our response - "this is an exception, and we just don't understand the situation properly yet". Take, for example, mitochondrial DNA mutation rates. This shows very strongly that all humans descended from one woman around 6,000 years ago. A powerful evidence for creation, but the evolutionary response is that there's just a missing clue, because it's an impossible result.
The things that creationists are accused of are done also by evolutionists. We have been unfairly accused.
I'm curious though, how often do you encounter these christians who throw up the faith argument? I should very much like to see them do it next time you find them, because they are causing damage to our position. They misunderstand the meaning of the word "faith", which is our trust in God to do what He has promised, nothing to do with believing in things we cannot prove.
Point A, while interesting, is really not the same as the moon example I gave. The chances of Point A happening is probably close to 1/1, whereas the chance of humans having culture flourish very suddenly at the exact time the moon is the right size and distance to cover us during an eclipse, and 400 times smaller and closer no less, is extraordinarily unique. It is not a 1/1 chance. And as I said before, I'm not quoting it as evidence of creation on itself, it is merely a strange oddity, a source of fascination, and that's all I meant it to be.
Don't worry about itI am so sick to death of hearing catch all phrases like "creationism is not science". Where is the science in declaring that archaeopteryx is the descendent of dinosaurs and ancestor of birds? There is speculation, but it's certainly not science. Science deals directly with repeatable, observable data. Origins deals with unrepeatable, unobservable history. Therefore evolution and creation both fall outside of science. The fact that one of these two models is essential to science says nothing about the scientific nature of these models.
I have to admin, I'm *really* not in the mood for discussing evolution to you. As soon as someone shows their preconditioned bias towards mockery of creation, I know that discussions will get nowhere. I'm only now interested in discussing, where I can, with people who are willing to listen. Only then will I be willing to admit that I am wrong about creation, and only then will they be willing to admit they are wrong about evolution.
And I looked at the link in your sig - it mentioned nothing about the multitudes of evolutionists on slashdot who are not scientists, but post about their own personal understanding of the theory. I wasn't talking about actual scientists of evolution, sorry if I made that unclear. The initial comment was regarding creationists who are not scientists representing in their understanding the model presented by creationists who are scientists.
As for saying it's BS and therefore flamebait, that's just a copout. I was not presenting this as major evidence against evolution. It is merely an oddity, and very unexpected. Certainly not evidence on it's own, I never claimed it was.
How often do I hear evolutionists openly mock creationist arguments. So far I have found very few evolutionists who actually listen with some respect (Gleef is one such). You should understand that even if you don't agree with something, there are usually reasons why someone disagrees with you. Now here is the truth of the matter:
Just because someone gets it in their mind that they are a creationist and know everything there is, does not mean that what they say is a reflection of the current creationist position.
There are many different evolutionists with different ideas. The same problem exists. So instead of saying "there's never the same thing", I instead show them when they veer from what is actually taught, or answer their arguments when it is the official evolutionary line. You should do the same. If you want to see past the BS that uninformed creationists give, then forget everything you know about what they've told you and check out some of those websites I mentioned. I am amazed time and time again how many evolutionists think that we creationists reject natural selection. Are you going to be surprised too when I tell you we don't? Scientific American's 15 answers to creationist 'nonsense' is filled with arguments we don't use. It's just misinformed rubbish - but it influences the minds of many evolutionists who think that it's actually our position.
Do you know how common it is for an evolutionist to say that creationists are biased by their own presuppositions, yet they fail to realise that their own position is based on philosophical presuppositions? Consider these words of some leading evolutionists.
Richard Lewontin:
"We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its contructs, in spite of its failure to fulfil many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomoenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Food in the door" - R. Lewontin, "Billions and Billions of Demons," New York Review (January 0, 1997): p.31
Stephen Gould:
'Our ways of learning about the world are strongly influenced by the social preconceptions and biased modes of thinking that each scientist must apply to any problem. The stereotype of a fully rational and objective "scientific method," with individual scientists as logical (and interchangeable) robots is self-serving mythology' - S.J. Gould, Natural History 103(2):14, 1994
Philosopher of science David Hull:
...science is not as empi
Bwahahaha :) You think you can hurt this "poor deluded creationist" by throwing insults as an anonymous coward? This is nothing more than a small source of amusement. I'm really confused as to what you were trying to achieve...unless it was just to get a reply.
Well, here it is.