Oh, yes, and I guess the nazis had left out of their good heart, not because the red army was coming? And to think that I celebrated when the baltic republics got independence, it really scares the shit out of me what you guys are becoming.
And that is precisely the attitude that makes me have no sympathy whatsoever for the Estonians. They destroy the graves of the soldiers that kicked the Nazis out and then go around trying to bring back some kind of pure Estonian "Lebensraum". I am well aware of what Stalin did afterwards, and the introduction of Russian people to dilute the Estonian population, but I am also aware of the collaborationist past of the Estonians with the Nazi occupation, so I don't see that the Estonians can really give lessons to anyone.
In think you are presenting an partial conclusion on what 1984 is about, for starters Orwell was a communist, only not of the type that Stalin liked.
The point of 1984 is how power perpetuates itself through the establishment of a reign of fear (like Stalin did with the purges) through constant surveilance of the people and the presence of an external enemy, whether real or imagined, as tools to control dissent and keep power for its own sake. There is nothing in a capitalist society to stop that from happening, I would say more, because of the way people are lulled into a sense of security an advanced consumerist capitalist society are more likely to fall for it because they feel they have more to lose if the "enemy" wins, and they are more ready to let the changes creep in in the name of security and comfort.
Yep, as someone very dear to me usually says, the only downside of there not being an afterlife is that you can't go Ha Ha! to the religious twats when you get there. Then again, another shame of it is that people like GWB and TB will never get their comeuppance.
I beg to differ, as a user of MS development and office products I can tell you that their documentation sucks. I would say that it is as useful as having no documentation at all most of the time. For good documentation check QT, postgre or gcc, all of them open source projects.
Actually, there are different theories, but one of them says, based on linguistic evidence, that it worked the other way around, that is, the Europeans came from the region that we nowadays know as Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan. That would explain the close linguistic relation between most European languages and Persian and Hindi.
The West is in large part built upon Christianity. But unfortunately, Christianity has been so ridiculously demonized that few people are aware of this, or don't want to be aware of it.
I would say that what are considered traditional western values (critical thinking, evidence based reasoning, the scientific method) are values, which were developed against the christian tradition, rather than by it.
Humph, where do people get this thing about Nazi Germany being atheist? Haven't you heard of the legend inscribed in the belt buckles of the SS uniforms? Or are you just being selective?
A couple of years ago we moved and sold our house. We had all the paperwork from the solicitors saying that our mortgage was paid up and everything was finished.
Then, a few days later, we noticed that what would have been our next mortgage payment was marked to be taken from our account. We contacted our bank and stoped the payment, as well as the mortgage company to tell them what had happened. The mortgage company apologised for the error and said our account was clear and we didn't owe them anything. Still, a few more days later we got a letter from the mortgage company saying that we had missed a payment and could we please send them a cheque for the ammount. We phoned them again, they apologised again, and luckily we haven't heard about that account since.
Well, I don't think it was just the UK calling 10^12 a billion. When I went to school in Spain I also learnt it that way (10^9 one thousand million and 10^12 one billion). I remember that later on I started reading books that called 10^9 one billion and they usually had a footnote saying that that was the US custom. I am not sure, as I haven't lived in Spain for some years now, but I believe that in the spanish press they still use one billion for 10^12.
I know this is now way off topic, but I like your comment and I thought this, the worst part of there not being anything after death is that you can't go and tell the religious guys: told ya!
Good god, where do you buy your apples? I don't think I ever bought any apple that lasted less than a week and a half, organic or not. They usually last longer (if I don't eat them earlier that is)
By the time those guys were born the Arabs were long gone from Europe. The christian kings of Castilla, Spain wasn't invented until 200 years later, took the last Arab kingdom in 1492.
I any case, the gist of what you say is true, but you have your timing is mixed up, and it didn't hapen that way.
Well, actually Iran has a very significant christian (Armenian) minority, for instance, the Armenian Cathedral in Isfahan is a significant tourist atraction, so no, bibles are definitely not forbiden in Iran.
You said it, property rights, but no interest whatsoever in human rights, specially if those pesky things might get in the way of profit maximisation and property rights.
I am writing from the UK. The Visa Platinum from Barclays Bank (Barclaycard) had the double guarantee benefit for purchases over a certain value, but it has been/is being phased out. I know, because I took it on my fridge.
They sent a leaflet announcing the changes a few months ago. If I recall correctly, the benefit should be finishing about now.
I don't think member states are as inocent as you make them sound, the UK and dutch governments in particular. It looks more like the member states are pushing behind the scenes getting the comission to do their dirty work.
False, Visual Studio is widely renowned as the singular best programming environment there is, and is a large reason LOTS of programmers stick to Windows.
I have recently have had to start using VS and Source Safe at work, and believe me, I only use them because I have to. I can't believe they have the face to charge money for those programs when the free alternatives are so much better.
Quite true. I had a problem accesing the Smile bank (an internet bank in the UK) with firefox, though it worked fine with konqueror.
I phoned the technical support, and they gave me some tips on getting it to work with firefox, the guy even knew what firefox, mozilla and konqueror were! He said they would look into it, and in about three weeks the site was fixed and working in firefox.
Well, is the whole of the universe getting more ordered? Evolution generates a little bit of order here at the expense of a lot of entropy being generated in the Sun, so, overall, there is more disorder in the universe. I believe, Sir, that it is you that don't get it.
Slashdot Mirror
www.zen.co.uk
Oh, yes, and I guess the nazis had left out of their good heart, not because the red army was coming? And to think that I celebrated when the baltic republics got independence, it really scares the shit out of me what you guys are becoming.
And that is precisely the attitude that makes me have no sympathy whatsoever for the Estonians. They destroy the graves of the soldiers that kicked the Nazis out and then go around trying to bring back some kind of pure Estonian "Lebensraum". I am well aware of what Stalin did afterwards, and the introduction of Russian people to dilute the Estonian population, but I am also aware of the collaborationist past of the Estonians with the Nazi occupation, so I don't see that the Estonians can really give lessons to anyone.
In think you are presenting an partial conclusion on what 1984 is about, for starters Orwell was a communist, only not of the type that Stalin liked.
The point of 1984 is how power perpetuates itself through the establishment of a reign of fear (like Stalin did with the purges) through constant surveilance of the people and the presence of an external enemy, whether real or imagined, as tools to control dissent and keep power for its own sake. There is nothing in a capitalist society to stop that from happening, I would say more, because of the way people are lulled into a sense of security an advanced consumerist capitalist society are more likely to fall for it because they feel they have more to lose if the "enemy" wins, and they are more ready to let the changes creep in in the name of security and comfort.
Yep, as someone very dear to me usually says, the only downside of there not being an afterlife is that you can't go Ha Ha! to the religious twats when you get there. Then again, another shame of it is that people like GWB and TB will never get their comeuppance.
I beg to differ, as a user of MS development and office products I can tell you that their documentation sucks. I would say that it is as useful as having no documentation at all most of the time. For good documentation check QT, postgre or gcc, all of them open source projects.
Actually, there are different theories, but one of them says, based on linguistic evidence, that it worked the other way around, that is, the Europeans came from the region that we nowadays know as Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan. That would explain the close linguistic relation between most European languages and Persian and Hindi.
I would say that what are considered traditional western values (critical thinking, evidence based reasoning, the scientific method) are values, which were developed against the christian tradition, rather than by it.
Humph, where do people get this thing about Nazi Germany being atheist? Haven't you heard of the legend inscribed in the belt buckles of the SS uniforms? Or are you just being selective?
Then, a few days later, we noticed that what would have been our next mortgage payment was marked to be taken from our account. We contacted our bank and stoped the payment, as well as the mortgage company to tell them what had happened. The mortgage company apologised for the error and said our account was clear and we didn't owe them anything. Still, a few more days later we got a letter from the mortgage company saying that we had missed a payment and could we please send them a cheque for the ammount. We phoned them again, they apologised again, and luckily we haven't heard about that account since.
Well, I don't think it was just the UK calling 10^12 a billion. When I went to school in Spain I also learnt it that way (10^9 one thousand million and 10^12 one billion). I remember that later on I started reading books that called 10^9 one billion and they usually had a footnote saying that that was the US custom. I am not sure, as I haven't lived in Spain for some years now, but I believe that in the spanish press they still use one billion for 10^12.
I know this is now way off topic, but I like your comment and I thought this, the worst part of there not being anything after death is that you can't go and tell the religious guys: told ya!
Good god, where do you buy your apples? I don't think I ever bought any apple that lasted less than a week and a half, organic or not. They usually last longer (if I don't eat them earlier that is)
Well, at least it landed on Mars. Remember when NASA lost a probe because they mixed up imperial and metric units?
Not all muslims are arabs, Turks, Iranians, Pakistanis ... all of those are muslims, but not arabs.
By the time those guys were born the Arabs were long gone from Europe. The christian kings of Castilla, Spain wasn't invented until 200 years later, took the last Arab kingdom in 1492.
I any case, the gist of what you say is true, but you have your timing is mixed up, and it didn't hapen that way.
Well, actually Iran has a very significant christian (Armenian) minority, for instance, the Armenian Cathedral in Isfahan is a significant tourist atraction, so no, bibles are definitely not forbiden in Iran.
You said it, property rights, but no interest whatsoever in human rights, specially if those pesky things might get in the way of profit maximisation and property rights.
They sent a leaflet announcing the changes a few months ago. If I recall correctly, the benefit should be finishing about now.
I don't think member states are as inocent as you make them sound, the UK and dutch governments in particular. It looks more like the member states are pushing behind the scenes getting the comission to do their dirty work.
A capitalist?
I have recently have had to start using VS and Source Safe at work, and believe me, I only use them because I have to. I can't believe they have the face to charge money for those programs when the free alternatives are so much better.
Well, you said it, we have issues with Mr Gates because he only tries to make money, and doesn't care about anything else.
I phoned the technical support, and they gave me some tips on getting it to work with firefox, the guy even knew what firefox, mozilla and konqueror were! He said they would look into it, and in about three weeks the site was fixed and working in firefox.
Well, is the whole of the universe getting more ordered? Evolution generates a little bit of order here at the expense of a lot of entropy being generated in the Sun, so, overall, there is more disorder in the universe. I believe, Sir, that it is you that don't get it.