The latest situation is that I posted 2 near-identical videos to YouTube, in the account I was forced to create after my original accounts and videos were removed:
One contained information showing negative passages from the Qur'an One contained information showing negative passages from the Bible
Their formats were similar, just the origin of the material differed.
The Qur'an video has just been removed by YouTube and flagged as 'Content Inappropriate' The Bible video? It has not been touched. It's there now.
YouTube is censoring any comment which puts Islam in a bad light. Negative Christian comments are being ignored.
You're forgetting, the fundies don't really need to explain anything in scientific terms. When science proves them wrong, they have the ultimate answer: 'God did it'. If their god can create a whole universe, he can certainly magic up a few zillion tons of water, and magic them away again afterwards. There's no point in talking to Creationists about 'science' and 'proof', when they believe in a god who can bend the rules at will. Faith their case is 'belief despite all evidence to the contrary'.
And while the people/sheep are herded around, looking anxiously over their shoulders, fearful of anything which appears to be out of the ordinary, all it takes is the tiniest of incidents, which would normally be seen for what it is (a non-event), for the entire mass to panic. The current climate of fear is like watching a scary movie - we all know we're not going to get hurt and that the threat isn't real, but we still jump and scream when the director wants us to.
Strife and Discord - Xena connection after all!
on
"Xena" To Be Named Eris
·
· Score: 4, Informative
I suspect that the astronomer who wanted Xena and Gabrielle to be the names of the planet and its companion has still got his Xenaphile way - Strife and Discord were two very prominent characters in many of the Xena episodes. Usually associated with Ares, the God of War who of course already has his own planet, Mars (the Roman version). The trio is united!
What I don't get about all the Intelligent Design crap is that they say that there is evidence of a designer, but they only believe in the one god. The universe is so vast and complex that surely it would take at least a dozen or so REALLY brainy god-dudes to come up with all this stuff. So why aren't the god-squadders advocating a belief system based on lots of gods, all with their specific departments? They argue that there is evidence for an intelligent designer, but I've yet to see anyone put forward a case that there weren't a load of em. In fact at the moment they probably outsourced some of the work to 'gods of other religions' which leaves a lot of em unemployed, and pretty much explains why the weather's getting worse - damned out-of-work ID types too much time to play with their tornado and earthquake powers. At least Ganesh is able to scratch his own arse while he juggles - handy having all those arms, you never get bored.
Many US scientists have done research only for the government to 'advise' them not to publish. Or to de-emphasise the role of evidence for global warming. Go against those wishes and suddenly the funding rug is yanked from under your feet. Speak out anyway and you are marginalised and your work ridiculed by a series of 'attack dog' government scientists who enforce the party line. And then because you can't get another job you can't continue your research, at least not at the head of a 'reputable' team.
Don't you think it's strange that the rest of the world's scientists are almost entirely united in their belief in the evidence pointing towards global warming, while the US's front-facing viewpoint is exactly the opposite? Surely this is not because US scientists don't read non-US scientific papers and have come to this viewpoint totally independently?
As for 'junk science', you most certainly could not call the massive amount of work that has gone into investigating global warming as 'junk'. For real junk, look up 'intelligent design'... but that's another story (albeit with a very similar nation-polarised ending).
I wouldn't go so far as to call them vermin, but yes, you're correct, the USA has a lot of nukes. And if by 40's you are referring to World War II, history books usually record that it started in 1939. Unless you're thinking of a country who entered late and whose president said he would do anything he could to stay out of the war (naturally I wasn't there but I have a recording of his speech).
And I think more people will be worried about the effect that rising sea levels have on flooding - at least the water/power companies tell you when they want to put your house under millions of tons of water.
And PS2 owners will buy because they can play all their old games on the new console, while there are still relatively few new games. Having said that, who ever used a PS2 to play PS1 games?
For the low income wage slaves, get a PS2 and/or 100 games for about 50 quid on eBay - there's plenty of life in the old ones... sighs fondly in remembrance of genuine panic when the monster appeared in 3D Monster Maze on the ZX-81!
The PS2 was £399 when it was released in the UK, so I don't see a problem with early adopters paying this much. Within 6 months the price will be dropped by £100 so if you can wait, do so. It wasn't so long ago that consumer (ie non-PC) DVD recorders were £1,000, now they are less than £100. It's always expensive being the first to buy new technology. Besides, if you wait you can enjoy the hacks, cracks and general techno-japery that accompany the consoles once they get into the hands of the soldering-iron crew.
Got your accents mixed up - 'wee' is Scottish dialect, not Irish.
Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty
Wi bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murdering pattle.
Even with the pink pages all around the site, and the fact that I was actually looking for the traditional April Fools Day stories, I still found myself wide-eyed at the very thought of this being real, even if only for a split second.
Serious sites should play more jokes like this, but on other days of the year - that would really freak people out.
Sorry, I can cite prior art on that one. If you can breathe underwater, however, you can probably get it passed - although the fish got there first, they are unlikely to raise any objection in person at the USPTO.
If you are saying that the adverse impacts, loss of freedoms etc, are such that 'everything should be patented' is wrong, then surely by your same argument a SINGLE patent is wrong. Patents restrict freedoms for 17 years, whether it is a single patent or multi-millions of patents. The system is already in place where you can, right now, file any and every idea you can think of, and stop other people using that idea/invention for a fixed amount of time - that's the very basis of the patent system.
My original post was actually calling for an end to the ridiculous patenting of intellectual ideas, facts, and biological properties (eg human genes). I was saying this: get all these junk patents out of the way, all at once. They are going to be patented one by one anyway, so rather than prolonging the agony with a one-by-one drip feed, patent them all now. Then in 17 years when they expire (and they do expire - you get a monopoly but the patent deal is that you accept the expiration date), we will all be free to invent medicines based on any human gene of our choice, we can all use one-click systems on our web sites, and so on - insert patent of your choice here.
We are going to be locked out of these things one by one, 17 years each, for centuries (for ever in fact), so let's get a patent on everything, and then in 17 years there will be no patents left to stop us doing ANYTHING.
Of course, it's not possible - for a start, everything that is ever going to be invented will have to be invented right now! So there is no need for 'serious contemplation'. But in theory, get them all out of the way and by 2023 we have a patent-free world where anyone can use any idea they choose.
How many billions of genomes did I need to individually file for again?
Let's just have patents on EVERYTHING, every gene, every molecule, every action you could ever think of. Then in 17 years (or whatever the time limit is) when they expire, we can forget all this patent bullshit and just get on with life again. I'd be willing to wait those 17 years if the patent system would just expire.
That happened to me - I just had to create the smallest C++ program and it would call me names and tell me I was an idiot. These things can scar you for life.
That probably encompasses my feelings on the subject. Making it more difficult to kill people is a key point - if I'm going to be mugged, I'd rather be beaten up than shot. I have much more chance of surviving. Banning guns takes away the weapons from opportunists, the people who are desperate, get drunk, and go out to rob the local shop. You can get guns, yes, but it is VERY difficult, and you have to be extremely determined to do so, and given the network of people you'd have to be involved with, the contacts you'd need, the average 'street punk' probably wouldn't even know where to go to get one in the UK.
The fact that fake gun crime seems to be rising is probably why there is more and more legislation being introduced which makes it both harder to buy imitations, and is tougher on people who own/carry them. The same goes for air guns - more laws on the way.
Even kids don't play with toy guns any more, unless it's fantasy 'laser rifle' things which are obvious toys and bear no relation to real-world weapons. It's not socially acceptable to play 'cops and robbers' or 'cowboys and indians', at least not with toy pistols and rifles. Obviously a lot of outdoor play has been replaced by video games, but shooting pixels is a lot safer than shooting bullets!
You're not allowed to carry knives, or any offensive weapon, and have not been allowed to do so for many years. The amnesty is for illegal knives such as (from the article) stealth knives, flick knives, gravity knives, disguised knives, which are illegal to manufacture, sell and import. Nothing there about kitchen knives or any other household implement - you can defend yourself with anything to hand in your own home. Just remember that the point at which the intruder starts to run is the point at which you can't touch him, otherwise you become the attacker - the law will only defend you if you were defending yourself.
Not sure what relevance your torture/rape analogy has - it has no bearing on anything said here.
Well no, not really, because in the UK gun related crime has gone from a very low point to a slightly higher, but still very low, point. I don't think Americans get this point - UK gun crime is low and we don't have guns, whereas US gun crime is off the scale and you do. Or are you saying that because everyone in the US has a gun, that has led to an incredibly low incidence of gun related crime in America?
Total homicides using all types of guns in 2004/05 - 78. That's 78 deaths in a whole year in the entire COUNTRY. How many gun related deaths in the US during the same period? Remembering there are only 4 times the number of people so your target to aim for is 78 x 4 = 312 deaths. You'll not be surprised when I tell you that the US has around 30,000 gun-related homicides - that's about 100 times more per head of population.
If there are some figures to support your claim that more guns equals less crime, I'd be more than willing to take a look.
UK citizens have the right to self protection. Just not with guns. You can bash someone over the head if they get into your house, no problem. And because hand guns are illegal, and very hard to come by, burglars don't tend to carry them, and they know that householders also won't shoot at them, another reason that burglars don't need to carry a gun to pretect THEMselves. I'm perhaps making a really bad case for this, but basically, fewer guns equals VERY low gun deaths in the UK. Compare the figures with US gun deaths (look elsewhere for those) - remembering that the US has only 4 times the population I will bet my dog's hind legs that US gun deaths are WAY more than 4 times the UK level. And that's a good thing, right?
However I've now checked the stats and it seems that gun crimes have increased in the UK, so that really pisses all over my argument! Oh well, I can only assume that gun crime would have increased anyway - you were NEVER allowed to own handguns at home for personal protection use, so the banning of them would have made little difference.
I hereby award this little effort an F in debating class. Sigh.
We like our gun control, thanks very much. Not many people are shot in this country. Some, not many - the number is very, very small. The UK population has never had a history of carrying offensive weapons, certainly never any form of gun, and as far as I know the only people who were affected when handguns were totally banned were a few people in gun clubs who had to find a new hobby. And it buggered up our Olympic shooting team of course.
Overall, not much was taken away, but the one or two nutters who used to get their guns from the gun club and go mad have been deterred. Criminals still get guns, but criminals can get anything, legal or not.
Slashdot Mirror
...and of course YouTube has now deleted THAT account too, and banned me PERMANENTLY.
The whole story is at http://www.gisburne.com/
The latest situation is that I posted 2 near-identical videos to YouTube, in the account I was forced to create after my original accounts and videos were removed:
One contained information showing negative passages from the Qur'an
One contained information showing negative passages from the Bible
Their formats were similar, just the origin of the material differed.
The Qur'an video has just been removed by YouTube and flagged as 'Content Inappropriate'
The Bible video? It has not been touched. It's there now.
YouTube is censoring any comment which puts Islam in a bad light. Negative Christian comments are being ignored.
I have posted a new YouTube video about this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEaC6Azs9DE
And there is more information on my web site:
http://www.gisburne.com/
Please contact YouTube with any protests you may have. This is censorship, and YouTube is caving in to pressure from Muslims, undeniably.
http://www.youtube.com/user/NickGisburne2000
The full story is on there. If someone in Slashdot can change the story link to go there, I would appreciate it. Thanks.
Nick Gisburne
You're forgetting, the fundies don't really need to explain anything in scientific terms. When science proves them wrong, they have the ultimate answer: 'God did it'. If their god can create a whole universe, he can certainly magic up a few zillion tons of water, and magic them away again afterwards. There's no point in talking to Creationists about 'science' and 'proof', when they believe in a god who can bend the rules at will. Faith their case is 'belief despite all evidence to the contrary'.
So he voted for himself, but his wife went to check the vote for him. Okay, so who did his WIFE vote for?!
And while the people/sheep are herded around, looking anxiously over their shoulders, fearful of anything which appears to be out of the ordinary, all it takes is the tiniest of incidents, which would normally be seen for what it is (a non-event), for the entire mass to panic. The current climate of fear is like watching a scary movie - we all know we're not going to get hurt and that the threat isn't real, but we still jump and scream when the director wants us to.
I suspect that the astronomer who wanted Xena and Gabrielle to be the names of the planet and its companion has still got his Xenaphile way - Strife and Discord were two very prominent characters in many of the Xena episodes. Usually associated with Ares, the God of War who of course already has his own planet, Mars (the Roman version). The trio is united!
What I don't get about all the Intelligent Design crap is that they say that there is evidence of a designer, but they only believe in the one god. The universe is so vast and complex that surely it would take at least a dozen or so REALLY brainy god-dudes to come up with all this stuff. So why aren't the god-squadders advocating a belief system based on lots of gods, all with their specific departments? They argue that there is evidence for an intelligent designer, but I've yet to see anyone put forward a case that there weren't a load of em. In fact at the moment they probably outsourced some of the work to 'gods of other religions' which leaves a lot of em unemployed, and pretty much explains why the weather's getting worse - damned out-of-work ID types too much time to play with their tornado and earthquake powers. At least Ganesh is able to scratch his own arse while he juggles - handy having all those arms, you never get bored.
Don't you think it's strange that the rest of the world's scientists are almost entirely united in their belief in the evidence pointing towards global warming, while the US's front-facing viewpoint is exactly the opposite? Surely this is not because US scientists don't read non-US scientific papers and have come to this viewpoint totally independently?
As for 'junk science', you most certainly could not call the massive amount of work that has gone into investigating global warming as 'junk'. For real junk, look up 'intelligent design'... but that's another story (albeit with a very similar nation-polarised ending).
I wouldn't go so far as to call them vermin, but yes, you're correct, the USA has a lot of nukes. And if by 40's you are referring to World War II, history books usually record that it started in 1939. Unless you're thinking of a country who entered late and whose president said he would do anything he could to stay out of the war (naturally I wasn't there but I have a recording of his speech).
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/11/ 08/0550203
And I think more people will be worried about the effect that rising sea levels have on flooding - at least the water/power companies tell you when they want to put your house under millions of tons of water.
And PS2 owners will buy because they can play all their old games on the new console, while there are still relatively few new games. Having said that, who ever used a PS2 to play PS1 games? For the low income wage slaves, get a PS2 and/or 100 games for about 50 quid on eBay - there's plenty of life in the old ones... sighs fondly in remembrance of genuine panic when the monster appeared in 3D Monster Maze on the ZX-81!
The PS2 was £399 when it was released in the UK, so I don't see a problem with early adopters paying this much. Within 6 months the price will be dropped by £100 so if you can wait, do so. It wasn't so long ago that consumer (ie non-PC) DVD recorders were £1,000, now they are less than £100. It's always expensive being the first to buy new technology. Besides, if you wait you can enjoy the hacks, cracks and general techno-japery that accompany the consoles once they get into the hands of the soldering-iron crew.
I can read the pink on white, but the pink on grey is near impossible for my tired eyes. Darker pink or darker grey please!
Serious sites should play more jokes like this, but on other days of the year - that would really freak people out.
Sorry, I can cite prior art on that one. If you can breathe underwater, however, you can probably get it passed - although the fish got there first, they are unlikely to raise any objection in person at the USPTO.
If you are saying that the adverse impacts, loss of freedoms etc, are such that 'everything should be patented' is wrong, then surely by your same argument a SINGLE patent is wrong. Patents restrict freedoms for 17 years, whether it is a single patent or multi-millions of patents. The system is already in place where you can, right now, file any and every idea you can think of, and stop other people using that idea/invention for a fixed amount of time - that's the very basis of the patent system.
My original post was actually calling for an end to the ridiculous patenting of intellectual ideas, facts, and biological properties (eg human genes). I was saying this: get all these junk patents out of the way, all at once. They are going to be patented one by one anyway, so rather than prolonging the agony with a one-by-one drip feed, patent them all now. Then in 17 years when they expire (and they do expire - you get a monopoly but the patent deal is that you accept the expiration date), we will all be free to invent medicines based on any human gene of our choice, we can all use one-click systems on our web sites, and so on - insert patent of your choice here.
We are going to be locked out of these things one by one, 17 years each, for centuries (for ever in fact), so let's get a patent on everything, and then in 17 years there will be no patents left to stop us doing ANYTHING.
Of course, it's not possible - for a start, everything that is ever going to be invented will have to be invented right now! So there is no need for 'serious contemplation'. But in theory, get them all out of the way and by 2023 we have a patent-free world where anyone can use any idea they choose.
How many billions of genomes did I need to individually file for again?
Let's just have patents on EVERYTHING, every gene, every molecule, every action you could ever think of. Then in 17 years (or whatever the time limit is) when they expire, we can forget all this patent bullshit and just get on with life again. I'd be willing to wait those 17 years if the patent system would just expire.
That happened to me - I just had to create the smallest C++ program and it would call me names and tell me I was an idiot. These things can scar you for life.
The fact that fake gun crime seems to be rising is probably why there is more and more legislation being introduced which makes it both harder to buy imitations, and is tougher on people who own/carry them. The same goes for air guns - more laws on the way.
Even kids don't play with toy guns any more, unless it's fantasy 'laser rifle' things which are obvious toys and bear no relation to real-world weapons. It's not socially acceptable to play 'cops and robbers' or 'cowboys and indians', at least not with toy pistols and rifles. Obviously a lot of outdoor play has been replaced by video games, but shooting pixels is a lot safer than shooting bullets!
You're not allowed to carry knives, or any offensive weapon, and have not been allowed to do so for many years. The amnesty is for illegal knives such as (from the article) stealth knives, flick knives, gravity knives, disguised knives, which are illegal to manufacture, sell and import. Nothing there about kitchen knives or any other household implement - you can defend yourself with anything to hand in your own home. Just remember that the point at which the intruder starts to run is the point at which you can't touch him, otherwise you become the attacker - the law will only defend you if you were defending yourself. Not sure what relevance your torture/rape analogy has - it has no bearing on anything said here.
Sample page (first one I pulled up from Google):
http://www.gun-control-network.org/GF05.htm
Total homicides using all types of guns in 2004/05 - 78. That's 78 deaths in a whole year in the entire COUNTRY. How many gun related deaths in the US during the same period? Remembering there are only 4 times the number of people so your target to aim for is 78 x 4 = 312 deaths. You'll not be surprised when I tell you that the US has around 30,000 gun-related homicides - that's about 100 times more per head of population.
If there are some figures to support your claim that more guns equals less crime, I'd be more than willing to take a look.
However I've now checked the stats and it seems that gun crimes have increased in the UK, so that really pisses all over my argument! Oh well, I can only assume that gun crime would have increased anyway - you were NEVER allowed to own handguns at home for personal protection use, so the banning of them would have made little difference.
I hereby award this little effort an F in debating class. Sigh.
We like our gun control, thanks very much. Not many people are shot in this country. Some, not many - the number is very, very small. The UK population has never had a history of carrying offensive weapons, certainly never any form of gun, and as far as I know the only people who were affected when handguns were totally banned were a few people in gun clubs who had to find a new hobby. And it buggered up our Olympic shooting team of course.
Overall, not much was taken away, but the one or two nutters who used to get their guns from the gun club and go mad have been deterred. Criminals still get guns, but criminals can get anything, legal or not.