I have read the Bible, some parts many times. While I agree that the reading isn't all that difficult, I keep coming to different conclusions about what it says from those of the believers.
Examples off the top of my head are that in the Adam and Eve story, the Snake tells the truth and God or God(s) lied. Jacob wrestled God, not an angel, and was kicking his ass until God cheated and hit him in the crotch. God tells his people to sacrifice their first born children to him in Exodus and confirms that he did this in Ezekiel.
Christians always tell me that I should not interpret these plain statements in the Book as literal. I see no reason not to.
I have been struggling with these questions as well. Are there people who believe the bible is literally true in every word? If so, what portion of the nominally Christian population do they represent?
I have met a number of people who claim to believe the Bible to be literally true, but when asked about specifics say that those passages are metaphorical. I have come to the conclusion that the literalists are ignorant, but consistent. The non-literalists are generally better educated but have no consistent way of determining what is true and what is not. There is no way an outsider could determine ahead of time by means of a set of rules what is to be taken literally and what is not. It all seems to come down to what the reader believes is true, but if I disblieve it all, then it all appears to me to be literary license, including that Son of God thing, but Christians all get in a bind when you start talking like that.
"its actually "25 free streamed songs per month", not "25 songs to play as you like, every month"
So, basically it is free as in radio. On the other hand, I can get a true free song a week on iTune, I just don't get to pick it unless I get lucky with a bottle of Diet Pepsi.
I don't know, I agree that it isn't news that Real sucks, but it also isn't news that the only way Real could hope to get market share is to give music away. I'm betting very few people will install Real software even for free music.
We have the same judicial system, more or less, in the U.S. and the U.K. These are common law rules.
My point was that it is not only possible to ask questions that are not leading, it is done every day by attorneys. Don't misconstrue that statement to mean that attorneys only ask non-leading questions.
The bottom line is that the poll taker made a blanket statement that it is impossible to ask such questions and silly to think that it is possible. I rebutted his conclusion by showing a pervasive counter-example.
"Just let me click and drag my files onto the player."
I dont' understand your criticism.
If you really want all that manual intervention, you can do that with iTunes. Create a playlist, drag whatever you want into it sine iTunes allows numerous ways to sort the music, and then set the preference to only load that playlist onto your iPod. Sync. Done.
There is a difference between something being possible, and something being probable.
In general slashdotters are like Mikey on the Life cereal commercials, they hate everything. But it is a nice change of pace from the mainstream media that loves everything.
Indeed, we have a limited government of eneumerated powers. the U.S. constitution eneumerates the powers the U.S. government has. It wasn't supposed to have any other powers.
Governmental powers, like features in MS products, just seem to multiply on their own, regardless of their actual utility or desirability.
"[a]ny power not expressely given to the federal government is reserved for the states, not for individuals."
The 10th Amendment to which you refer actually says:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
So, while I agree that a State could have established a state religion, I do not agree that powers are not reserved to individuals, since that is exactly what "the people" refers to: the people acting not as the U.S. or as a particular state of the Union.
"You want MS to create OSS software to give out for free, but do it anonymously? Ok, then how are we supposed to give credit to MS for doing this generous thing? You are falling into a circle here"
No, you are the one confused. If Microsoft gave it away anonymously, we could all say, "Wow, what a great piece of software, donated by a true altruist, whoever it is." Meanwhile, the boys in Redmond could all smile knowing they had done a good thing and we all appreciated it.
Just because we don't know it was MS, doesn't mean we couldnt' praise the action and just because we don't know it was MS doesn't mean the Redmond boys couldn't feel good about it.
"You are deriding "experts", but really this expert wisdom is just basic common sense. It's better to live to fight another day than to die for the $5 in your wallet."
There are only two types of people who could conceivably be "experts" on muggings: muggers, and career victims. Your "expert" assumes the mugger isn't going to shoot your ass anyway, just cuz. "Experts" on hijacking assumed the hijackers just wanted to get on the news.
Both are wrong. Experts suffer from the same shortcomings as generals: they are always fighting the last war. Blindly following an "expert" is foolish.
"No. Note the difference between the hiackers having "the pilot to fly to Cuba" versus them having control of the plane. If the hijackers are in the cabin with hostages but the pilot is in the locked cockpit and still in control of the aircraft, we don't have a 9/11-type scenario."
IF the pilot is stillin control, then he doesn't need to go to Cuba. That's the difference between a hijacking and an attempted hijacking.
"Again, it comes down to knowing what's worth fighting over. If the hijackers want the pilot to fly to Cuba, it's probably not worth getting a hostage killed over. If the hijackers want control of the plane, enabling them to turn the plane into a bomb, take 'em apart."
Right, and we should trust the hijackers to tell us truthfully what they are planning.
"Actually the passengers on Flight 93 [flight93me...roject.org] knew that it was worth fighting about, and did so."
Yep, way too late. It took too long for the pasengers to shed their sheep's clothing.
"While I understand that anarchists can have moral beliefs..."
Anarchists can have moral beliefs? Wow that is so understanding of you. I can see you are a deep thinker who holds well thought out opinions grounded in a broad knowledge of the subject of anarchism.
Get real. Anarchism is all about moral beliefs, that's how it works.
Other than that, I agree with you that Dave is a sell-out.
"Well, unless he actually did something, I'm pretty sure the US constitution used to uphold the rights of people to actually be whack-jobs and extremists."
As written it should protect them, considering that it was written by the same whack-jobs and extremists who founded this country. I'm just thinking most of us don't have the stones they had back in 1776.
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I have read the Bible, some parts many times. While I agree that the reading isn't all that difficult, I keep coming to different conclusions about what it says from those of the believers.
Examples off the top of my head are that in the Adam and Eve story, the Snake tells the truth and God or God(s) lied. Jacob wrestled God, not an angel, and was kicking his ass until God cheated and hit him in the crotch. God tells his people to sacrifice their first born children to him in Exodus and confirms that he did this in Ezekiel.
Christians always tell me that I should not interpret these plain statements in the Book as literal. I see no reason not to.
I have met a number of people who claim to believe the Bible to be literally true, but when asked about specifics say that those passages are metaphorical. I have come to the conclusion that the literalists are ignorant, but consistent. The non-literalists are generally better educated but have no consistent way of determining what is true and what is not. There is no way an outsider could determine ahead of time by means of a set of rules what is to be taken literally and what is not. It all seems to come down to what the reader believes is true, but if I disblieve it all, then it all appears to me to be literary license, including that Son of God thing, but Christians all get in a bind when you start talking like that.
I don't know about you, but after being sodomized a couple of times by Real, I and my anus are a bit gin-shy about installing the new version.
So, basically it is free as in radio. On the other hand, I can get a true free song a week on iTune, I just don't get to pick it unless I get lucky with a bottle of Diet Pepsi.
I don't know, I agree that it isn't news that Real sucks, but it also isn't news that the only way Real could hope to get market share is to give music away. I'm betting very few people will install Real software even for free music.
What exactly is a "surface" of laser light? The article didn't seem helpful in this respect.
And the snippet in "Civil War" is an audio clip from the Paul Newman movie, "Cool Hand Luke." Doesn't that just make you crave boiled eggs? :-)
My point was that it is not only possible to ask questions that are not leading, it is done every day by attorneys. Don't misconstrue that statement to mean that attorneys only ask non-leading questions.
The bottom line is that the poll taker made a blanket statement that it is impossible to ask such questions and silly to think that it is possible. I rebutted his conclusion by showing a pervasive counter-example.
An attorney can lead on cross-examination only, not on direct examination. Go look at the rules.
Nonsense. It is very easy to ask questions that do not suggest an answer or lead the respondent to a particular answer. Attorneys do this every day.
Now, it may be the case that no one will pay for a truely unbiased poll, but that is a different matter entirely.
Yes. Especially given his stated reason, which, as I showed, was lame.
I dont' understand your criticism.
If you really want all that manual intervention, you can do that with iTunes. Create a playlist, drag whatever you want into it sine iTunes allows numerous ways to sort the music, and then set the preference to only load that playlist onto your iPod. Sync. Done.
Sony does seem to be doing better at creating "the GameBoy of the 21st Century."
In general slashdotters are like Mikey on the Life cereal commercials, they hate everything. But it is a nice change of pace from the mainstream media that loves everything.
Governmental powers, like features in MS products, just seem to multiply on their own, regardless of their actual utility or desirability.
The 10th Amendment to which you refer actually says:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
So, while I agree that a State could have established a state religion, I do not agree that powers are not reserved to individuals, since that is exactly what "the people" refers to: the people acting not as the U.S. or as a particular state of the Union.
No, you are the one confused. If Microsoft gave it away anonymously, we could all say, "Wow, what a great piece of software, donated by a true altruist, whoever it is." Meanwhile, the boys in Redmond could all smile knowing they had done a good thing and we all appreciated it.
Just because we don't know it was MS, doesn't mean we couldnt' praise the action and just because we don't know it was MS doesn't mean the Redmond boys couldn't feel good about it.
he he, no pregnant lady and no ambulence. Good work quinto.
There are only two types of people who could conceivably be "experts" on muggings: muggers, and career victims. Your "expert" assumes the mugger isn't going to shoot your ass anyway, just cuz. "Experts" on hijacking assumed the hijackers just wanted to get on the news.
Both are wrong. Experts suffer from the same shortcomings as generals: they are always fighting the last war. Blindly following an "expert" is foolish.
This statement makes no sense, so I guess you are right, I must be on slashdot.
"Get over yourself. I've seen the activist-protester types in action, and it's easy enough to believe. If you don't believe it, so fucking what?"
So, fucking, I'm not fucking convinced, that's fucking what. What is your fucking problem? Are you fucking deprived?
Yeah, you're eloquent. You certainly convinced me. LOL
IF the pilot is stillin control, then he doesn't need to go to Cuba. That's the difference between a hijacking and an attempted hijacking.
Right, and we should trust the hijackers to tell us truthfully what they are planning.
"Actually the passengers on Flight 93 [flight93me...roject.org] knew that it was worth fighting about, and did so."
Yep, way too late. It took too long for the pasengers to shed their sheep's clothing.
Anarchists can have moral beliefs? Wow that is so understanding of you. I can see you are a deep thinker who holds well thought out opinions grounded in a broad knowledge of the subject of anarchism.
Get real. Anarchism is all about moral beliefs, that's how it works.
Other than that, I agree with you that Dave is a sell-out.
As written it should protect them, considering that it was written by the same whack-jobs and extremists who founded this country. I'm just thinking most of us don't have the stones they had back in 1776.
Geez, ain't that the truth. Check out FreeRepublic or NewsMax sometime and read the post from all the extremists who showed up.