... In the US cents in my checkbook are important....
Would that not depend on whether the errors made were equally in your favor and against it? If you did a large number of transactions and half of them added a penny or two to your account and half of them subtracted a similar amount, it would all even out in the, would it not? Only if the errors were unidirectional, would there be a problem in the long term.
Actually, the Bible predicts the complete DESTRUCTION (not merely the fall) of the Roman Empire which is the final successor to Babylon. That has not happened yet. The nations and cultures that arose out of the Roman world, both east and west are still with us today. It is predicted that these nations and peoples are to form a fragile, but powerful, evil world government which will be totally destroyed and replaced, as Isaiah predicts:
For to us a Child is born, to us a Son is given; and the government shall be on His shoulder; and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Isa 9:7 There is no end of the increase of His government and peace on the throne of David, and on His kingdom, to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice from now on, even forever. The zeal of LORD of Hosts will do this.
So there is nothing wrong with the prophecy, it just has yet to happen. The faint outlines of and movement toward this coming one world system and governmental control are already visible. In fact the global warming agenda is part of the pressure exerted on nations toward that ultimate goal. Nations will cede their sovereignty to the UN or its successor in an attempt to solve the world's problems, real or imagined.
There are of course, but has the scientific "establishment" ever been able to tell the difference at first between a true crackpot and an Einstein? There are many scientists who disagree with powerful established interests about global warming and intelligent design. Science is one field where the evidence ALONE should be decisive, but in these two areas our culture has put in heavy doses of religious or political dogma of various kinds. Historically, many of the scientists I have mentioned came up with unsettling ideas that were opposed by the established scientific/political/religious powers in control at the time.
Human nature does not change. Scientists who put forth theories that threaten to overturn other's careers and work of a lifetime will always be opposed before the effort is made to examine the evidence put forth to determine whether a given idea might be valid or simply a brainfart of some crackpot.
The possibility that mankind is not in control of the weather/climate is unsettling to many, as it the notion that there might be a God after all who created everything and to whom every person will be held accountable. Nobody likes to be told that they are not the captain of their ship of life, in control of their own destiny.
(...Advances in science are done slowly...)
That is more true of the application of science, of technology, but not entirely new scientific insights. The list of scientists I gave, as well as others, came up with breakthrough ideas that were usually opposed, sometimes violently, by the then existing governmental/scientific/religious power structure.
... Should I run any more data past your particular religious authority of choice...
Probably not, because the Bible is not intended to be a scientific textbook. However, what would cause a prophet who has been right on in other prophecies already fulfilled write something apparently so off the wall? Both Isaiah and the Apostle John write about a time period where there will be great upheaval in human affairs and nature, near the end of this age.
From geological records we see evidence of incredible upheavals and catastrophe in ages past. The nice uniformitarian gentle picture of nature is the exception. Modern telescopes and space probes bring hard evidence that there are rather violent, energetic events taking happening in many places of the universe or at least have taken place in the past. Looking at the moon and some other planets also depicts a violent past. What makes you or anybody else so sure that our corner of the universe, the solar system and its planets are exempt from future upheavals?
You may not believe whether these and other biblical writers received inside information from the Creator, but don't be so quick to discount the fact that upheavals and dramatic changes have taken and certainly can, and according to these and other biblical prophets will take place again.
...Or if all computers had a working hibernate feature...
The sleep function of all modern Macs is very reliable. The only time I've had a Mac not resume properly is when I removed an external storage device while the system was asleep. Simply closing the lid on any Mac Laptop puts it into sleep mode, where RAM is maintained. The wake-up time is what it takes to spin the HD up again. Apple can do this better than other PC makers, because they design and test the OS software together with their own hardware. None of the other manufacturers have that ability. They have to make their hardware work with whatever MS dishes up and MS cannot test every computer made for compatibility.
Wind power and hydro are really solar power indirectly. It is the sun that makes the winds blow and powers the water cycle. Even oil and coal is solar power stored up from long ago. Only nuclear is not from the sun. So in a sense all "alternative" energy sources are ultimately solar.
Do you really, honestly believe that nature pays attention to how many scientists agree or disagree to *anything*? Let's all vote on tomorrow's weather to be sunny and warm or rainy and wet or snowy and icy.. oh yeah that will change the weather. Maybe in politics the majority rules at least in most so called democratic states.
...Agreeing on the cause is one thing, and as you point out, there is pretty good agreement on it....
The fact that Mars also seems to be getting warmer and that solar output has been MEASURED to be increasing is not mentioned at all by the IPCCC at all, because they ASSUME right from the get-go that humans are the cause of the warming. Since the main heat source for Earth and Mars is the sun, solar output is the only variable that would affect both.
...the information represents consensus opinion...
Of course the majority in every field, especially science, is ALWAYS right. If you were to go to the trouble to study the history of science or any other human endeavor, you would note that the majority has NEVER, even one time, come up with any significant progress for humanity. It has always been the lone Newton, Copernicus, Roemer, Kepler, Darwin, Einstein, Maxwell, Roentgen and countless others that challenged the majority status quo and brought about quantum jumps in scientific understanding. All of them were at first fought tooth and nail by the majority establishment.
Looking into the fields of Music, Literature, Philosophy and others, this is true as well.
If you want to read about well qualified climatologists who do NOT agree to the man caused global warming agenda, look here:
Of course it is warming! Those Landrovers we sent up there are the cause. Oh wait... Maybe the sun is putting out more power. Over all, it is remarkable how steady the power output of the sun is. It is far better regulated than the most well regulated outlet in any house on the planet. NO power company anywhere on earth manages to regulate their power as well as the sun does. Even so, the sun does vary its output a little, increasing very slowly over time. Look here for more:
Look especially at the output graph for the last 400 years or so.
There is also a prophecy in the Bible concerning the end of the age, where the sun will be seven times hotter: Isaiah 30:26
In the book of Revelation, which is about the end times, we also read about a very much hotter sun: Rev 16:8-9
Maybe scientists are beginning to measure the start of this dramatic increase already. If this is really to come true, eliminating greenhouse gases won't do squat. Maybe we'll have to send Al Gore up to the sun and turn down its thermostat.
...I certainly don't want to be stuck using only OS designs from the 70's for the rest of my career...
It appears that that will be your lot until all computers are 64 bit or more and come with as much non-volatile main RAM as they do now with disk space. Much of, if not most of present day computers limitations stem from the necessity of needing to manage at least two memory systems, one fast (RAM) and the other much slower disk or the slightly faster, newer SSDs. Both of these are glacial compared to the processors and do not allow instant random access to any data in the system. Consequently, today's computers spend a large fraction of their time shuffling data around.
All OS have to deal with this present limitation. A 2^64 memory space of a single non-volatile RAM storage system will mean that internally, computers will not move data as much, but only pointers to where the data is to be found in the address space. A "file" will be nothing more than an address range. Modifying a few places in a file will not make it necessary to first read the WHOLE file, then modify a few bytes and then write the file back to preserve it in case the power to the computer fails.
When even the most inexpensive computers have 10TB of non-volatile RAM, then some truly new ideas in OS design will be possible. No such computer will ever "boot" but simply get turned off and on like a light bulb. It will always remember its state when turned off and instantly resume when powered back on.
...why should she have to learn about RAM and hard drives and filesystems just to type up a letter...
Because volatile RAM happens to be one of the limitations of computers still to this very day, as it has been from the time when solid state memory replaced the earlier magnetic cores.
If all computers were 64 bit and had at least 500-1000GB of non-volatile fast RAM, computers could do exactly what Grandma wanted. Such a computer would never really "boot" because all OS type programming would be installed by the manufacturer into memory, rather than a mechanical or solid state storage device. There would only be ONE fast main memory system where everything would stay as it as last written. A given piece of data would occupy a section of the address space until that space was released for other data. Data would seldom be moved around, but only memory pointers as move, unless two copies of the same data were needed.
...Apple crossed years ago with their insidious "Apple Software Update"...
However, any user can set the update to manual mode. Then the user may decide when or if at all, to run the program. After the available updates are displayed, the user may choose to skip updating of software not used. A user may also download the updates only and then install them as needed or wanted later. If a user has several computers, then the updates don't have to burden the Internet more than once. I always skip Garageband updates, since I have never used it, but some other users here do and get it from our central server.
because they continue to buy programs that are improperly coded so as to require administrator rights just for everyday use. Mac users would not let purveyors of such software get away with that sort of thing. Also, there is no registry and all applications are self contained bundles that can be placed into any directory a users has write access to. Mac users spend an arm and a leg for their integrated computer SYSTEMS and will not settle for second rate or worse software, the way Windows users do. If Windows users would be more discriminating, the software of programmers who make programs that need admin rights would rot on the shelves. That would fix that situation after a while.
...Either god is fair and I'll be judged as a good person,...
But that is the problem, God requires perfection, there is no fuzzy line of a "good enough" definition you may have made up for yourself. When you are building a house, you need an external standard, a level, not your own keen eyeballs or feelings to build level floors and perpendicular walls.
If you are honest, you will admit that you have not ALWAYS without fail lived up to even whatever standard you have set for yourself. How many strikes ought you to be allowed before you're "out"? That is WHY God sent Jesus who NEVER sinned, to take your place IF you are willing to accept that. When you do, you are admitting that you have no merit of your own but are accepting the grace gift of God.
A person either believes God or not. There is no middle ground. Anybody can believe if they WANT to. Maybe you can think of a more universal dividing criteria between heaven and hell than belief or unbelief. Here is a suggested list God might have used: Intelligent-stupid, wealthy-poor, handsome or beautiful-ugly, tall-short, fat-thin, athletic-awkward, strong-weak, healthy-sick etc.. Try to think of others.
When another person informs you of something and you tell them that you don't believe, are you not in effect labeling such a one as ignorant at best or a liar at worst? When you tell God that you don't believe what he says or even deny his existence, are you not doing exactly that, calling him a liar? When someone calls YOU an ignoramus or a liar, do you like that? Would you want to live in the same house with someone with such an attitude for ETERNITY?
We are not discussing any religion here, but your and mine eternal destiny, either present or absent from God.
...Even if, tomorrow, Barack Obama woke up a Seekrit Muzlim and decided to cut off all military and economic aid to Israel, the country would survive...
Israel does not survive because of its own military might nor does it require the protection of the United States or anyone else. Israel survives and prospers because of the promises Jehovah God made your ancestors Abraham Isaac and Jacob as well as to King David. It is not that Jews are anything special, but that the creator God of the universe, the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob keeps his promises because he is not a liar such as we humans are.
...I get your point that you think we are worthless as a species...
I do not think that we are worthless as a species, but that value or worth, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. One person's trash is another's treasure. I believe, that because God made us, we are his treasure, extremely valuable to him. We, as human beings are much more than something that crawled out of the primeval ooze.
Personally, I do not think that any intelligent beings able to travel the unimaginable distances of interstellar or intergalactic space would be limited in any of the ways that we are. Most people, especially in the technological Western world, believe that our physical bodies, specifically our brains give rise to our personality and consciousness. This is a relatively recent belief that was not held by any significant number of people in the ages past. Any intelligent beings who believe this about themselves and if this belief is true, would never get out of their immediate galactic neighborhood.
I believe that all humans are eternal Spirit beings patterned after the one eternal God. Jesus Christ, who claiming to be God living in a human body, informed us that God is Spirit and expects to be worshiped in spirit and truth. I don't know exactly what that means, but this thing labeled "spirit" is quite different from what we label "physical". Science is limited to the study of the physical universe which is communicated to us by sensory detectors built into our bodies which we presently inhabit. Aided by extensions to the senses, we have learned that the physical universe is unimaginably huge. It appears that any physical object is confined by the laws of physics as we understand them, to an extremely tiny portion of the universe.
Any intelligent being hoping to explore a significant portion of the universe, cannot possibly be confined by a physical, mortal container such as we are in our human body in its present state. Jesus Christ demonstrated this possibility, arising from death in a transcendent glorified body. This overcoming of death itself is at the heart of the Christian faith. He left this earth temporarily, not in a roaring rocket or flashing spaceship, but in a silent cloud of light. God intends for those who believe Jesus and are willing to submit to him, to explore the rest of His incredible universe and beyond the realm of time and space. There, and at that time, these humble resurrected humans will also meet, interact with and enjoy all the many other intelligent beings inhabiting all galaxies in the universe.
....So tell me, which ethnic minority are the Iranians going to exterminate...
The same minority Adolf Hitler managed to exterminate about 6 million of -- the Jews. There is hardly any speech that the current Iranian president makes where he does NOT advocate the annihilation of the state of Israel. If he had the power and knew he could get away with it, he would do it today rather than wait for tomorrow. It is the avowed goal of the Muslim enemies of Israel, not only in Iran, to push that nation into the Mediterranean and exterminate every last Jew on planet Earth. They hate the United States, mostly because it is the only nation that supports Israel.
...We'll just protect ourselves like we always have...
There is no way you can protect yourself against your enemies, but you will be protected. You will be protected not because you are great or good, but because of the promises, the covenants I made with your forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as well your King David.
...Luckily for the rest of the world, the President of Iran doesn't have very much power...
Hitler did not have very much power either when he first came on the scene. He promised the German people: "I will change Germany such that you will not recognize it after I am done". He was right about that, in that Germany was an unrecognizable smoking heap of rubble only 12 years after Hitler came to power. The rest of the world was totally changed by the events he initiated.
...According to a number of sources, President Mahmoud "Untreatable-Psychotic" Ahmadinejad of Iran firmly believes that Allah will aid him in wiping out the infidels of the world....
I have not heard that he has ever expressed such destructive plans for the world as a whole, but only against Israel and the Jews everywhere in general, as well as those who support them. Anyone, who expresses in no uncertain terms of unbridled animosity toward the only democratic free State in that part of the world, it is clearly dangerous the whole world, if he can have his thumb on a nuclear button.
It is an established fact, that the individual Arabs living in Israel with full rights as Israeli citizens, have more freedoms than any Arab living in any Arab country.
..."let the Israelis bomb the bejesus of them."...
The Israelis have never advocated the extermination of another nation or people group. Iran and other enemies of Israel have expressed this goal more often than anyone can count. This tiny little nation has been attacked by its enemies who will not be satisfied with anything less than total extermination of every Jew on the planet. Hitler was the last tyrant that tried and failed at this. At some point in the future, Iran and its Moslem allies will try and fail again. Historically, every nation that went against Jews eventually came to ruin. What God had promised to Abraham centuries ago has been and still is in effect today.
Gen 12:3 And I will bless those that bless you and curse the one who curses you. And in you shall all families of the earth be blessed.
...because some advanced civilization who can hear our signal is essentially scared of dealing with us...
You are discounting the reason I gave concerning the war like nature of the human race as most likely why space aliens have avoided us, if they exist. What reason would you give why an advanced, intelligent race from across the galaxy would WANT to contact humanity? What could the human race possibly offer to a civilization with a demonstrated ability of distant space travel? Do not confuse the resources that humans can offer with the innate resources of our planet. If they were after our planet and its resources and we opposed them in any way, they could exterminate us like cockroaches in a day.
Slashdot Mirror
... In the US cents in my checkbook are important....
Would that not depend on whether the errors made were equally in your favor and against it? If you did a large number of transactions and half of them added a penny or two to your account and half of them subtracted a similar amount, it would all even out in the, would it not? Only if the errors were unidirectional, would there be a problem in the long term.
...following the fall of the Roman Empire ...
Actually, the Bible predicts the complete DESTRUCTION (not merely the fall) of the Roman Empire which is the final successor to Babylon. That has not happened yet. The nations and cultures that arose out of the Roman world, both east and west are still with us today. It is predicted that these nations and peoples are to form a fragile, but powerful, evil world government which will be totally destroyed and replaced, as Isaiah predicts:
For to us a Child is born, to us a Son is given; and the government shall be on His shoulder; and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
Isa 9:7 There is no end of the increase of His government and peace on the throne of David, and on His kingdom, to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice from now on, even forever. The zeal of LORD of Hosts will do this.
So there is nothing wrong with the prophecy, it just has yet to happen. The faint outlines of and movement toward this coming one world system and governmental control are already visible. In fact the global warming agenda is part of the pressure exerted on nations toward that ultimate goal. Nations will cede their sovereignty to the UN or its successor in an attempt to solve the world's problems, real or imagined.
...there are thousands of crackpot morons...
There are of course, but has the scientific "establishment" ever been able to tell the difference at first between a true crackpot and an Einstein? There are many scientists who disagree with powerful established interests about global warming and intelligent design. Science is one field where the evidence ALONE should be decisive, but in these two areas our culture has put in heavy doses of religious or political dogma of various kinds. Historically, many of the scientists I have mentioned came up with unsettling ideas that were opposed by the established scientific/political/religious powers in control at the time.
Human nature does not change. Scientists who put forth theories that threaten to overturn other's careers and work of a lifetime will always be opposed before the effort is made to examine the evidence put forth to determine whether a given idea might be valid or simply a brainfart of some crackpot.
The possibility that mankind is not in control of the weather/climate is unsettling to many, as it the notion that there might be a God after all who created everything and to whom every person will be held accountable. Nobody likes to be told that they are not the captain of their ship of life, in control of their own destiny.
(...Advances in science are done slowly...)
That is more true of the application of science, of technology, but not entirely new scientific insights. The list of scientists I gave, as well as others, came up with breakthrough ideas that were usually opposed, sometimes violently, by the then existing governmental/scientific/religious power structure.
... Should I run any more data past your particular religious authority of choice...
Probably not, because the Bible is not intended to be a scientific textbook. However, what would cause a prophet who has been right on in other prophecies already fulfilled write something apparently so off the wall? Both Isaiah and the Apostle John write about a time period where there will be great upheaval in human affairs and nature, near the end of this age.
From geological records we see evidence of incredible upheavals and catastrophe in ages past. The nice uniformitarian gentle picture of nature is the exception. Modern telescopes and space probes bring hard evidence that there are rather violent, energetic events taking happening in many places of the universe or at least have taken place in the past. Looking at the moon and some other planets also depicts a violent past. What makes you or anybody else so sure that our corner of the universe, the solar system and its planets are exempt from future upheavals?
You may not believe whether these and other biblical writers received inside information from the Creator, but don't be so quick to discount the fact that upheavals and dramatic changes have taken and certainly can, and according to these and other biblical prophets will take place again.
...Or if all computers had a working hibernate feature...
The sleep function of all modern Macs is very reliable. The only time I've had a Mac not resume properly is when I removed an external storage device while the system was asleep. Simply closing the lid on any Mac Laptop puts it into sleep mode, where RAM is maintained. The wake-up time is what it takes to spin the HD up again. Apple can do this better than other PC makers, because they design and test the OS software together with their own hardware. None of the other manufacturers have that ability. They have to make their hardware work with whatever MS dishes up and MS cannot test every computer made for compatibility.
...The productive renewable path is solar....
Wind power and hydro are really solar power indirectly. It is the sun that makes the winds blow and powers the water cycle. Even oil and coal is solar power stored up from long ago. Only nuclear is not from the sun. So in a sense all "alternative" energy sources are ultimately solar.
...97% of specialists and 82% of scientists...
Do you really, honestly believe that nature pays attention to how many scientists agree or disagree to *anything*? Let's all vote on tomorrow's weather to be sunny and warm or rainy and wet or snowy and icy.. oh yeah that will change the weather. Maybe in politics the majority rules at least in most so called democratic states.
...Agreeing on the cause is one thing, and as you point out, there is pretty good agreement on it....
The fact that Mars also seems to be getting warmer and that solar output has been MEASURED to be increasing is not mentioned at all by the IPCCC at all, because they ASSUME right from the get-go that humans are the cause of the warming. Since the main heat source for Earth and Mars is the sun, solar output is the only variable that would affect both.
.There isn't a single credible scientist who says that the current observed increase in temperature isn't due to anthropogenic causes...
How about Dr. Madhav Khandekar, Dr. Tim Patterson, and other Scientists at Armagh Observatory?
You can read about what these people and others reported contrary to the CO2 mantra of certain groups:
http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3056
...the information represents consensus opinion...
Of course the majority in every field, especially science, is ALWAYS right. If you were to go to the trouble to study the history of science or any other human endeavor, you would note that the majority has NEVER, even one time, come up with any significant progress for humanity. It has always been the lone Newton, Copernicus, Roemer, Kepler, Darwin, Einstein, Maxwell, Roentgen and countless others that challenged the majority status quo and brought about quantum jumps in scientific understanding. All of them were at first fought tooth and nail by the majority establishment.
Looking into the fields of Music, Literature, Philosophy and others, this is true as well.
If you want to read about well qualified climatologists who do NOT agree to the man caused global warming agenda, look here:
http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3056
...Mars is also undergoing global warming...
Of course it is warming! Those Landrovers we sent up there are the cause.
Oh wait... Maybe the sun is putting out more power. Over all, it is remarkable how steady the power output of the sun is. It is far better regulated than the most well regulated outlet in any house on the planet. NO power company anywhere on earth manages to regulate their power as well as the sun does. Even so, the sun does vary its output a little, increasing very slowly over time. Look here for more:
http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3056
Look especially at the output graph for the last 400 years or so.
There is also a prophecy in the Bible concerning the end of the age, where the sun will be seven times hotter: Isaiah 30:26
In the book of Revelation, which is about the end times, we also read about a very much hotter sun: Rev 16:8-9
Maybe scientists are beginning to measure the start of this dramatic increase already. If this is really to come true, eliminating greenhouse gases won't do squat. Maybe we'll have to send Al Gore up to the sun and turn down its thermostat.
...I certainly don't want to be stuck using only OS designs from the 70's for the rest of my career...
It appears that that will be your lot until all computers are 64 bit or more and come with as much non-volatile main RAM as they do now with disk space. Much of, if not most of present day computers limitations stem from the necessity of needing to manage at least two memory systems, one fast (RAM) and the other much slower disk or the slightly faster, newer SSDs. Both of these are glacial compared to the processors and do not allow instant random access to any data in the system. Consequently, today's computers spend a large fraction of their time shuffling data around.
All OS have to deal with this present limitation. A 2^64 memory space of a single non-volatile RAM storage system will mean that internally, computers will not move data as much, but only pointers to where the data is to be found in the address space. A "file" will be nothing more than an address range. Modifying a few places in a file will not make it necessary to first read the WHOLE file, then modify a few bytes and then write the file back to preserve it in case the power to the computer fails.
When even the most inexpensive computers have 10TB of non-volatile RAM, then some truly new ideas in OS design will be possible. No such computer will ever "boot" but simply get turned off and on like a light bulb. It will always remember its state when turned off and instantly resume when powered back on.
...why should she have to learn about RAM and hard drives and filesystems just to type up a letter...
Because volatile RAM happens to be one of the limitations of computers still to this very day, as it has been from the time when solid state memory replaced the earlier magnetic cores.
If all computers were 64 bit and had at least 500-1000GB of non-volatile fast RAM, computers could do exactly what Grandma wanted. Such a computer would never really "boot" because all OS type programming would be installed by the manufacturer into memory, rather than a mechanical or solid state storage device. There would only be ONE fast main memory system where everything would stay as it as last written. A given piece of data would occupy a section of the address space until that space was released for other data. Data would seldom be moved around, but only memory pointers as move, unless two copies of the same data were needed.
...Apple crossed years ago with their insidious "Apple Software Update" ...
However, any user can set the update to manual mode. Then the user may decide when or if at all, to run the program. After the available updates are displayed, the user may choose to skip updating of software not used. A user may also download the updates only and then install them as needed or wanted later. If a user has several computers, then the updates don't have to burden the Internet more than once. I always skip Garageband updates, since I have never used it, but some other users here do and get it from our central server.
...Users are to blame ....
because they continue to buy programs that are improperly coded so as to require administrator rights just for everyday use. Mac users would not let purveyors of such software get away with that sort of thing. Also, there is no registry and all applications are self contained bundles that can be placed into any directory a users has write access to. Mac users spend an arm and a leg for their integrated computer SYSTEMS and will not settle for second rate or worse software, the way Windows users do. If Windows users would be more discriminating, the software of programmers who make programs that need admin rights would rot on the shelves. That would fix that situation after a while.
...Either god is fair and I'll be judged as a good person,...
But that is the problem, God requires perfection, there is no fuzzy line of a "good enough" definition you may have made up for yourself. When you are building a house, you need an external standard, a level, not your own keen eyeballs or feelings to build level floors and perpendicular walls.
If you are honest, you will admit that you have not ALWAYS without fail lived up to even whatever standard you have set for yourself. How many strikes ought you to be allowed before you're "out"? That is WHY God sent Jesus who NEVER sinned, to take your place IF you are willing to accept that. When you do, you are admitting that you have no merit of your own but are accepting the grace gift of God.
A person either believes God or not. There is no middle ground. Anybody can believe if they WANT to. Maybe you can think of a more universal dividing criteria between heaven and hell than belief or unbelief. Here is a suggested list God might have used: Intelligent-stupid, wealthy-poor, handsome or beautiful-ugly, tall-short, fat-thin, athletic-awkward, strong-weak, healthy-sick etc.. Try to think of others.
When another person informs you of something and you tell them that you don't believe, are you not in effect labeling such a one as ignorant at best or a liar at worst? When you tell God that you don't believe what he says or even deny his existence, are you not doing exactly that, calling him a liar? When someone calls YOU an ignoramus or a liar, do you like that? Would you want to live in the same house with someone with such an attitude for ETERNITY?
We are not discussing any religion here, but your and mine eternal destiny, either present or absent from God.
...Even if, tomorrow, Barack Obama woke up a Seekrit Muzlim and decided to cut off all military and economic aid to Israel, the country would survive...
Israel does not survive because of its own military might nor does it require the protection of the United States or anyone else. Israel survives and prospers because of the promises Jehovah God made your ancestors Abraham Isaac and Jacob as well as to King David. It is not that Jews are anything special, but that the creator God of the universe, the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob keeps his promises because he is not a liar such as we humans are.
You definitely should, if God made you that promise. However if he did not, you would be a liar. God says about all liars shall burn in hell.
...I get your point that you think we are worthless as a species...
I do not think that we are worthless as a species, but that value or worth, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. One person's trash is another's treasure. I believe, that because God made us, we are his treasure, extremely valuable to him. We, as human beings are much more than something that crawled out of the primeval ooze.
Personally, I do not think that any intelligent beings able to travel the unimaginable distances of interstellar or intergalactic space would be limited in any of the ways that we are. Most people, especially in the technological Western world, believe that our physical bodies, specifically our brains give rise to our personality and consciousness. This is a relatively recent belief that was not held by any significant number of people in the ages past. Any intelligent beings who believe this about themselves and if this belief is true, would never get out of their immediate galactic neighborhood.
I believe that all humans are eternal Spirit beings patterned after the one eternal God. Jesus Christ, who claiming to be God living in a human body, informed us that God is Spirit and expects to be worshiped in spirit and truth. I don't know exactly what that means, but this thing labeled "spirit" is quite different from what we label "physical". Science is limited to the study of the physical universe which is communicated to us by sensory detectors built into our bodies which we presently inhabit. Aided by extensions to the senses, we have learned that the physical universe is unimaginably huge. It appears that any physical object is confined by the laws of physics as we understand them, to an extremely tiny portion of the universe.
Any intelligent being hoping to explore a significant portion of the universe, cannot possibly be confined by a physical, mortal container such as we are in our human body in its present state. Jesus Christ demonstrated this possibility, arising from death in a transcendent glorified body. This overcoming of death itself is at the heart of the Christian faith. He left this earth temporarily, not in a roaring rocket or flashing spaceship, but in a silent cloud of light. God intends for those who believe Jesus and are willing to submit to him, to explore the rest of His incredible universe and beyond the realm of time and space. There, and at that time, these humble resurrected humans will also meet, interact with and enjoy all the many other intelligent beings inhabiting all galaxies in the universe.
....So tell me, which ethnic minority are the Iranians going to exterminate...
The same minority Adolf Hitler managed to exterminate about 6 million of -- the Jews. There is hardly any speech that the current Iranian president makes where he does NOT advocate the annihilation of the state of Israel. If he had the power and knew he could get away with it, he would do it today rather than wait for tomorrow. It is the avowed goal of the Muslim enemies of Israel, not only in Iran, to push that nation into the Mediterranean and exterminate every last Jew on planet Earth. They hate the United States, mostly because it is the only nation that supports Israel.
...We'll just protect ourselves like we always have...
There is no way you can protect yourself against your enemies, but you will be protected. You will be protected not because you are great or good, but because of the promises, the covenants I made with your forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as well your King David.
Sincerely,
God
...Luckily for the rest of the world, the President of Iran doesn't have very much power...
Hitler did not have very much power either when he first came on the scene. He promised the German people: "I will change Germany such that you will not recognize it after I am done". He was right about that, in that Germany was an unrecognizable smoking heap of rubble only 12 years after Hitler came to power. The rest of the world was totally changed by the events he initiated.
...According to a number of sources, President Mahmoud "Untreatable-Psychotic" Ahmadinejad of Iran firmly believes that Allah will aid him in wiping out the infidels of the world....
I have not heard that he has ever expressed such destructive plans for the world as a whole, but only against Israel and the Jews everywhere in general, as well as those who support them. Anyone, who expresses in no uncertain terms of unbridled animosity toward the only democratic free State in that part of the world, it is clearly dangerous the whole world, if he can have his thumb on a nuclear button.
It is an established fact, that the individual Arabs living in Israel with full rights as Israeli citizens, have more freedoms than any Arab living in any Arab country.
..."let the Israelis bomb the bejesus of them."...
The Israelis have never advocated the extermination of another nation or people group. Iran and other enemies of Israel have expressed this goal more often than anyone can count. This tiny little nation has been attacked by its enemies who will not be satisfied with anything less than total extermination of every Jew on the planet. Hitler was the last tyrant that tried and failed at this. At some point in the future, Iran and its Moslem allies will try and fail again. Historically, every nation that went against Jews eventually came to ruin. What God had promised to Abraham centuries ago has been and still is in effect today.
Gen 12:3 And I will bless those that bless you and curse the one who curses you. And in you shall all families of the earth be blessed.
...because some advanced civilization who can hear our signal is essentially scared of dealing with us...
You are discounting the reason I gave concerning the war like nature of the human race as most likely why space aliens have avoided us, if they exist. What reason would you give why an advanced, intelligent race from across the galaxy would WANT to contact humanity? What could the human race possibly offer to a civilization with a demonstrated ability of distant space travel? Do not confuse the resources that humans can offer with the innate resources of our planet. If they were after our planet and its resources and we opposed them in any way, they could exterminate us like cockroaches in a day.