But I would like to see the God channels as well as Home Shopping network, QVC, and Womens Entertainment survive on their own merit instead of the current situation (because I wont pay for them).
That's the issue here. The moralists want to be able to get their programming without paying for all those sinful channels. The next step will be to start taxing the heathen programming with the eventual goal of driving those channels out of business.
The colorful phrase "Materialism-and-oh-yeah-that-dead-Jew festival" is a parody of the modern mainstream perspective on Christmas. The point is that Christmas, a Christian holy day, is now more about commercialism and consumption than about Christ himself. The "oh-yeah-that-dead-Jew" bit refers to the lack of attention paid to Christ during the better part of the Christmas season. If there is disrespect to decry then it is to be found every day for the next month in shopping centers across the nation.
Of course he could sign it. He just couldn't make it binding. The fact is that he did sign it, giving it the Clinton administration's support. That's the whole point.
Obviously, the Senate never ratified it. It was never even presented to the Senate; they knew that the Protocol was a long way from being workable in the US.
All in all, it is incorrect to say that Clinton did not sign on to the Kyoto Protocol. He wanted to find some middle ground between environmental disaster and economic disaster. Bush, on the other hand, seems to have no interest in anything other than giving polluters a free license and a pat on the back.
He had Al Gore sign it for him. Did you forget this essential fact? Are you being intentionally misleading? I find your "non-slanted facts" rather lacking in impartiality.
The concept of "man-made" not being "natural" is an inane concept and inflammatory.
Just pretend that every "natural" is "non-man-made". The whole point is to determine whether climate change is a direct result of human activity. It has nothing to do with the semantics of the word "natural".
It may be in our destiny to become extinct after we take a few thousand other species with us.
Admittedly, fatalism is quite popular. Environmentalism is really only for those who believe that we can control our destiny.
I just wish the hyperbolic inflammatory tree huggers would get a grip on reality. Hell, if a 2 million ton asteroid hit the earth and caused the next ice age what would the whining tree huggers have to bitch about then?
Wow. I'm glad you have such a firm grip on reality. And I'm delighted that you never use inflammatory language. I'm never sarcastic, you know.
Don't panic, and don't let anyone else panic, don't make any wild claims, and make certain that the spirit of open scientific inquiry is kept alive on this subject.
Absolutely. If I see people running through the streets in a panic then I will do my best to stop them. Likewise, those who are smugly sure that our present course is safe must be shown reason. Clearly the best thing to do here is proceed cautiously and prepare for the worst until more is known.
But what does that have to do with the original point made about corruption within the Bush administration? Bush is not part of Clinton's party. Bush's fellows are mostly from the Reagan & original Bush administrations. I see no credible link between Clinton and and the corruption in the government today.
I continue to doubt these supposed connections between Bin Laden and corruption in the Bush administration. It's undeniable that the government of Saudi Arabia wields considerable influence in the White House, but I'm not convinced that Bin Laden himself holds sway within the Saudi government.
I'll never be surprised when people blame Clinton for Bush's problems, but this is one of the weakest arguments yet. Do you expect anyone to believe that Clinton, through Bin Laden, somehow set the stage for a corrupt Bush regieme?
These are your words: "I just don't want other people to be trampled on in the process."
I interpreted "other people" as people who oppose stem cell research, and I supposed that you were taking the position that we shouldn't do any research without the permission of everyone. Hence my reference to the admittedly extreme instances of opposition to medical science.
What I was trying to get at with my post was related to the topic of the thread. New techniques will not end the controversies of medical science precisely because the sheer diversity of beliefs guarantees that there will always be opposition to medical science in general, and if not to these techniques in particular then to others.
Based on your reply, I now suspect that "other people" most likely refers to the embryos in which stem cells originate. I apologize for responding to the wrong argument, but invite you to consider that many people who oppose embryonic stem cell research have greater qualms than the destruction of embryos.
Religion and God are meta-physical concepts, while science is the study of the physical world. The two aren't mutually exclusive ideas. A scientist can just as easily believe in a religion as an atheist in science.
But can a contemporary evangelical Christian respect science as easily as an agnostic? Can someone who places an enormous value on the literal veracity of various myths really accept that some of those myths are false and the rest are untestable? The answer is being played out across the country, and so far it is a resounding NO.
The grandparent poster was saying that a communist state with a totalitarian government was not a communist state.
I would have to disagree with the claim that the USSR was a functioning communist state. That's like saying that Iran is a functioning democracy. It seems pretty obviously false when you do the analysis.
I don't give a damn about political correctness, "sending the wrong message", or any such excuse for misinformation. Attempts at communism have obviously had shitty results, but it serves nothing to try to redefine communism as something that yields shitty results. The USSR is just another failed attempt, a the model of Marxist ideals as some would have us believe.
I can't speak for everyone, but I have a problem with using fetuses for stem cell research, and none whatsoever with this.
Fetuses, eh? So you don't have any problems with embryonic stem cell research? Or have you not educated yourself on this matter before reaching your hasty conclusion?
I just don't want other people to be trampled on in the process.
This is the problem. ALL medical technology infringes on religion in some way. Some believe that stem cells have magical powers that shouldn't be messed with. Some believe that using medicine is against God's will. Some believe that sickness is caused by evil spirits, and so doctors should be replaced with exorcists. Do you propose we make exceptions for every religious objection, just to make sure that these people aren't "trampled on" in some real or imaginary way?
Maybe you guys mean that Communism can never reach Marxism because Marxism is impossible to be enforced without a totalitarian government?
Think about the logic there. According to your claim, only totalitarian states can truly achieve communism. Thus, the states that fail to achieve communism would tend to have other forms of government. But the opposite is true: failed attempts at communism tend to have totalitarian governments. It seems far more likely that a totalitarian government is an impediment to achieving a working communist system.
I realize that you disagree with me. I also realize that the riots are the result of complex cultural factors that cannot be easily summarized. I simply wanted to disabuse you of your faith in the tolerance of the French government.
I find the argument that inflammatory statements from the French government are the direct cause of the riots offensively absurd, esp. in light of France's reputation for pandering to the multicultural tolerance dogma.
France's government is conservative is many ways. They are infamous for their obsessive protection of French culture from outside influences. Perhaps the most well-known act in recent years is their ban on muslim headscarves in the classroom. They claim that their policy is even-handed (even secular!), but the fact is that it is designed to preserve one culture and hinder another. It is this demeaning conservatism and cultural supremacy that we can thank (in part) for the rioting.
Chirac may have been right about Iraq, but don't think for a moment that he's a paragon of liberal ideals.
"Manga" is not a style, it specifically refers to Japanese graphic storytelling. Otherwise there'd be no reason to even use that word. We use that word to refer to their comics/graphic novels because they use that word to refer to the same material. (It is the same with "anime".)
This assertion doesn't hold up under scrutiny. Why don't we use a French term for French comics? Why don't we use a Japanese term for Japanese movies?
Yes, in the English lexicon "manga" refers to a style. This style's association with Japan explains why we call it "manga". When an American draws a comic that inherits its style from manga, it is reasonable to call it American manga.
This is not an unusual linguistic phenomenon. You can write a mambo without setting foot in Latin America. You can invent a crepe without being French. You can even craft a calumet without being Native American.
Heh. A newspaper promising manga is like a pet store that starts selling neko food instead of cat food. On the other hand, "manga" often refers to a specific style developed by the Japanese but based in part on western techniques. The latter is probably what the headline refers to.
Anyone who has no doubts about the beginning of the universe is a fool. I don't know who these Big Bang zealots are, but if they exist as you have described them then they have a strange belief system indeed.
Does it take more faith to believe that an all powerfull, self-existing God created the Universe, or that the Universe created itself from nothing?
Aren't those statements essentially the same? You can't say that God exists outside of the universe because the universe contains everything by definition. So in both cases the universe either 1) has no beginning or 2) creates itself. On the other hand, the words 'beginning' and 'creates' imply chronology, which is a trait of the universe. So it could not 'begin' without already existing. What a meaningless exercise in semantic manipulation. (I'm not even going to touch the "self-existing" part.)
That is why you can't believe Genesis to be the word of God and believe in evolution at the same time.
It is known that Genesis contradicts itself. If people have no trouble believing that the literal word of God is contradictory then they should be able to take evolution in stride.
Not everyone who has problems with evolution is a young-earth creationist and ID is not creationism.
ID was invented by creationists for creationists. It is creationism dressed up in fancy words. The same logical flaws in creationism apply to ID. There's really nothing new in ID other than a well-financed campaign to legitimize it in the eyes of the less educated.
If ID were not creationism then the proponents of ID would first and foremost try to become established in the scientific community. They would concentrate on developing and refining their theory. If they made enough progress then it would naturally make its way into the classroom.
Unfortunately for everyone, ID is creationism. Proponents of ID are simply trying to push it into the classroom as quickly as possible, with as little scrutiny as possible. Why would any real scientist do this?
Don't forget Joseph C Wilson, who was far too successful at rational thought, as were numerous former government employees. All those "intellectual elites" are apparently just too successful for their own good and need a nice nanny state to shut them up if they ever think too much.
Good job Einstein, you've deduced that filtering and p2p software are legal. Now please address the main point of the article, regarding western companies directly profiting from oppression.
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But I would like to see the God channels as well as Home Shopping network, QVC, and Womens Entertainment survive on their own merit instead of the current situation (because I wont pay for them).
That's the issue here. The moralists want to be able to get their programming without paying for all those sinful channels. The next step will be to start taxing the heathen programming with the eventual goal of driving those channels out of business.
The colorful phrase "Materialism-and-oh-yeah-that-dead-Jew festival" is a parody of the modern mainstream perspective on Christmas. The point is that Christmas, a Christian holy day, is now more about commercialism and consumption than about Christ himself. The "oh-yeah-that-dead-Jew" bit refers to the lack of attention paid to Christ during the better part of the Christmas season. If there is disrespect to decry then it is to be found every day for the next month in shopping centers across the nation.
Of course he could sign it. He just couldn't make it binding. The fact is that he did sign it, giving it the Clinton administration's support. That's the whole point.
Obviously, the Senate never ratified it. It was never even presented to the Senate; they knew that the Protocol was a long way from being workable in the US.
All in all, it is incorrect to say that Clinton did not sign on to the Kyoto Protocol. He wanted to find some middle ground between environmental disaster and economic disaster. Bush, on the other hand, seems to have no interest in anything other than giving polluters a free license and a pat on the back.
And neither did Clinton.
He had Al Gore sign it for him. Did you forget this essential fact? Are you being intentionally misleading? I find your "non-slanted facts" rather lacking in impartiality.
The concept of "man-made" not being "natural" is an inane concept and inflammatory.
Just pretend that every "natural" is "non-man-made". The whole point is to determine whether climate change is a direct result of human activity. It has nothing to do with the semantics of the word "natural".
It may be in our destiny to become extinct after we take a few thousand other species with us.
Admittedly, fatalism is quite popular. Environmentalism is really only for those who believe that we can control our destiny.
I just wish the hyperbolic inflammatory tree huggers would get a grip on reality. Hell, if a 2 million ton asteroid hit the earth and caused the next ice age what would the whining tree huggers have to bitch about then?
Wow. I'm glad you have such a firm grip on reality. And I'm delighted that you never use inflammatory language. I'm never sarcastic, you know.
Don't panic, and don't let anyone else panic, don't make any wild claims, and make certain that the spirit of open scientific inquiry is kept alive on this subject.
Absolutely. If I see people running through the streets in a panic then I will do my best to stop them. Likewise, those who are smugly sure that our present course is safe must be shown reason. Clearly the best thing to do here is proceed cautiously and prepare for the worst until more is known.
But what does that have to do with the original point made about corruption within the Bush administration? Bush is not part of Clinton's party. Bush's fellows are mostly from the Reagan & original Bush administrations. I see no credible link between Clinton and and the corruption in the government today.
I continue to doubt these supposed connections between Bin Laden and corruption in the Bush administration. It's undeniable that the government of Saudi Arabia wields considerable influence in the White House, but I'm not convinced that Bin Laden himself holds sway within the Saudi government.
I'll never be surprised when people blame Clinton for Bush's problems, but this is one of the weakest arguments yet. Do you expect anyone to believe that Clinton, through Bin Laden, somehow set the stage for a corrupt Bush regieme?
Fortunately, Bush has an entire supply of "internets" so it's okay if the heathen UN takes one or two.
What does Bin Laden have to do with government corruption? Is Bin Laden the true power behind the Republican party? That's news to me.
These are your words: "I just don't want other people to be trampled on in the process."
I interpreted "other people" as people who oppose stem cell research, and I supposed that you were taking the position that we shouldn't do any research without the permission of everyone. Hence my reference to the admittedly extreme instances of opposition to medical science.
What I was trying to get at with my post was related to the topic of the thread. New techniques will not end the controversies of medical science precisely because the sheer diversity of beliefs guarantees that there will always be opposition to medical science in general, and if not to these techniques in particular then to others.
Based on your reply, I now suspect that "other people" most likely refers to the embryos in which stem cells originate. I apologize for responding to the wrong argument, but invite you to consider that many people who oppose embryonic stem cell research have greater qualms than the destruction of embryos.
Religion and God are meta-physical concepts, while science is the study of the physical world. The two aren't mutually exclusive ideas. A scientist can just as easily believe in a religion as an atheist in science.
But can a contemporary evangelical Christian respect science as easily as an agnostic? Can someone who places an enormous value on the literal veracity of various myths really accept that some of those myths are false and the rest are untestable? The answer is being played out across the country, and so far it is a resounding NO.
The grandparent poster was saying that a communist state with a totalitarian government was not a communist state.
I would have to disagree with the claim that the USSR was a functioning communist state. That's like saying that Iran is a functioning democracy. It seems pretty obviously false when you do the analysis.
I don't give a damn about political correctness, "sending the wrong message", or any such excuse for misinformation. Attempts at communism have obviously had shitty results, but it serves nothing to try to redefine communism as something that yields shitty results. The USSR is just another failed attempt, a the model of Marxist ideals as some would have us believe.
I can't speak for everyone, but I have a problem with using fetuses for stem cell research, and none whatsoever with this.
Fetuses, eh? So you don't have any problems with embryonic stem cell research? Or have you not educated yourself on this matter before reaching your hasty conclusion?
I just don't want other people to be trampled on in the process.
This is the problem. ALL medical technology infringes on religion in some way. Some believe that stem cells have magical powers that shouldn't be messed with. Some believe that using medicine is against God's will. Some believe that sickness is caused by evil spirits, and so doctors should be replaced with exorcists. Do you propose we make exceptions for every religious objection, just to make sure that these people aren't "trampled on" in some real or imaginary way?
Maybe you guys mean that Communism can never reach Marxism because Marxism is impossible to be enforced without a totalitarian government?
Think about the logic there. According to your claim, only totalitarian states can truly achieve communism. Thus, the states that fail to achieve communism would tend to have other forms of government. But the opposite is true: failed attempts at communism tend to have totalitarian governments. It seems far more likely that a totalitarian government is an impediment to achieving a working communist system.
I realize that you disagree with me. I also realize that the riots are the result of complex cultural factors that cannot be easily summarized. I simply wanted to disabuse you of your faith in the tolerance of the French government.
I find the argument that inflammatory statements from the French government are the direct cause of the riots offensively absurd, esp. in light of France's reputation for pandering to the multicultural tolerance dogma.
France's government is conservative is many ways. They are infamous for their obsessive protection of French culture from outside influences. Perhaps the most well-known act in recent years is their ban on muslim headscarves in the classroom. They claim that their policy is even-handed (even secular!), but the fact is that it is designed to preserve one culture and hinder another. It is this demeaning conservatism and cultural supremacy that we can thank (in part) for the rioting.
Chirac may have been right about Iraq, but don't think for a moment that he's a paragon of liberal ideals.
You're just nit picking. Obviously, if you have a creationist agenda then the most intelligent thing to do is support ID.
"Manga" is not a style, it specifically refers to Japanese graphic storytelling. Otherwise there'd be no reason to even use that word. We use that word to refer to their comics/graphic novels because they use that word to refer to the same material. (It is the same with "anime".)
This assertion doesn't hold up under scrutiny. Why don't we use a French term for French comics? Why don't we use a Japanese term for Japanese movies?
Yes, in the English lexicon "manga" refers to a style. This style's association with Japan explains why we call it "manga". When an American draws a comic that inherits its style from manga, it is reasonable to call it American manga.
This is not an unusual linguistic phenomenon. You can write a mambo without setting foot in Latin America. You can invent a crepe without being French. You can even craft a calumet without being Native American.
Heh. A newspaper promising manga is like a pet store that starts selling neko food instead of cat food. On the other hand, "manga" often refers to a specific style developed by the Japanese but based in part on western techniques. The latter is probably what the headline refers to.
Anyone who has no doubts about the beginning of the universe is a fool. I don't know who these Big Bang zealots are, but if they exist as you have described them then they have a strange belief system indeed.
Does it take more faith to believe that an all powerfull, self-existing God created the Universe, or that the Universe created itself from nothing?
Aren't those statements essentially the same? You can't say that God exists outside of the universe because the universe contains everything by definition. So in both cases the universe either 1) has no beginning or 2) creates itself. On the other hand, the words 'beginning' and 'creates' imply chronology, which is a trait of the universe. So it could not 'begin' without already existing. What a meaningless exercise in semantic manipulation. (I'm not even going to touch the "self-existing" part.)
That is why you can't believe Genesis to be the word of God and believe in evolution at the same time.
It is known that Genesis contradicts itself. If people have no trouble believing that the literal word of God is contradictory then they should be able to take evolution in stride.
Not everyone who has problems with evolution is a young-earth creationist and ID is not creationism.
ID was invented by creationists for creationists. It is creationism dressed up in fancy words. The same logical flaws in creationism apply to ID. There's really nothing new in ID other than a well-financed campaign to legitimize it in the eyes of the less educated.
If ID were not creationism then the proponents of ID would first and foremost try to become established in the scientific community. They would concentrate on developing and refining their theory. If they made enough progress then it would naturally make its way into the classroom.
Unfortunately for everyone, ID is creationism. Proponents of ID are simply trying to push it into the classroom as quickly as possible, with as little scrutiny as possible. Why would any real scientist do this?
Don't forget Joseph C Wilson, who was far too successful at rational thought, as were numerous former government employees. All those "intellectual elites" are apparently just too successful for their own good and need a nice nanny state to shut them up if they ever think too much.
But I rant.
Good job Einstein, you've deduced that filtering and p2p software are legal. Now please address the main point of the article, regarding western companies directly profiting from oppression.
Ah, but the Nazis lost in the end because they attacked communism. Now what lessons were we supposed to learn again?