Wow, a gig of special aps + ~300 megs of documents and mail = 1.3 gigs
So you're telling me WinXP and Office take up 8.7 gigs?:p I always knew MS was bloated, but WOW....
When I was helping upgrade work systems from Win98 to NT4 (a WHILE back), the Ghost images I created ended up fitting on one regular sized CD. With heavy compression ofcourse, but still, that was the OS, a full MS suite, Visio, SAP software, plus about a dozen specialized applications. I can't imagine how you managed to get a 10 gig ghost image.
Formating the guy's HD might be a little extreme, but back when I actually used IRC, I used to get bots trying to infect me all the time. So I'd run the file, capture and analyze the packets it sends as it's connecting, then shut it down, reconnect using mIRC, and take over the botnet. From there it was a simple matter to get them to accept a script which would eradicate all the bots.
They're getting more complex these days, but the same principles still apply. Once you get one on your system, it's a simple matter to analyze it and use it to take control off, and destroy, the rest of them.
I didn't say I was boycotting Nike, nor did I say that all western companies should stop using sweatshops. What would be nice is if these sweatshops got some standards and treated their workers like human beings. I agree with you; putting them out of work would make them worse off than they already are. I just think your particular logic is ridiculous. "They don't know any better so we don't need to help them" doesn't make sense to me.
Ah, so we're just having a bit of a misunderstanding. I absolutely beleive in helping these people as much as we can, I just disagree with the way that most "activists" would have us do it. Shutting down "sweatshops" is no solution, and I'm glad you agree on that. Paying them more is possible, but it has to be done carefuly, and it would in most cases be a very small increase. Otherwise you risk damaging the local economy and creating more problems. Improving conditions at the factories is deffinitely something that we should be looking at. As far as I know however, most of them are already at, or above, the standard for the host countries, so I'm not sure how much of a difference could be made there. Working hours could be reduced, however I very much doubt these places have mandatory 16 hour shifts to begin with - the workers end up working those hours because they want to make more money. If you put a limit on maximum number of work hours per week, most of them would just try to find second jobs. There's all sorts of complications when you start trying to change these things; they're not nearly as simple as "activists" would have you beleive. And I think that's intentional; it's much harder to get people to come to a rally that's based on a bunch of minor, meticulously planned out changes, and MUCH easier to get them to rally behind absolutely rediculous ideas which can be printed on a cardboard sign or worn on a t-shirt. Who wants to carry a picket that says "Pay African workers an extra penny an hour!" when they can carry signs saying "Get Corporate Fachist Pigs Out Of Africa!".
Also, I don't happen to own any Nike products, but that's only because I think they're too expensive. =)
You know, I'm getting sick and tired of this particular brand of logic. "If something is good for the rich, or for "us", then it must be bad for everyone else". What a load of horse shit. When will you realize that the rich getting richer generaly helps everyone involved in the proccess? People like you whine and bitch about the fact that the "ultra-rich" are so much better off than our "poor", while our poor in fact enjoy a lifestyle which would be considered comfortable, or even decadent in most of the world, and the "sweatshop" labourers employed by our horrible "ultra rich" corporations make money to support themselves and their families in an environment where jobs are extremely difficult to come by. You don't give a shit about the fact that capitalist economies continualy outperform socialist economies, and manage to provide a more comfortable life for everyone involved in the procces, including the "poor" and unemployed. Instead you cling to socialist and communist ideals which continualy fail to live up to the promised "paradise" we keep hearing about. The level of ignorance, and the ammount of self-delusion required to maintain your beleifs continualy astounds me. It's even more unfortiunate that these sorts of beleifs seem to blossom in our "educational" institutions, while even poor uneducated farmers in third world countries can understand the realities of life. Education is supposed to erradicate ignorance, but it certainly doesn't seem to be working in our universities and colleges.
Your beleifs aren't "unpatriotic". They're just totaly fucking wrong, and, if carried out to their inevitable conclusion, outright inhumane. It seems like half the worlds problems are created by well-meaning idiots.
You're going to help them by boycotting Nike? So ultimately you want all western companies to cease operating "sweatshops". Which in turn gives them no incentive to operate there. Which means, they all pack up and leave.
How exactly does that help those people? You're putting them all out of work and letting them starve. Isn't this a case of "in order to save the villiage, we had to burn the villiage"?
Your viewpoint disgusts me, but who am I to call you out on it?
That's about the only rational thing you've said so far...
In case you're unaware, Asian sweat-shop workers probably don't have access to/. and are therefore unlikely to run accross the joke. Moreover, they'd be unlikely to understand what all the fuss is about anyway. That way of life is perfectly natural for them; not only would they not understand the joke, but they'd probably be pretty confused about your concern, and would be wondering why you want to put them out of business.
Since you've allowed yourself to guess my motivation, allow me to guess yours: When you've been confronted by information rocking your beliefs in regards of scientific leadership of the world, you've been trying to poke holes in that information. The original statement that the USA still retains the world lead in scientific advancement, is not true anymore, which is shown clearly in absolute numbers.
Hah. Pull up your pants, your bias is showing.
Comparing the US to the EU, and then saying that the USA no longer retains it's leadership in scientific advancement? Well, you could also compare the US to all other countries in the world put together, and say that the US no longer leads the way in military advancement either. Doesn't mean it would be true though. If you want to compare the EU to another organization, then do a comparison between the EU and NATO. If you want to compare the USA to another country then compare them to another country. Otherwise it's quite clear you're just trying to twist statistics to support your biases.
It implies that the book is actually based on historical events. It in no way means that peoples interpretation of those events was accurate, nor that every story told is absolutely real.
Just imagine, the year is 2306....
You: Everyone knows that the earth was almost destroyed in 1999 by space-aliens. Me: What do you base that on? You: Well, it says so right in The Independance Day. Me: But what makes you think it's factual. You: Easy. It makes reference to a city called "Washington", which archeologists have long thought to be fictional. Just recently we've re-discovered the foundations of the "White House", which was in "Washingotn". Therefore, the rest of The Independence Day must be true as well.
Well, we certainly were lied to, but it wasn't by Bush.
Unless, ofcourse, you mean to suggest that the rest of the world, inlcuding England, Australia, France, Germany, and even the UN security council, all depended on US intelligence, and therefore when they all said Sadam had weapons, they were only saying it because Big Bad Dubya lied to them about it.
What a load of horse-shit. Where the hell do people like you get off blaiming the combined failiures of multiple international intelligence communities on one man who has nothing whatsoever to do with intelligence gathering or analysis? Anyone with half a fucking neuron in their brainpan would be able to realize that either Sadam was damn good at hiding his weapons, or he intentionaly misled us into beleiving he had weapons which he doesn't. Either way, the main responsibility for that particular fiasco can be laid at Sadam's feet, along with some blame being directed at the numerous intelligence organizations which fell for his act. What the HELL does Bush have to do with any of that? Open your friggin' mind for a minute and look at things objectively. If people like you are "progressive" than god help the human race. You couldn't progress your way out of a wet paper bag.
The situation in Iraq is dire. Lacking sufficient troops to quell the insurgency, Washington just might exit Iraq, leaving it to spiral into civil war.
You know, when I see statements like that, I'm torn between the desire to knock the speakers teeth down his throat, and the desire to break into an extended session of rolling on the floor laughing.
Due to my lack of proximity to you, I ofcourse had to go with the laughter. I'm still wiping the tears off my cheeks. Thanks man, I know it was unintentional, but you totaly made my day:)
Now, on with the response:
US military deaths in Iraq: 2,317 in 3 years.
WW2: 2,500 men lost in one day amongst airborne divisions during d-day. 300,000 dead in 4 years.
Korea: 54,000 dead in 3 years.
Vietnam: 2,316 lost in one month (May, 1968). 58,226 in 8 years.
But, ofcourse, "the situation in Iraq is dire". Things are so bad that roughly the same number of American soldiers died in one month in Vietnam, and in one day during WW2. I don't know how the American people can ever hope to deal with such a disaster. It's become quite clear that there's no way to win! US forces must return NOW, or at this rate they'll ALL be dead in 80 years or so! Mostly from old age, but still....
Creationists do not dispute the existence of microevolution....They dispute the validity of radioisotope dating and that E. coli and H. sapiens had a common ancestor.
I know. Which, in itself is rather silly since the existance of micro-evolution automaticaly tends to suggest that macro-evolution is at the very least a pretty good possibility. It's not conclusive mind you, but only someone with fairly firm pre-conceptions on the subject would be able to look at micro-evolution and then say "aha! this proves that God gave us genes, but he only lets us change a little!".
Other than that the prophecies of the Bible are falsifiable but have in fact held up? For instance, rchaeologists once believed Jericho and Nineveh were myths until they unearthed the cities' ruins. Psalm 22 contains a graphic depiction of a crucifixion, a method of execution that would not be practiced until centuries later when the Romans invented it.
How is that proof of God? Let me get the logic here:
The Bible talks about cities which existed when the Bible was first written, but some archeologists didn't beleive in their existance. We then find these cities. Therefore God must be real.
What the hell? Hey, look, I can do that too:
Some people say that Michael Moore is a Big Fat Lying Idiot.
After reviewing video evidence, I have concluded that he is indeed fat.
Therefore, that is conclusive evidence that he is also a Lying Idiot.
Think about it - science wouldn't progress more rapidly if you reduced the population size of the USA but continued to publish the same number of papers. Yet the per-capita statistic would rise. The per-capita statistic is not a way of measuring scientific progress.
And neither is the number of scientific papers published. You can have one country fire off 200,000 papers "proving" that the Atomic Bomb could never work, while another country goes and builds it without publishing a single paper.
1) No country is outperforming the US. 2) The EU and Asia aren't countries anyway, they consist of MANY countries. 3) Per capita statistics are important because they reflect the state of the society. For instance, you can say that the US and China both have about 2 million citizens incarcerated in their prison system, which, without any other point of reference would indicate that both countries have relatively similar incarceration rates. OR you can say that the Chinese have 0.1% of their population imprisoned, while the US has imprisoned 0.6% of it's population. Which makes a big difference, now doesn't it. Similarly, with the scientific papers, if you don't consider the population differences then it would seem that the average EU citizen is better educated, or that funding for science is more readily available. That perception changes once you consider population figures.
Science make bold and utterly false prediction, just to have some other upstart technology steal the show.
Eh, no. Science never made any such predictions. SCIENTISTS sometimes make predictions, however, the good ones limit themselves to hypothesis, and then attempt to prove those hypothesis through Science. These "bold and utterly false predictions" are made by people seeking media attention and fame.
For evolution to happen, it would be like taking a watch and hitting it with a hammer until it was broken into a thousand peices, and then putting those peices in a bag and shaking the bag so the watch is magically put back together.
In case you haven't noticed, a watch isn't alive. It has no desire to grow or improve. It doesn't care wether it's functioning properly, or broken down to it's component molecules. Life does. For one thing, we can see clear signs of human adaptation. People in warm, sunny climates have darker skin than those living in colder climates. Humans living at high altitudes have expnaded lung capacity. People living in extremely cold climates have smaller bodies with shorter limbs than those living in warm climates. We see small changes on those levels all the time. Bological changes DO occur in response to the environment; that much is undeniable. The only thing you can legitemately question is whether or not evolution occurs on a larger scale, creating entirely new species over time. But the fact that micro-evolution can be logicaly demonstrated to have occured is enough to make your watch analogy absolutely useless. Watches do not procreate and change to suit their environment.
No, everything a rational observer looks at gives proof that God does exist. He made everything, and when we look at a beautiful flower or the stars in the sky, we see our Creators work.
I've yet to see a flower or a star with the words "God wuz here" writen on it. Even if I were to see it, I'd suggest it's mainly evidence that someone with a magic-marker was really bored. There is no evidence of God. If you wish to beleive in him/her/it, that's your choice, however, claiming that you have evidence of it only illustrates the fact that you have no idea what the word "evidence" means. As such, any rational discussion with you is largely a waste of time.
What the hell? For one, you're misinterpreting the statistics. It seems like you made up your mind that scientific research is on the decline in the US, and only then went looking for info to back that claim.
From the article you linked:
In 1981, when the company began tracking the data, the United States accounted for 39.7 percent of the total number of papers published in the world (172,132 papers); the EU accounted for 32.3 percent (139,954 papers); and the Asia Pacific region accounted for 13 percent (56,644 papers). By 2004, the EU accounted for 38 percent of the total number of papers (292,067); the United States accounted for 33.3 percent (256,374); and the Asia Pacific region accounted for 25.3 percent of papers (195,001).
In other words, the total number of papers published in the US increased by 48% during this time period (172,132 to 256,374). A decrease in percentages does not equal a decrease in number. Considering that the EU has about 60% more people than does the US, they SHOULD be putting out a higher number of papers than the US. The reason for the unequal increase in papers published by the US and EU respectively should be clear to anyone who's lived in Europe; the US has always had a fairly effective, and reasonably accessible education system, whereas in many parts of the EU, education was limited, and economic difficulties meant a much higher dropout rate due to the need to begin working at an early age. Similar reasons explain the jump in papers coming out of Asia. If Europe and Asia were producing the same number of papers per capita as the US, the figures should looks something like this:
US: 256,374
EU: 401,015
Asia: 3,197,401
So obviously, the US is still way ahead of the curve, and Asia is still FAR behind. Europe's doing a decent job of catching up, but I don't expect to see them surpass the US any time soon.
I don't think any of that is true. If it was then Russia would be more technologially advanced then the us due to their long occupation of Afghanistan.
That would, ofcourse, assume that the USSR didn't have all sorts of other problems. Communist and capitalist economies are two totaly different animals. It would also assume that the ruskies cared enuogh about their foot-soldiers to try and devise technological solutions to the threat of insurgent warfare. Which, in what is sure to be the understatement of the year, was not the case.
COnventional wars are good for the economy because they make your enemy produce more weaponry.
Eh? How does "the enemy" producing weaponry improve YOUR economy? I think one of us hasn't had enough coffee today; your statement seems like a total non-sequitor.
Yes, a hundred thousand people IS "a lot", so yeah, there probably are "a lot" of people who were happy with Sadam. Ofcourse, everything's relative. The majority of the 27 million Iraqi's would be calling you all sorts of names if they could hear you right now.
And yeah, Castro sure does put on a good PR show doesn't he? Organized crowds of "supporters"....pre-written "man-on-the-street" interviews....oh, and I especially like the wall he's having built to stop his people from looking at the horrible messages being propagated by the American embassy. What a wonderful dictator Castro is! EVERY country should have one just like him!
Everyone realizes it, Al Qaeda just happen to be the only ones bothering to try and fight. Ofcourse, Al Qaeda style tactics don't win wars - they don't even really CONSTITUTE a war. So I'm sorry to tell you this, but your hero Osama is NOT a tactical genius. And if he beleives, as you do, that "a war of attrition" will negatively impact the US, I'd go so far as to call him a f-ing idiot. War of any type normaly boosts the economy, and improves science/technology, which in turn makes things better for society as a whole. This type of warfare especialy isn't likely to harm the US - it produces minimal casualties, and the US has complete control over just how much money to expend.
Anyway that's way off topic. Just wanted to point that, while no military is likely to defeat the US using conventional tactics, terrorist tactics are even more regressive, and are much less likely to garner an offensive win. They CAN be used to win a war fought on foreign soil, but that's entirely due to the lack of "staying power". In other words, due to the idiots in the peanut gallery who start screaming "quagmire" at the drop of a casing. Staying power is never an issue for a military on it's home soil though, which is why terrorism can't win an offensive war.
Actualy Tom Clancy wrote a couple books on exactly that premise. I think it's a good point - a C-130 or a B-52 could be configured to carry enough weaponry to destroy a small airforce. Fighters are more useful now for reconnoisance roles, or maybe situations where you'd like to visualy identify the enemy before you blast him out of the sky.
Heh, sure, if by "individual matchup" you mean what the indian airforce did when they "won" a competition against US fighters: basicaly designing the exercise to prohibit the use of advanced avionics or missiles with a range in excess of the ones available to the Indian airforce.
What your highly vaunted "pundits" are refering to is the fact that the MiG-29 has flight characteristics and capabilities which meet or exceed those of comparale US fighters. What they fail to mention is that fighters are these days simply platforms for electronics suites and a payload. The days of fighters swooping around locked in a dog-fight-to-the-death are long gone. Anyone who attempts to engage the US ariforce in that type of combat will survive just long enough to realize just how stupid they really are.
Ofcourse, the other important consideration for any NATO country looking to buy a fighter is interoperability. Buy an F-18, or the new JSF, and you're gauranteed to be able to work side by side with the major players. Buy a MiG and you'll be relegated to the airforces version of KP duty.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, man, like, everyone know that the pigs are just there to opress us...
Hey I'll trade you my Che Guevera shirt for some of that shiny tinfoil....
Wow, a gig of special aps + ~300 megs of documents and mail = 1.3 gigs
:p I always knew MS was bloated, but WOW....
So you're telling me WinXP and Office take up 8.7 gigs?
When I was helping upgrade work systems from Win98 to NT4 (a WHILE back), the Ghost images I created ended up fitting on one regular sized CD. With heavy compression ofcourse, but still, that was the OS, a full MS suite, Visio, SAP software, plus about a dozen specialized applications. I can't imagine how you managed to get a 10 gig ghost image.
:D
Maybe I should have put a disclaimer on my post:
WARNING: Proffessional bot-wrangler on a special machine. Do not attempt this at home.
Formating the guy's HD might be a little extreme, but back when I actually used IRC, I used to get bots trying to infect me all the time. So I'd run the file, capture and analyze the packets it sends as it's connecting, then shut it down, reconnect using mIRC, and take over the botnet. From there it was a simple matter to get them to accept a script which would eradicate all the bots.
They're getting more complex these days, but the same principles still apply. Once you get one on your system, it's a simple matter to analyze it and use it to take control off, and destroy, the rest of them.
I didn't say I was boycotting Nike, nor did I say that all western companies should stop using sweatshops. What would be nice is if these sweatshops got some standards and treated their workers like human beings. I agree with you; putting them out of work would make them worse off than they already are. I just think your particular logic is ridiculous. "They don't know any better so we don't need to help them" doesn't make sense to me.
:)
Ah, so we're just having a bit of a misunderstanding. I absolutely beleive in helping these people as much as we can, I just disagree with the way that most "activists" would have us do it. Shutting down "sweatshops" is no solution, and I'm glad you agree on that. Paying them more is possible, but it has to be done carefuly, and it would in most cases be a very small increase. Otherwise you risk damaging the local economy and creating more problems. Improving conditions at the factories is deffinitely something that we should be looking at. As far as I know however, most of them are already at, or above, the standard for the host countries, so I'm not sure how much of a difference could be made there. Working hours could be reduced, however I very much doubt these places have mandatory 16 hour shifts to begin with - the workers end up working those hours because they want to make more money. If you put a limit on maximum number of work hours per week, most of them would just try to find second jobs. There's all sorts of complications when you start trying to change these things; they're not nearly as simple as "activists" would have you beleive. And I think that's intentional; it's much harder to get people to come to a rally that's based on a bunch of minor, meticulously planned out changes, and MUCH easier to get them to rally behind absolutely rediculous ideas which can be printed on a cardboard sign or worn on a t-shirt. Who wants to carry a picket that says "Pay African workers an extra penny an hour!" when they can carry signs saying "Get Corporate Fachist Pigs Out Of Africa!".
Also, I don't happen to own any Nike products, but that's only because I think they're too expensive. =)
On that we can deffinitely agree
You know, I'm getting sick and tired of this particular brand of logic. "If something is good for the rich, or for "us", then it must be bad for everyone else". What a load of horse shit. When will you realize that the rich getting richer generaly helps everyone involved in the proccess? People like you whine and bitch about the fact that the "ultra-rich" are so much better off than our "poor", while our poor in fact enjoy a lifestyle which would be considered comfortable, or even decadent in most of the world, and the "sweatshop" labourers employed by our horrible "ultra rich" corporations make money to support themselves and their families in an environment where jobs are extremely difficult to come by. You don't give a shit about the fact that capitalist economies continualy outperform socialist economies, and manage to provide a more comfortable life for everyone involved in the procces, including the "poor" and unemployed. Instead you cling to socialist and communist ideals which continualy fail to live up to the promised "paradise" we keep hearing about. The level of ignorance, and the ammount of self-delusion required to maintain your beleifs continualy astounds me. It's even more unfortiunate that these sorts of beleifs seem to blossom in our "educational" institutions, while even poor uneducated farmers in third world countries can understand the realities of life. Education is supposed to erradicate ignorance, but it certainly doesn't seem to be working in our universities and colleges.
Your beleifs aren't "unpatriotic". They're just totaly fucking wrong, and, if carried out to their inevitable conclusion, outright inhumane. It seems like half the worlds problems are created by well-meaning idiots.
You're going to help them by boycotting Nike? So ultimately you want all western companies to cease operating "sweatshops". Which in turn gives them no incentive to operate there. Which means, they all pack up and leave.
How exactly does that help those people? You're putting them all out of work and letting them starve. Isn't this a case of "in order to save the villiage, we had to burn the villiage"?
Your viewpoint disgusts me, but who am I to call you out on it?
That's about the only rational thing you've said so far...
You deserve a smack upside the head.
/. and are therefore unlikely to run accross the joke. Moreover, they'd be unlikely to understand what all the fuss is about anyway. That way of life is perfectly natural for them; not only would they not understand the joke, but they'd probably be pretty confused about your concern, and would be wondering why you want to put them out of business.
In case you're unaware, Asian sweat-shop workers probably don't have access to
Since you've allowed yourself to guess my motivation, allow me to guess yours: When you've been confronted by information rocking your beliefs in regards of scientific leadership of the world, you've been trying to poke holes in that information. The original statement that the USA still retains the world lead in scientific advancement, is not true anymore, which is shown clearly in absolute numbers.
Hah. Pull up your pants, your bias is showing.
Comparing the US to the EU, and then saying that the USA no longer retains it's leadership in scientific advancement? Well, you could also compare the US to all other countries in the world put together, and say that the US no longer leads the way in military advancement either. Doesn't mean it would be true though. If you want to compare the EU to another organization, then do a comparison between the EU and NATO. If you want to compare the USA to another country then compare them to another country. Otherwise it's quite clear you're just trying to twist statistics to support your biases.
It implies that the book is actually based on historical events. It in no way means that peoples interpretation of those events was accurate, nor that every story told is absolutely real.
Just imagine, the year is 2306....
You: Everyone knows that the earth was almost destroyed in 1999 by space-aliens.
Me: What do you base that on?
You: Well, it says so right in The Independance Day.
Me: But what makes you think it's factual.
You: Easy. It makes reference to a city called "Washington", which archeologists have long thought to be fictional. Just recently we've re-discovered the foundations of the "White House", which was in "Washingotn". Therefore, the rest of The Independence Day must be true as well.
At which point I roll my eyes and walk away.
I think we're done here.
How the hell is that justice? Taking advantage of gold-digging whores is (or should be) a universal freedom!
Well, we certainly were lied to, but it wasn't by Bush.
Unless, ofcourse, you mean to suggest that the rest of the world, inlcuding England, Australia, France, Germany, and even the UN security council, all depended on US intelligence, and therefore when they all said Sadam had weapons, they were only saying it because Big Bad Dubya lied to them about it.
What a load of horse-shit. Where the hell do people like you get off blaiming the combined failiures of multiple international intelligence communities on one man who has nothing whatsoever to do with intelligence gathering or analysis? Anyone with half a fucking neuron in their brainpan would be able to realize that either Sadam was damn good at hiding his weapons, or he intentionaly misled us into beleiving he had weapons which he doesn't. Either way, the main responsibility for that particular fiasco can be laid at Sadam's feet, along with some blame being directed at the numerous intelligence organizations which fell for his act. What the HELL does Bush have to do with any of that? Open your friggin' mind for a minute and look at things objectively. If people like you are "progressive" than god help the human race. You couldn't progress your way out of a wet paper bag.
The situation in Iraq is dire. Lacking sufficient troops to quell the insurgency, Washington just might exit Iraq, leaving it to spiral into civil war.
:)
You know, when I see statements like that, I'm torn between the desire to knock the speakers teeth down his throat, and the desire to break into an extended session of rolling on the floor laughing.
Due to my lack of proximity to you, I ofcourse had to go with the laughter. I'm still wiping the tears off my cheeks. Thanks man, I know it was unintentional, but you totaly made my day
Now, on with the response:
US military deaths in Iraq: 2,317 in 3 years.
WW2: 2,500 men lost in one day amongst airborne divisions during d-day. 300,000 dead in 4 years.
Korea: 54,000 dead in 3 years.
Vietnam: 2,316 lost in one month (May, 1968). 58,226 in 8 years.
But, ofcourse, "the situation in Iraq is dire". Things are so bad that roughly the same number of American soldiers died in one month in Vietnam, and in one day during WW2. I don't know how the American people can ever hope to deal with such a disaster. It's become quite clear that there's no way to win! US forces must return NOW, or at this rate they'll ALL be dead in 80 years or so! Mostly from old age, but still....
Creationists do not dispute the existence of microevolution....They dispute the validity of radioisotope dating and that E. coli and H. sapiens had a common ancestor.
I know. Which, in itself is rather silly since the existance of micro-evolution automaticaly tends to suggest that macro-evolution is at the very least a pretty good possibility. It's not conclusive mind you, but only someone with fairly firm pre-conceptions on the subject would be able to look at micro-evolution and then say "aha! this proves that God gave us genes, but he only lets us change a little!".
Other than that the prophecies of the Bible are falsifiable but have in fact held up? For instance, rchaeologists once believed Jericho and Nineveh were myths until they unearthed the cities' ruins. Psalm 22 contains a graphic depiction of a crucifixion, a method of execution that would not be practiced until centuries later when the Romans invented it.
How is that proof of God? Let me get the logic here:
The Bible talks about cities which existed when the Bible was first written, but some archeologists didn't beleive in their existance. We then find these cities. Therefore God must be real.
What the hell? Hey, look, I can do that too:
Some people say that Michael Moore is a Big Fat Lying Idiot.
After reviewing video evidence, I have concluded that he is indeed fat.
Therefore, that is conclusive evidence that he is also a Lying Idiot.
Great logic huh?
Think about it - science wouldn't progress more rapidly if you reduced the population size of the USA but continued to publish the same number of papers. Yet the per-capita statistic would rise. The per-capita statistic is not a way of measuring scientific progress.
And neither is the number of scientific papers published. You can have one country fire off 200,000 papers "proving" that the Atomic Bomb could never work, while another country goes and builds it without publishing a single paper.
Well...
1) No country is outperforming the US.
2) The EU and Asia aren't countries anyway, they consist of MANY countries.
3) Per capita statistics are important because they reflect the state of the society. For instance, you can say that the US and China both have about 2 million citizens incarcerated in their prison system, which, without any other point of reference would indicate that both countries have relatively similar incarceration rates. OR you can say that the Chinese have 0.1% of their population imprisoned, while the US has imprisoned 0.6% of it's population. Which makes a big difference, now doesn't it. Similarly, with the scientific papers, if you don't consider the population differences then it would seem that the average EU citizen is better educated, or that funding for science is more readily available. That perception changes once you consider population figures.
Science make bold and utterly false prediction, just to have some other upstart technology steal the show.
Eh, no. Science never made any such predictions. SCIENTISTS sometimes make predictions, however, the good ones limit themselves to hypothesis, and then attempt to prove those hypothesis through Science. These "bold and utterly false predictions" are made by people seeking media attention and fame.
Michael Chrichton does a good job of explaining the difference in Aliens Cause Global Warming.
For evolution to happen, it would be like taking a watch and hitting it with a hammer until it was broken into a thousand peices, and then putting those peices in a bag and shaking the bag so the watch is magically put back together.
In case you haven't noticed, a watch isn't alive. It has no desire to grow or improve. It doesn't care wether it's functioning properly, or broken down to it's component molecules. Life does. For one thing, we can see clear signs of human adaptation. People in warm, sunny climates have darker skin than those living in colder climates. Humans living at high altitudes have expnaded lung capacity. People living in extremely cold climates have smaller bodies with shorter limbs than those living in warm climates. We see small changes on those levels all the time. Bological changes DO occur in response to the environment; that much is undeniable. The only thing you can legitemately question is whether or not evolution occurs on a larger scale, creating entirely new species over time. But the fact that micro-evolution can be logicaly demonstrated to have occured is enough to make your watch analogy absolutely useless. Watches do not procreate and change to suit their environment.
No, everything a rational observer looks at gives proof that God does exist. He made everything, and when we look at a beautiful flower or the stars in the sky, we see our Creators work.
I've yet to see a flower or a star with the words "God wuz here" writen on it. Even if I were to see it, I'd suggest it's mainly evidence that someone with a magic-marker was really bored. There is no evidence of God. If you wish to beleive in him/her/it, that's your choice, however, claiming that you have evidence of it only illustrates the fact that you have no idea what the word "evidence" means. As such, any rational discussion with you is largely a waste of time.
What the hell? For one, you're misinterpreting the statistics. It seems like you made up your mind that scientific research is on the decline in the US, and only then went looking for info to back that claim.
From the article you linked:
In 1981, when the company began tracking the data, the United States accounted for 39.7 percent of the total number of papers published in the world (172,132 papers); the EU accounted for 32.3 percent (139,954 papers); and the Asia Pacific region accounted for 13 percent (56,644 papers). By 2004, the EU accounted for 38 percent of the total number of papers (292,067); the United States accounted for 33.3 percent (256,374); and the Asia Pacific region accounted for 25.3 percent of papers (195,001).
In other words, the total number of papers published in the US increased by 48% during this time period (172,132 to 256,374). A decrease in percentages does not equal a decrease in number. Considering that the EU has about 60% more people than does the US, they SHOULD be putting out a higher number of papers than the US. The reason for the unequal increase in papers published by the US and EU respectively should be clear to anyone who's lived in Europe; the US has always had a fairly effective, and reasonably accessible education system, whereas in many parts of the EU, education was limited, and economic difficulties meant a much higher dropout rate due to the need to begin working at an early age. Similar reasons explain the jump in papers coming out of Asia. If Europe and Asia were producing the same number of papers per capita as the US, the figures should looks something like this:
US: 256,374
EU: 401,015
Asia: 3,197,401
So obviously, the US is still way ahead of the curve, and Asia is still FAR behind. Europe's doing a decent job of catching up, but I don't expect to see them surpass the US any time soon.
I don't think any of that is true. If it was then Russia would be more technologially advanced then the us due to their long occupation of Afghanistan.
That would, ofcourse, assume that the USSR didn't have all sorts of other problems. Communist and capitalist economies are two totaly different animals. It would also assume that the ruskies cared enuogh about their foot-soldiers to try and devise technological solutions to the threat of insurgent warfare. Which, in what is sure to be the understatement of the year, was not the case.
COnventional wars are good for the economy because they make your enemy produce more weaponry.
Eh? How does "the enemy" producing weaponry improve YOUR economy? I think one of us hasn't had enough coffee today; your statement seems like a total non-sequitor.
Yes, a hundred thousand people IS "a lot", so yeah, there probably are "a lot" of people who were happy with Sadam. Ofcourse, everything's relative. The majority of the 27 million Iraqi's would be calling you all sorts of names if they could hear you right now.
And yeah, Castro sure does put on a good PR show doesn't he? Organized crowds of "supporters"....pre-written "man-on-the-street" interviews....oh, and I especially like the wall he's having built to stop his people from looking at the horrible messages being propagated by the American embassy. What a wonderful dictator Castro is! EVERY country should have one just like him!
Everyone realizes it, Al Qaeda just happen to be the only ones bothering to try and fight. Ofcourse, Al Qaeda style tactics don't win wars - they don't even really CONSTITUTE a war. So I'm sorry to tell you this, but your hero Osama is NOT a tactical genius. And if he beleives, as you do, that "a war of attrition" will negatively impact the US, I'd go so far as to call him a f-ing idiot. War of any type normaly boosts the economy, and improves science/technology, which in turn makes things better for society as a whole. This type of warfare especialy isn't likely to harm the US - it produces minimal casualties, and the US has complete control over just how much money to expend.
Anyway that's way off topic. Just wanted to point that, while no military is likely to defeat the US using conventional tactics, terrorist tactics are even more regressive, and are much less likely to garner an offensive win. They CAN be used to win a war fought on foreign soil, but that's entirely due to the lack of "staying power". In other words, due to the idiots in the peanut gallery who start screaming "quagmire" at the drop of a casing. Staying power is never an issue for a military on it's home soil though, which is why terrorism can't win an offensive war.
Actualy Tom Clancy wrote a couple books on exactly that premise. I think it's a good point - a C-130 or a B-52 could be configured to carry enough weaponry to destroy a small airforce. Fighters are more useful now for reconnoisance roles, or maybe situations where you'd like to visualy identify the enemy before you blast him out of the sky.
I'd love to see the looks on their faces when they realize it only runs in reverse.
Heh, sure, if by "individual matchup" you mean what the indian airforce did when they "won" a competition against US fighters: basicaly designing the exercise to prohibit the use of advanced avionics or missiles with a range in excess of the ones available to the Indian airforce.
What your highly vaunted "pundits" are refering to is the fact that the MiG-29 has flight characteristics and capabilities which meet or exceed those of comparale US fighters. What they fail to mention is that fighters are these days simply platforms for electronics suites and a payload. The days of fighters swooping around locked in a dog-fight-to-the-death are long gone. Anyone who attempts to engage the US ariforce in that type of combat will survive just long enough to realize just how stupid they really are.
Ofcourse, the other important consideration for any NATO country looking to buy a fighter is interoperability. Buy an F-18, or the new JSF, and you're gauranteed to be able to work side by side with the major players. Buy a MiG and you'll be relegated to the airforces version of KP duty.