I'm with Richard Dawkins on this one, kids shouldn't be brainwashed with non-existent crap and the state should take kids off parents who abuse their children by raising them on fairy tales - they are evil and damaging.
My mum told both me and my bro there was no such thing as Santa very early. Upset the other parents but so what?
That guy symbolises the cause he hands out flyers for so well.
On the surface the data shows that there is a melting, but really it's all rhetoric, he's crouched down underneath in a hollow set of fake steps.
Warm is the new Cool. But even moderate people are getting sick of this crap now.. for some real facts check out Penn and Tellers Bullshit Environmental Hysteria - http://www.videosift.com/video/Penn-Teller-Bullshit-Environmental-Hysteria
Getting environmental campaigners to sign a petition banning dihydrogen monoxide - classic!
The environmentalist movement has been infiltrated by anti-globalist anarchists and has been for a long time. This is why Patrick Moore left Greenpeace.
Good facts, makes me want to read Origin of the Species even more now.
Interesting also is that it wasn't his scientific observations or study that made him lose his faith, it was personal events - tragedies.
Sort of reinforces the concept that science and religion are not incompatible (since he seemed to have no scientific problem with religion) and that it takes personal reasons to lose faith, not scientific...
ie. When presented with science and hard facts, a believer is more likely to reconcile those to their faith than to lose it. But when faced with the loss of a loved one, they question everything they believe.
Can someone explain to me how the "bailout" was supposed to be a good thing???!!!
I hate the republican party as much as the next guy but if McCain sabotaged the deal then he did the right thing for once.
Sure we're all gonna take the hit anyway (I work for an American investment bank in London - so I'm near the epicenter job-wise).
The fact is these jacked up investment wbankers and CEOs are responsible for the housing bubble - due to liar loans and irresponsible lending, including those who took out mortgages they knew they couldn't afford (but I just gotta get me a house or prices will float away...!).
This is a market, and market prices reflect demand and supply - look at the history of house prices and you will see that what is happening is normal. Unfortunately it's going to be a big one because house prices have been artificially high for a long time. Who is responsible for this - yep greedy home-sellers and property flippers trying to make up to 50%-80% profit on the house they bought just a few months or years ago.
This is called a correction, it had to come. The "bailout" was just going to be pumping more worthless credit into a broken system. You don't keep feeding in product, you stop the machine and find out what is wrong and fix it.
The way this should have been fixed all along is by regulation.. but we wouldn't want to prevent all those rich execs from having their huge bonuses off the backs of the poor now would we?
Raise inflation and you raise wages and reduce personal debt. Then regulate the loan market. Curtail self-declared mortgages and limit mortgage max loan amount to 3.5x income. That will keep the market sweet and keep prices stable.
Don't pretend to be thick and believe that the "bailout" was the Obi Wan Kenobi to our Princess Leia economies. We need a recession and the sooner the better.. we also need basic education in schools about the principles of economics... I can't believe so many people can be so stupid.
Wasn't 'global warming' originally a theory we could stave off the ice-age by increasing our emissions?
I don't care anyway, I'm still trying to deal with the millenium bug that demagnetised all my tapes and caused the huge zombie infestation right outside my front door...
@Ted, you make some fine points but this question:
"Sorry, Love to Be Wrong, but you just don’t get my point. Why crash four planes at all? Why come up with such a fantastic and potentially unmanageable catastrophe such as using four planes when a few well-placed explosives will do?"
Could equally be asked of the terrorist hijackers. How did they hide such a fantastical plan, and why didn't they use bombs instead of planes?
I have my beliefs about 9/11 but at this point I'm not trying to argue either way - just putting your logic to the test.
Also, real conspiracies do exist as someone pointed out in a comment above. To question those conspiracies would be conspiratorial in itself eg. Did Nixon really conspire to gather information about an opponent, or was he set up by someone who didn't want him to win the next election? Did Guy Fawkes really plot to blow up English parliament or was he a scapegoat?
Equally, it is very real and very feasible a government would want to harm it's own people to political ends. Unless you do trust the words of democratically elected leaders such as Robert Mugabe?
Finally, since it is believable that terrorists conspired to fly planes into major American landmarks, and it's believable that high level operators such as Bin Laden conspired (there's that word again) with others behind closed cave-doors to carry this out... is it really that hard to imagine some higher-level agents working for any countries government eg. Taliban or America used Bin Laden and others to carry this out?
Oh but we're back to the American government would never lie to it's people argument again.
Look through your emotions and see the big picture. Like I say, I'm not promoting my views, just asking questions.
@Ted, appreciate you know your stuff and not trying to twist your words but it was the line "To say, “There’s nothing in the Bible that says the Olympics were bad or Christianity is a state religion” is specious." that needed refuting. Perhaps I could have addressed the rest of your comment too as I don't disagree with everything else you said.
Of course not. Both sides were at each other until the pagan religions were pretty much wiped off the face of the earth. You can say that’s not what Christianity is all about, but that’s what happened at the time.
Sadly it is very true. History shows that evil people can corrupt anything intended for good.
Show me where the in the Bible (the commonly world known accepted one) it instructs Christians to:
1. Become the official state religion. 2. Ban the Olympics. 3. Persecute non-Christians. 4. Torture sinners.
You may be right on the history angle but you are without a shadow of a doubt, dead wrong on the biblical angle. Your comment shows that aside from dipping in and out you haven't studied the book at all.
No doubt, however (correct me if I'm wrong) the pyramids were built with slaves, therefore, since they represent slavery shouldn't they be destroyed in a symbolic act of restoration?
I agree we're going slightly off-topic but I'm trying to keep this in the frame of #10 on the list which for me turns a fun list into a slight dig at Christians. My original point was why not just say it was Emperor Theodosius who killed the games (there's nothing I can find in the bible that tells me the Olympic games warranted banning - come to think of it, there's nothing in the bible that tells me Christianity belongs to any state or is a state religion).
And yes, I'm a Christian but (and I know this will come as a shock) I enjoy Neatorama. I wouldn't want Neatorama to dig at atheists but every now and then there's an article that digs at the Christians and it brings out people like JIFP above.
One last point regarding trashing of ancient buildings...
They are only appreciated now because they are ancient, we can see the hard work in them, and some of them are great works of art.
But back in the day they were built, they were simply buildings made out of what every other building was, they were common and not seen as ancient architectural masterpieces.
If someone pulls down an old shed today, does anyone protest over it's greatness? No. But in 2000 years that old shed you have in your back garden might be visited by people from all over the world (and galaxy?)!
What's all that got to do with the Olympics or #10 on the list.
@Alex
Explanation accepted as far as I'm concerned, it's seems that the Romans simply traded their gods for the Christian God and carried on their persecution- they simply swapped teams!
@Offended Atheists etc...
Guys, I tried not to make a generalisation, I didn't even use the term atheist, I said "some people", there's no need to turn this into an US vs THEM debate.
Looks like people can change after all... or as Jesus himself would say, "repent..."
My mum told both me and my bro there was no such thing as Santa very early. Upset the other parents but so what?
On the surface the data shows that there is a melting, but really it's all rhetoric, he's crouched down underneath in a hollow set of fake steps.
Warm is the new Cool. But even moderate people are getting sick of this crap now.. for some real facts check out Penn and Tellers Bullshit Environmental Hysteria - http://www.videosift.com/video/Penn-Teller-Bullshit-Environmental-Hysteria
Getting environmental campaigners to sign a petition banning dihydrogen monoxide - classic!
The environmentalist movement has been infiltrated by anti-globalist anarchists and has been for a long time. This is why Patrick Moore left Greenpeace.
Interesting also is that it wasn't his scientific observations or study that made him lose his faith, it was personal events - tragedies.
Sort of reinforces the concept that science and religion are not incompatible (since he seemed to have no scientific problem with religion) and that it takes personal reasons to lose faith, not scientific...
ie. When presented with science and hard facts, a believer is more likely to reconcile those to their faith than to lose it. But when faced with the loss of a loved one, they question everything they believe.
I hate the republican party as much as the next guy but if McCain sabotaged the deal then he did the right thing for once.
Sure we're all gonna take the hit anyway (I work for an American investment bank in London - so I'm near the epicenter job-wise).
The fact is these jacked up investment wbankers and CEOs are responsible for the housing bubble - due to liar loans and irresponsible lending, including those who took out mortgages they knew they couldn't afford (but I just gotta get me a house or prices will float away...!).
This is a market, and market prices reflect demand and supply - look at the history of house prices and you will see that what is happening is normal. Unfortunately it's going to be a big one because house prices have been artificially high for a long time. Who is responsible for this - yep greedy home-sellers and property flippers trying to make up to 50%-80% profit on the house they bought just a few months or years ago.
This is called a correction, it had to come. The "bailout" was just going to be pumping more worthless credit into a broken system. You don't keep feeding in product, you stop the machine and find out what is wrong and fix it.
The way this should have been fixed all along is by regulation.. but we wouldn't want to prevent all those rich execs from having their huge bonuses off the backs of the poor now would we?
Raise inflation and you raise wages and reduce personal debt. Then regulate the loan market. Curtail self-declared mortgages and limit mortgage max loan amount to 3.5x income. That will keep the market sweet and keep prices stable.
Don't pretend to be thick and believe that the "bailout" was the Obi Wan Kenobi to our Princess Leia economies. We need a recession and the sooner the better.. we also need basic education in schools about the principles of economics... I can't believe so many people can be so stupid.
I don't care anyway, I'm still trying to deal with the millenium bug that demagnetised all my tapes and caused the huge zombie infestation right outside my front door...
"Sorry, Love to Be Wrong, but you just don’t get my point. Why crash four planes at all? Why come up with such a fantastic and potentially unmanageable catastrophe such as using four planes when a few well-placed explosives will do?"
Could equally be asked of the terrorist hijackers. How did they hide such a fantastical plan, and why didn't they use bombs instead of planes?
I have my beliefs about 9/11 but at this point I'm not trying to argue either way - just putting your logic to the test.
Also, real conspiracies do exist as someone pointed out in a comment above. To question those conspiracies would be conspiratorial in itself eg. Did Nixon really conspire to gather information about an opponent, or was he set up by someone who didn't want him to win the next election? Did Guy Fawkes really plot to blow up English parliament or was he a scapegoat?
Equally, it is very real and very feasible a government would want to harm it's own people to political ends. Unless you do trust the words of democratically elected leaders such as Robert Mugabe?
Finally, since it is believable that terrorists conspired to fly planes into major American landmarks, and it's believable that high level operators such as Bin Laden conspired (there's that word again) with others behind closed cave-doors to carry this out... is it really that hard to imagine some higher-level agents working for any countries government eg. Taliban or America used Bin Laden and others to carry this out?
Oh but we're back to the American government would never lie to it's people argument again.
Look through your emotions and see the big picture. Like I say, I'm not promoting my views, just asking questions.
@Ted, appreciate you know your stuff and not trying to twist your words but it was the line "To say, “There’s nothing in the Bible that says the Olympics were bad or Christianity is a state religion” is specious." that needed refuting. Perhaps I could have addressed the rest of your comment too as I don't disagree with everything else you said.
@Seth, thanks for balanced the insight!
Sadly it is very true. History shows that evil people can corrupt anything intended for good.
Show me where the in the Bible (the commonly world known accepted one) it instructs Christians to:
1. Become the official state religion.
2. Ban the Olympics.
3. Persecute non-Christians.
4. Torture sinners.
You may be right on the history angle but you are without a shadow of a doubt, dead wrong on the biblical angle. Your comment shows that aside from dipping in and out you haven't studied the book at all.
No doubt, however (correct me if I'm wrong) the pyramids were built with slaves, therefore, since they represent slavery shouldn't they be destroyed in a symbolic act of restoration?
I agree we're going slightly off-topic but I'm trying to keep this in the frame of #10 on the list which for me turns a fun list into a slight dig at Christians. My original point was why not just say it was Emperor Theodosius who killed the games (there's nothing I can find in the bible that tells me the Olympic games warranted banning - come to think of it, there's nothing in the bible that tells me Christianity belongs to any state or is a state religion).
And yes, I'm a Christian but (and I know this will come as a shock) I enjoy Neatorama. I wouldn't want Neatorama to dig at atheists but every now and then there's an article that digs at the Christians and it brings out people like JIFP above.
They are only appreciated now because they are ancient, we can see the hard work in them, and some of them are great works of art.
But back in the day they were built, they were simply buildings made out of what every other building was, they were common and not seen as ancient architectural masterpieces.
If someone pulls down an old shed today, does anyone protest over it's greatness? No. But in 2000 years that old shed you have in your back garden might be visited by people from all over the world (and galaxy?)!
What's all that got to do with the Olympics or #10 on the list.
@Alex
Explanation accepted as far as I'm concerned, it's seems that the Romans simply traded their gods for the Christian God and carried on their persecution- they simply swapped teams!
@Offended Atheists etc...
Guys, I tried not to make a generalisation, I didn't even use the term atheist, I said "some people", there's no need to turn this into an US vs THEM debate.