I kind of assumed that was the exact point they were trying to make. Or maybe I see satire in everything.

Yes sir, President Lincoln. You know what you did.

We all do stupid things, but there's a reason we do those things. Another way to say it would be that something caused us to perform the stupid action. The real question is, given a unique and massively complex set of inputs, will we always get the same output? You may think you have free will because you were faced with a decision and you made a choice, but something on some fundamental level caused you to make that choice, and if whatever that fundamental thing is was just responding to inputs, then it's not really free will in the philosophical sense.

For a moment I read the article text as 'Cosmo Magazine', and assumed a 'shadow biosphere' was some sort of new eco-friendly eyeliner. God I need a vacation.

If someone gets 0% of the vote in Iowa they could still get 100% of the electoral votes. But that doesn't really matter, because under this system, whoever gets the majority of the popular vote wins.

I've followed this bill for some time (it's already in place in some states). The bill says that this method will only be "activated" once enough states sign on to have 270 electoral votes between them.

Once enough states sign up to make 270 EC votes, then the bill activates, and those states give all their votes to whoever wins the national popular vote.

Under this system, everyone's individual vote counts, and everyone's vote has equal weight. In my opinion that is the only way to have a fair voting system.

Hold greedy assholes responsible for their actions??? Ha, this is America!

I agree. Labels only serve as tools of judgment for idiots. "Left" and "Right" don't even have definite meaning. They are just terms that different people apply different meanings to. People who self-identify with one of those labels probably have vastly different ideas of what they stand for than those who don't. Even within those groups there are varying beliefs.

I wish the media would stop using those terms and focus on people and people's ideas. Of course then the ignorant masses wouldn't know who to vote for, because they'd actually have to pay attention to what someone stands for rather than what political party they fall into.

I'm sure that in 1985 plutonium is available in every corner drugstore, but in 1955 it's a little hard to come by!

Go into her closet and throw out her most impractical pair of shoes. Payback's a bitch, bitch.

Not being religious, I wouldn't give a damn ;) However, I can see how religious people would think that was the worst thing that could ever happen, so your point is well made.

I don't think it makes much sense to say that Muslims hate the western world. I'm sure some do, I'm sure some don't, and I'm sure many feel somewhere in between. Maybe them complaining about how we haven't embraced Islam is the same as people here complaining about how they haven't embraced democracy. There may be cultural norms fueled by the kinds of colonialism and exploitation you talk about, but I don't think the majority of people have some overarching hate. The only Islam-majority country I've ever been to is Morocco, so maybe I'm naive/wrong/whatever, but it just doesn't seem realistic to say an entire group of people hates another, for any reason.

Like when a computer is being retarded, because it's being slowed down?

Being moderate and open-minded is the only way to go! It's hard at first, but gets easier.

Yes I have read that also. It seems like an interesting scenario, because on the one hand those populations are causing the earth's to grow like crazy, but on the other each one of them probably uses a tenth of the energy that someone from an industrialized country does. So should we work towards their development to stem population growth, or focus more on reducing our energy needs? Perhaps support sustainable development in developing countries and work to switch over to sustainable development in ours?

true. no matter what we do, no matter how far our technology goes (unless it allows us to expand into space), if our population keeps growing we are all doomed. eventually we'll need to stabilize our population, and preferably shrink it.

what i'd personally like to see is a culture that cuts out most of the excess crap we waste our time and resources producing, and have a much smaller population with everyone working to produce what we need plus a few luxuries, with a massive focus on advancing technology. Imagine cheap real estate everywhere in the world? plenty of space for everyone?

stop having babies!