Why does it matter? Blame it on whomever it makes you feel good to blame it on. Yay, those evil $OTHER_PARTY bastards did it, yay! The problem didn't go away. How can we fix it? Neither party as it stands today is even trying.
And the Tea Party people are just morons that will get yet another Republican elected. We're doomed.
The only power the tea party has is the vote. I think this is what is scaring so many people, the middle class has about had enough of deficit spending in Washington and is starting to organize.
That isn't what scares me. What scares me is that the Tea Partiers are so fucking stupid that they are voting for Republicans. One of the two parties (and really the worse of the two) that enabled the massive fraud that brought us to the brink of economic collapse. Who removed regulations in order to allow AIG sell insurance on bonds to people who didn't even own the bonds with no need to report the sales and no requirement for a capital reserve to cover that insurance? Republicans. Yet the Tea Partiers act like these guys are the ones that will save us. That or they let their social conservative interests blind them and start supporting insane people like Bachmann, or corrupt politicians like Perry, or lying nutjobs like Gingrich. How the hell are we going to change anything if we keep pulling from the same pool of assholes?
And he calls you foolish. Who goes into climate science if they think there is no climate change? Nobody? Stop being obtuse. The field itself is an example of institutional bias.
Ahh, yes. Reality's well-known liberal bias rears its head again...
Does a person go into a climate science career if is he is not already very convinced climate change exists? That's like going into Astronomy despite believing there are no planets or stars in space.
That makes no sense at all. I'm pretty sure everyone knows we have a climate. Whether you believe climate change exists or not, there is plenty to study, and many more answers to find. There's also the potential to find and correct flaws in our current understanding, and to further refine it.
More accurately and appropriately, you'd have to approach it like an intro to world religions class. This is what people believe, without saying this is true, or this is a fairly tail. By an large, most universities do a pretty good job teaching it without requiring or prohibiting any belief from the students.
Yep, and I'm fine with that. It's only at the high school and lower grades that I don't think it should be introduced. At least not without the necessary foundations in history, language, literature, philosophy, logic, science, etc. Basically you're evaluating a whole mess of literature tied to belief systems. There are groups of people everywhere that actually believe that one or more of these various stories are absolutely true. Students need to be equipped to deal with that.
Considering that the impact on culture is huge, in fact the primary driver of our current civilization, I'd say there is plenty to teach.
I don't disagree with that, and most colleges/universities do have courses in these things. I don't find it terribly useful in primary schools, as they have so many more fundamental things to teach that it would be very difficult to approach this subject without requiring all sorts of other courses first. Not to mention, parents tend to get all worked up if their kid hears anything about religion other than their own particular brand of dogma. Once you get to college-level, it is more open, and the students should have at least a somewhat better foundation for it.
Oh... so
I'll give you the word "outmoded", as it does represent a value judgement. I would substitute "ancient" instead probably. The statement is basically correct though, that religion shouldn't be taught in schools, unless it's specifically a study of such myths (aka fairy tales). There's no real evidence to support them as anything else, so aside from simple understanding of the stories, their literary value, or their impact on culture, there's not much to teach. You have the constitutional right to talk to whatever imaginary friends you like. You just don't get to advertise those friends in the schools.
Two words: Muzzle Flares.
One word: Artillery.
Because it doesn't show that the government can do something and do it efficiently, it only shows that someone with a lot of money and a lot of computers spread across a geographical network can create a worldwide network.
It shows that government can do something unbelievably valuable, that others can't or won't invest in. We've all benefited immensely from it though.
I love how people fail to understand logic and then call people who believe differently than themselves illogical.
Which logic could you possibly be referring to?
Adam and Eve were created with perfect genetics (no bad genes at all, recessive or otherwise). Once they sinned, imperfection and entropy were introduced. Every time their genes were replicated after this, there were imperfections in the copying as a result of sin (I will repeat here, this is the logic of the Biblical account informed by modern genetics). There was no reason why incest was a problem for the children of Adam and Eve because there were not yet any common recessive genes between any two of them. Adam and Eve's genes were perfect, all imperfections happened when those genes replicated to produce ova or sperm. Each of their children who had bad genes would have had different bad genes. It is only after multiple generations when enough bad genes had accumulated that there would be significant risk from having children with a sibling that the prohibition against incest was introduced.
Yep, when you allow magic into the equation, the sky's the limit! Or wait, no it's not! No limits!
Read it in context. Preferably the whole book. At this point, Paul has said that when God told us what he wanted from us (by means of the Old Testament Law), mankind as a whole rejected it and did our own thing. Paul's basically addressing exactly what the other poster said - if God can forgive our sin, why don't we just sin more so God can forgive more? He answers that by saying that when God forgives our sin, we are supposed to be different in the future. It would be wrong to take advantage of it. If this doesn't help, hit me on XMPP at mcivor@jabber.org and I can try again.
I haven't read it cover to cover, but I've read more than enough of it over the years to know that aside from some common sense stuff and good old folksy wisdom, much of which predates the Bible anyway, most of the rest of it is just very boring or very crazy. That these things have been reinterpreted (read: spun) so much over the years that people get less of the crazy in sermons is probably a good thing. I'm not entirely convinced of that though, as it also allows them to have misunderstandings about their religion. Then again, religion is rather meaningless in the overall scheme of things, as it is only actions that matter. Most Christians haven't read the Bible cover to cover anyway. If they could make any sense of it, they'd probably be rather shocked by some of what they find.
There are about as many interpretations of the scripture as there are believers. People generally believe what they want. Of course these days it seems that these fringe groups are growing larger and embracing the crazy wholeheartedly. Look at Perry or Bachmann and the crazy stuff that they believe. Look at who was leading Perry's prayer event. These guys are truly nuts, and they're running for the most powerful position in the world.
I know you just meant that as a joke, but there's actually a verse about that in Romans. "What then? Shall we go on sinning that grace might increase? By no means! If we have died to sin, how can we continue in it?"
I can't even parse that. I even looked up an explanation of it, and it still made no sense.
All the expertise cited in the article IS here. It is just relegated to small specialty shops that cater to small runs.
So the question becomes, "Can those industries be scaled up to the necessary size to handle large-scale production, and can it be done at a competitive price?" Seems to me that without some other variable changing, it won't happen. Something will have to either make it cost more to do overseas, or make it cheaper here, or both.
He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him. -- Bion
