The GPL was an ingenious invention. However, this is probably a good thing.

I am sure it can be turned into a brick.

"This message will self destruct in 5 seconds..."

When it comes to desktop environments, everyone has an opinion! (So here's mine: nothing beats the OSX interface. Nothing. XFCE is a distant second.)

I was wondering. In a scenario where I find an iDevice prototype, what if I handed it to Gizmodo for a couple of hours to do a review with, without charging Gizmodo anything for it and then called the original owner and returned it. Would I still be likely to the convicted for a crime like the chap in this article?

Alright, I agree with you that whether the Conquistadors baptized infants before slaughtering them is irrelevant, for ultimately, they were killing babies! Also, your proposition that the Spaniards would not risking the sin of murdering Christian infants is sound and I accept it. Thanks for pointing me to De las Casas work. Didn't know about him so far. The work is on Project Gutenberg. Will look it up.

I have no historical misconception. Here is the extract from an essay from Bertrand Russell, no less: http://bit.ly/r3O0Ym (Check the last lines in that page)

On the other hand, I can indeed point to civilizations that have fallen into the "quagmire of superstition". Lets see now.... the Mayans (who slaughtered their own en masse) and the invading Spanish conquistadors (who slaughtered the Mayans, but taking care to make sure that infants were baptized before being crushed underfoot) and Medieval Europe (that saw almost no progress in science or quality of life as compared to the Classical era of ancient Greece and Rome), present day Afghanistan (where doctors are shot because they keep looking at images of the human body)... darn... this list seems longer than I planned for!

I really have no idea what that means. Can someone please point me to an example of a society that has fallen under the despairing slough of materialism because of their irreligiousness? Or even a person for that matter? Please, before its too late! You see I am atheist and I don't want to fall into whatever "slough" this Bahai fellow is talking about.

What about if we rephrased the question to: "How many scientists think that science disputes religion in the most important questions, namely, origin of the universe, origin of organic life and the purpose of life (if any)?" I suspect the answer will yield startlingly different from 15%.

Hm... actually, I can't seem to muster any respect for the following dead people: Adolf Hitler, Mussolini, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Sadam Hussein, Osama Bin Laden... I don't know what that makes me... alienated, misanthropic or an non-essential element of human society.

He probably had elaborate exception handling done: what if the bride says, "No". What if he said no? What if someone in the audience speaks up instead of forever staying silent? What if the bride tripped on her dress and fell.... Seriously, there are an endless list of exceptional circumstances to consider, definitely worthy of a program!

Don't they have them interstellar gates that they can just jump through? Ask their scientists to the famous Dr.Nicholas Rush.

The Hoover Dam helped pull America out of the last depression. Investing in public infrastructure does work. Oh, but wait... America now hates Keynes and his policies... Well then, go Hayek! Though I wonder if the latter would have approved bailing out the banks. Oh well, I suppose America simply likes to base its economic policies on the worst of Keynesian and Free market economics. Hopefully, its piety will help lift it out of this depression.