Wine on Mint probably is compatible with more XP software than WIn8 is anyway.

I am beginning to think that what the world needs is more female hackers, so we can beat the agitators to the punch. We also need more minorities.

the intent is to keep the scene the scene without letting corporate agitators use race, sex, etc... as an excuse to divide the scene and force agendas.

Think about how everytime some alternative brand of politics is brought up, and the usual corporate tools spend weeks harping that the effort to buy minority votes the major party spent means we are not racist/sexist for following them.

We see these proffesional activists show up in the geek/hacker scene trying to make a name for themselves by cherry picking examples to blow up for fame and fortune, while meanwhile they don't contribute anything, either personality or code.

I don't mind the heads-up about a little-used piece of Gnu software (as pointed out, most distros push OpenSSL), but I do mind astro-turfing the Microsoft PR line of "Nobody's responsible if Linux fails!"

The irony, of course, is that most people haven't read Microsoft's EULA which effectively says 'Not only are we not responsible if Windows fails, but we'll sue you if you try to fix it yourself.'

This is really gonna bite the hundreds of millions running XP who will be orphaned this year when Microsoft stops supporting it. Not only do they face the prospect, in a matter of weeks, of never again seeing security updates from Microsoft, but it will be illegal to even try to fix future bugs themselves (or hire a third party to do it).

This last bit is something that Linux users have as a right

No support (not even 3rd party) for XP, and Windows 8 is just short of an entirely differend OS. You call THAT continuity?

At least with Linux, you have the option of (banding together with a group of like-minded entities, and) doing your own support, until you decide it's time to retire you old software/hardware combination.

That's the real choice and freedom you get when you use Free and/or Open Source software.

When Microsoft EOL's Vista (possibly as early as a couple of years from now), the people who tore their hair out getting used to it, are going to have to tear their hair out getting used to whatever Microsoft is shoving down people's throats then -- irrespective of whether or not the Vista based systems they have are really ready to be retired.

Here, Let me help you.

I place a quantum singularity inside a special magic box. The gravitational pull of the singularity is so strong that no force in the universe can overcome its attraction with the bottom of the box. No force in the universe can lift the singularity out of the box.

I can however, lift the singularity.

I can lift the box containing it, if I exert enough energy, and in so doing, lift the singularity.

If we replace "Magic box" with "The whole damned universe", the trick still applies-- We are then just left with a real headscratcher, "Through what, did the universe get lifted?"

Questions like the above "paradox" don't really prove or solve anything. They just demonstrate that there is ignorance that needs to be overcome.

The pedant will argue that "but being unable to lift the singularity out of the box means he is not omnipotent!" or some similar nonsense.

To that, I direct you at the paradox of time's arrow. There really isnt a compelling reason for time to only flow in one direction. Reversal of time would cause the singularity to be impossible to contain inside the magic box. An omnipotent god can thus retain the rules that gravitational force is based on the inverse square of the distances between the centers of mass, and where one of the masses exerts infinite spacial curviture-- and still move the singularity out of the box-- from his perspective.

The notion of "Cant do something" is always based on the idea of something infallible. At best, using it as a defense against an infallible god, is just substitution.

No, Not an idiot. I simply used a rule in logic to demonstrate how your statement is ill-devised, and not conclusive. Specifically, if you can demonstrate how a foundational axiom in a statement can be false, you can falsify all logic predicated upon that axiom.

This principle is a foundational precept in applied logic. It helps logicians recognize when they are wasting their time with a question. Being such a simple test, I applied it to your inquiry, and found that inquiry to be lacking. Call it pedantry if you want to, but it wasn't without purpose that I did this.

God does not have to be physically inside THIS universe to *exist*. (as such, any presupposition that he MUST be constrainable by the rules of this universe is pure hubris unfounded by evidence.) There is a growing body of evidence that there are other universes besides our own, and that their very existences have subtle influences upon our own. It is one of the possible explanations for why the various massive particles in the standard model have the masses that they do, in fact. (Not the only one, and probably not the leading one, but that does not make stop making it be one of them regardless.)

Similar to how a turing machine can simulate any other turing maching given sufficient memory and time, a being that observes time differently from the way we do can use even a tiny and subtle form of influence to completely control our universe, because they can fully calculate all the outcomes, and always be able to influence the outcomes of all interactions. (EG, they know exactly where and how to nudge.) This subtle interaction is indistinguishable from random chance to observers from within our universe, so it cant be proven this agency is at work. This does not discount that it is possible, however.

Do I imagine some strawman like "angels strumming harps surrounding some dude in a toga floating on a cloud" when I contemplate 'god'? No. I contemplate something so alien from anything we know of or can conceive of that it defies attempts to imagine it. By definition, all it requires is agency by which to make decisions, ability to see all possible outcomes statically (Sees the universe as one giant markov chain, essentially), and a means by which to influence said universe, however subtle. If those conditions are met, the entity will be both omnipresent and omnipotent, as seen from our universe. AKA, 'god'

what it looks like, why it chooses what it does, or even how it thinks are moot, and the sole venue of philosophers and theists. Those things are inconsequential to "existence", which is what the hard atheist and the theist dispute.

So, I will return your question-- Are YOU an idiot, making presumptions of other people that are unfounded, and then running off with those presumptions as if they were truth?

No, that still has problems with implied factors.

Specifically, it implies gravity, and that god is bound to the rules of physical reality. If so, then naturally god cannot be omnipotent, as you are implying-- however, if god is not bound by the laws of physical reality, then god can make a boulder that is impossible to lift, yet still lift it.

Your argument relies on there being something infallible that is "underneath" god. (both figuratively, and literally,.) An unliftable object would be a quantum singularity-- You need an impossible surface to support having such a thing sitting on it, waiting to be lifted-- It also presupposes that god is limited by physical reality, rather than what religion implies, which is the inverse. (Physical reality is dependent upon god.) The axioms by which logic and physics are underpinned are based on the constancy of the physical universe, and if that constancy isnt constant after all -- but instead based on the influence of an omnipotent god-- then it does not follow to use it as a means to refute the existence of that god.

With all the implied fallacies in place, you simply become redundant in asserting that god cannot exist within the confines of the physical universe. That's fine and dandy. Physics says that too:

Something like god would represent unlimited energy potential, and thus have unlimited mass energy. Unless god was also of an infinite volume, he would rapidly create the universe's single most extreme black hole in very short order. Since this is not observed to be the case, god clearly does not exist in our universe.

As such, it is illogical to attempt to use logical foundations predicated on this presumption to disprove the existence of such an entity.

The assertion that there are no alternatives to the physical universe we see and interact with does not meet up with recent findings and theory.

So, rather than some infallible truth being presented, all I see is a poorly framed argument that reduces to redundancy, while disproving nothing of consequence.

*Agnostic, in case you were interested.

You are describing the literal job role of a CEO (or at least, one of the many roles the EO has).

So how many? "A lot".

Or perhaps "more than enough for this to be a serious problem".

Every hypothesis is "an assumption". But some stand up to scrutiny and offer a lot of explanatory value.

As for evolution, what you said isn't heresy - it's a claim that you didn't try to back up.

That's one spin you could put on it.

Another choice is "How is a country full of people that believe nonsense going to survive the 21st Century?"

I guess that means I'm not a Slashdotter, because I don't believe any of those things exist (or are possible).

(Too bad...)

You're trying to pee in the punch with a "both sides do it" argument. The not-so-subtle difference is that "the left" doesn't deny that nuclear power and GM foods exist. To paraphrase the famous saying, everyone is entitled to their own policy opinions, but not to their own realities.

But then the Republicans aren't generally as bad as they get a rap for. Their only substantial reality-denying party positions are on evolution and global warming, and both of those are for easily understandable political reasons (the former too keep the dwindling numbers of the faithful faithful, the latter to please their corporate masters).

Like Prolog, where anything you can't prove is taken to be false?

Yeah, they would have gotten so much better a deal on gay rights if they had supported McCain & Palin.

Why? People do it all the time, from both sides of almost any conceivable argument.

It's human nature.

They key thing to take away from it is that while you are free to express any belief, you are not immune to the consequences of that belief.

It's not oppression for someone to disagree with you. This wouldn't even be a story if the guy was a racist - the bad PR for Mozilla would mean that his beliefs made him incompatible with the role of CEO. This is exactly what this is.

People will go on holding and expressing beliefs long after this is over. Of course, if those beliefs (that previously had been casually accepted by society, and thus had never been challenged) start to face opposition it doesn't mean you're suddenly being oppressed.