The price/performance ratio for Macs has always been highly dependent on what kind of device you're getting. Since the G4 iBook (which is when I started using Macs) their notebooks have been a pretty good value for what they did, especially if you want to run some kind of unixoid without having to fiddle around or compromise on capability. Since the unibody MBP they're pretty damn robust, too.

Their desktops, on the other hand, cater exclusively to a) people who need big workstations and b) people who see a sleek form factor, no fans and fewer cables on the desk as serious value-adds. I fall into neither of these categories, which is why my desktop is built from COTS parts.

Unfortunately even the notebooks are becoming less attractive as Apple is focusing on the "I want my notebook to be as light and thin as possible" demographic at the expense of everyone else. My next notebook will still run OS X because I'm used to it but it won't come from Apple.

They must be killed - judge, jury, executioner - before they can reveal that "Charlie" was a Gladio.

Finally a use for that giant abandoned circular tunnel that's been sitting out in Texas for the last few decades.

A young man from Nantucket...

I know "this really isn't the right Cafe, now is it?"

Doesn't this boil down to "people advocate their own way of life"? It's hardly surprising that people who have spent much or all of their lives under sharia law are basing their beliefs and opinions on that law. Just think about all the Americans who uncritically assume that freedom of speech is universally good and all the Germans who uncritically assume that suppressing national socialism trumps unrestricted freedom of speech. Turkey is a good example as great pains were taken to make Turkey a secular state. (Turkey is still rather quirky in many regards but religious nuts they're not.)

Also, your first numbers are about what those Muslims who believe sharia should be the law of the land have to say about leaving Islam. We're already talking about people who want a theocracy and their opinion on the specific case of someone leaving their religion. If we look at other numbers we see a different picture. Firstly, if we take the number of people who ask for sharia in the first place into consideration we see that the results are very regional with South Asia being the most sharia-friendly.

Even in places like Pakistan where most Muslims would like more sharia in their lives the vast majority still support religious freedom (pg. 63). As a matter of fact, the most intolerant country, Egypt, still has 77% in favor. Also note that virtually everywhere people are quite concerned about Muslim extremist groups (pg. 68) and that the only people who can muster even lukewarm approval of suicide bombings are those in very unstable regions like Palestine and Afghanistan.

If anything, the Pew study tells me that it's not a religious problem but a regional and social one. The most extreme opinions come from regions that are either politically unstable, have been dominated by extremists for decades or are Pakistan. (I don't know much about Pakistani culture so I can't tell what colors their opinions.) Also, the great Islamic crusade to convert everyone in the world is a myth. Broadly claiming that Muslims everywhere behave like telegenic extremists in particularly extremist countries is like claiming that the entire USA are like the Bible Belt and that the Westboro Baptist Church is representative of popular opinion in the States.

We have to figure out a way for everyone to get along. Painting an entire religion with broad strokes in a situation where religion is a politically charged topic is counterproductive, especially when all you have in favor of this is media coverage of extremists putting on a show for the media.

Atheism is what you call someone with no belief in a higher power,god. etc

By definition atheism is not a belief. Stop trying to turn it into one.

"Science is self correcting, meaning it is flawed. "
no. that's why it isn't flawed. Science is self correcting based on new data. A scientific field isn't complete, but science as a field and method isn't flawed. It would be flawed if it didn't change based on new information.

haha. no, read the references. They are pretty much excuse making and cheery picking to confirm their belief.

" And wouldn't the existence, and even the sometimes contradictory accounts of the Gnostic gospels, provide a more evidence of an actual historic figure whose image was "stomped over", rather than one made up out of whole cloth?"
No, why would you think that?

Nope. In fact it looks like 'Jesus' is an combination of at least three people. Based on dates of events, location, from different letters.
Of course the bible was written by men how said 'These 12 people are honest, wouldn't lie or make things up, and never checked them.
If you look at cults* and their behavior, you see striking similarity with the apostles, and other religion older the Christianity.

Then it gain political power and the rest is bloody history

Which is why it's alarming that the religious right is gaining so much power.

*for brevity, cult will be short hand for small start up religion

But we do not have anything similar when it comes to what caused the Big Bang, ranting about 14D planes colliding and creating ripples like on a pond, without any idea how those planes existed in the first place does not really strike me as a particularly sane argument

If you walked out an say the side of your car smashed in, would it not be reasonable to conclude you had been hit by a car even if you can't 'prove' a car did it?

It's like that, but with math. The fact that you can not understand it, doesn't make it insane. It makes you ignorant in that area.

Another excuse for people who can't actual base there idea on informed information.

So you attack him personally, because you got noting else except the incorrect idea that anyone gives a crap about you, and that you won't be anything but a whisper in a few decades. SO that leads you to post ad homs in what is a basic debate, that adult do.

Just because a bunch of morons had the expectation meant, doesn't make it an attack, or an insult.

News to Christian: YOU DON'T FUCKING OWN DECEMBER 25th.

You can stick you fake outrage your your ass.
It was not an attack. He used wording that made people expect one statement, then through an surprise ending.
That is not a fucking attack, and you can take you fucking outrage and shove it back up your ass.
I do note that every mouth breathing stupid ass xtian used it as an excuse to verbally attack atheist.

To be clear, I am not calling Christians mouth breathing stupid ass's. just ones like you.

That you don't know what the word 'newsworthy' means.