one of the main reasons Concorde became less profitable after that was because a lot of the services clientèle were killed in the 9/11 attacks.

The 3,000 people killed in 9/11 represent about 0.15% of the populations of New York and London. As comparison. 42,000 people were killed in car accidents in 2001.

That's arbitrary. It'd make just as much sense grouping animals by what colour they are. Crocodiles used to be warm blooded, too, so when did they switch from being dinosaurs to reptiles?

I didn't have a PC when Fallout 1 and 2 were released, I just had a PS1. I know it's nice to be able to afford everything, but most of us couldn't, and made choices.

JRPGs are awesome, too.

If I ever got free reign in building a house, I'd tessellate the rooms being octagons and squares.

What, just me?

My general sense is that pretty much old everything is big. But what if fossils expanded with time?

Not really true. The number of different species that have lived on the earth, it would be astonishing if the largest species to ever have lived had evolved recently... but this is exactly what has happened.

Also, there are some things (I hesitate to call them species) like the Coelacanth which have stayed very similar in form over hundreds of millions of years.

Large animals get more press. I'd guess they also fossilise better and are easier to find.

Regarding large insects and arachnids.... no one is completely certain, apart from the fact that there was a much higher oxygen content in the atmosphere during the Cambrian, allowing larger sizes. This does not explain everything though (but what does?).

Well, dinosaurs were divided into two main groups, the lizard-hipped and the bird-hipped dinosaurs. Birds evolved from the lizard-hipped dinosaurs, and the bird-hipped dinosaurs died out.

Reptile is a catch-all term that doesn't really mean anything. Crocodiles are much more closely related to birds and dinosaurs than they are to any other reptiles (so should probably be grouped with birds rather than lizards and snakes), and extinct "reptiles" like dimetrodon are more closely related to humans than they are to any extant reptiles.

They did a lot of good research, but you don't do heavy metal in Dobly.

The difference being that Age of Sail colonists could live in pretty much the same condition as the one they left. On Mars the "colonists" will be living underground and will never again feel fresh air in their lungs or sun on their skin. They will be dependent on the next supply mission or they will die.

My god, I can't believe you actually posted this on slashdot. I'd guess that 99% of those reading this will be ideally suited for life on Mars after having spent the last few years in mom's basement.

Nascar Race? You mean because they "raise" the flag and sing the National Anthem before the race and usually launch fireworks after it? Nearly every sporting event in the US starts with raising the flag and singing the National Anthem.

Yeah... that's the thing. Singing the anthem at each and every tiny sporting event looks really odd and jingoistic to most of the rest of the world. We don't do anything like that at our sporting events in England unless they're particularly noteworthy (FA cup final, etc), and even then it's sometimes booed, or mostly ignored.

Crime is going down in just about _all_ western countries. The leaded gasoline correlation does not apply in recent years.

Empathy is important.

This is similar to the "I don't want to see what I eat slaughtered" argument.

That it happens often is not a reason to not watch it.

Not wanting to watch something does not mean that it is not happening.

And yes, I'm a hypocrite. I really hate killing animals, and wish that I didn't have to.

Note : that last statement was about our roosters we had to kill. I've not got a compulsion to kill animals.

It's canon, not cannon.

Until fairly recently in human history, marriage was largely a religious and private issue.

Until fairly recently in human history, religion was not a private issue. The secular state did not exist (with a few notable exceptions, like the Mongol empire).

Those laws promoting family units have not worked. At all.