Judaism defines itself as both a *nation* and a religion. The conversion process entails both adopting the religious practices & moral principles, as well as becoming a citizen of the Nation of Israel (the modern State of Israel is a separate entity, although it makes any Jew-by-religion a citizen as said individual desires via the right-of-return law). That said, use of conjugations of 'Jew' irks me, as proper name of nation is Bnei/Am Yisrael (children of Israel/nation of Israel, respectively). 'Jew' only became a thing sometime after the first exile period, as the vast majority of survivors were from tribe of Yehuda (yehudim), which morphed into Jew over language transfers. Unlike most nations, it does not recognize renunciation of citizenship. You might not pay your taxes, so to speak, but you're still a member. (If a convert does so, it does work, under retro-active assumption that initial conversion was not sincere). on the matrilineal descent - keep in mind that the 'codified date' of 2nd century CE is the date of the first published work, the pre-existing oral laws were written down, it is incorrect to assume that any such thing sprang into existence then. There are circumstantial evidences from some canonical texts, but nothing that works (well) outside of the axiom system of Judaism in any event. All said, I am the opposite of surprised, some of the worst, most destructive antisemites in history were (and are) self-hating Jews.

Issue is that the cavendish, the most widely-grown banana, like a number of other banana species, had the ability to produce viable seeds bred out century(ies) ago(1). All plants of each of these varieties are clones, so a pathogen's 'trick' that works on one works on all. They have lost the protection that is one of the primary reasons why sexual reproduction is such a good idea. (1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

I disagree. Such artifacts are to the future humans [in the broadest sense of 'human'] as the fire-making kit of the human[s] who started the whole fire thing. As the remains of the first cities that our species built. A thousand thousands years from now, our descendants will look to such things and call them by what they are - the start of the beginning of everything. There are a number of quite good works of science fiction that involve this very thing - plot aside, it boils down to the loss of such things, and terrible tragedy of losing the keepsake of humanity's youth forever.

I've ended up having the desk at my office being a sitting desk, and my home desk being a standing one. My standing desk is the pile of to-be-used reams of printer paper I made on my desk (I lucked out in that my comfortable height happened to be around an integer multiple of reams + my desks height) Seems to be working for me.

division can be defined as: For a given X,Y X/Y = Z is equivalent to Find a Z such that Z*Y = X If Y is 0. then any value of Z works - so any division by 0 has infinitely *many* solutions - 0/0 is different only in that convenient things can happen with regard to limits of functions and stuff like that.

While not surprised, given the standard set of stereotypes that generally seem to be employed, both justifiable and not, nevertheless: The Flibberty!?

I have to agree that such an occurrence is plausible. Many texts on game theory (of the ones that I have read, at least) discuss that in general, companies that routinely bid on government contracts, and in particular ones operating in fields with limited competition (such as high aerospace, with high barrier to entry) have strong incentives to 'collude' in trading off in winning contracts, and that it is unnecessary for any communication to occur to do so. This alone can impose false constraints (i.e. that they are not inherently true, but occur for a reason that is technically not relevant). Furthermore, as long as an industry has relatively few players, and a low probability of any new players entering, and if demand sufficiently high, the most profitable mutual strategy is cooperation [without communication] - to all offer slightly differentiated products (more-or-less even split), or carve up and specialize in sub-industries. For an example of cooperation without communication [in extreme circumstances] see the 'truces' along the Western Front of WWI

According to Airdroid, my Galaxy has ~240 system apps (some of which seem to be OS-related, however) compared to 40 apps I installed myself.

I disagree with the specific beliefs of OSC. However, I do not feel that he is evil, or even causing evil. I feel that he is acting on genuine beliefs that he holds. The only way to change the mind or belief system if an individual is through logical and peaceful discourse. Additionally, it seems to me that a boycott, although personally satisfying, and perhaps capable of accomplishing some financial punishment to OSC, will also harm various others through no fault of their own. On another point, I feel that a compromise solution may be the best way out of this quagmire. I support removing the ability of the government to conduct marriage. By this, I mean that the government would not issue a 'marriage' license. Rather a group of adults who wish to live together as a family unit would register for a 'civil union' license. This would grant the members thereof the various benefits, rights, and conveniences that marriages grant in the secular realm. Marriage would be defined exactly as a religious ritual wholly out of the realm of government. Although this really amounts to wordplay, I feel that it alleviates much of the discomfort and fears of the religious opponents, while granting the ability of forming a family to any group, who can still conduct a marriage ceremony within whatever religious structure is mutually compatible with them. I would like to make a few side points over a few common misconceptions on this subject, the commonality of which irks me. With regard to religions that are inherently 'anti-gay' (I will speak of the Jewish religion with which I am familiar, at least much of it is applicable to the other Abrahamic religions), I must make several points: -Having homosexual desires, etc. is not inherently a sin. The thing which is forbidden is specifically the sexual act itself. -That said, although this is singled out as a 'To'Aivah' -an abomination- from all other sexual sins, it is not correct to focus and disparage those who commit this over ANY other sin, the same level of outrage should be felt against the one who embarrasses his fellow and the one who violates Shabbas- it is wrong to hyper-focus on one sin above all others. -With regard to the argument that mandating any kind of civil union for homosexuals would 'encourage' them, I feel that this is fallacious. -The annoyingly common idea that homosexuality is wrong because it is unnatural is completely wrong- it is simply not a valid argument, nor is its reverse. We see it in nature everywhere - it is not unnatural. It is considered prohibited because God said that it is -no more, no less-. It's commonality among all creation implies NOTHING - it is irrelevant to this argument. -From that point, even if homosexual desires are built in at the genetic level, the religion still demands that that desire be conquered and ignored by those who possess it - just because one wants to does not make it permitted.

In both cases a heuristic probability measure is being applied by the jury. The difference is more of where one draws the line between 'not guilty' and 'guilty' or 'liable for payment' and 'not liable for payment'.