I'm with you guys. I thought it was a really interesting style that they could do interesting things with, but the reality is that it isn't at all consistent with the style that the show has had up to this point. Actually, it would be more accurate to say this show has had issues keeping a consisten...

Bidbot/Omega Lairon.

(But occasionally I dabble with Bidbot/Dengler.)

What GamerGate has taught me: If you can't win an argument on specifics, argue on general principles. If you can't win an argument on general principles, be misleading about the specifics. To quote an old lawyer joke: "If the facts are against you, argue the law. If the law is against you, arg...

Are you sure about that?

I just really like the phrase "donkey college," completely regardless of context.

That seems a bit like trying to inflate a hot air balloon by positioning it above an incandescent lightbulb. It might work in theory, but in practice... less so.

The reality is we're human - we make mistakes, both honest and not-so-honest. These include interpretations of old texts and how they apply to modern life. For the most part, I side with those who advocate preaching love and forgiveness no matter what the real or perceived sin of another party is, ...

re: the anime thing, this is actually something that bothers me, cultural relativity aside. There are plenty of cases in anime (and more generally in Japanese culture in general) where women are presented as... well, as bimbos, as airheads, as eye candy. Certainly not flatteringly. But then I look o...

It's too easy for me to find examples of laws that are stupid regardless of morality for me to take laws seriously as moral guidelines. Isn't it also a matter of, for want of a better term, scale, though? It might be better if I explain through an example. Compare three people. All three say that th...

You're right, I should have been more clear there: you're correct, there are alternatives to the Abrahamic religions (shocking!). However, they're not the only ones with problems like this. In many Buddhist traditions, for instance, women can't attain enlightenment. The goal of women in those tradit...

Also, I don't get why homosexuals would call themselves christians or any other of those religions (my aim turns to christianity since besides secular christianity is the biggest religion in my country). I see that you can make a point that christian scripture allows for gays from societies standpo...

Merrymaker_Mortalis wrote:I feel out of my depth now.

When you're talking about life after death, there are three kinds of people: people who know they are out of their depth, people who don't realize they are out of their depth, and people who are lying.

Personally, I prefer to pronounce it with the soft "g" because I think "graphic" should be pronounced with a soft "g" as well so that it sounds like "girrafe-ic."

Basically, I like people saying ridiculous-sounding things.

If it's OK to say "Homosexuality is unacceptable because the Bible tells us so," then it must also be OK to say "Slavery is acceptable because the Bible tells us so." Both of these are "abstract precepts" provided by the Bible. There is little from the Bible that disti...

They're a set of precepts that outline a model of how to live your life. I use the term "theory" less in the scientific sense and more to distinguish from practical application, but you're right that it's not the right term. Maybe "abstract" is a better way of putting it. Like, y...

AlexanderDitto - I don't know that I'm willing to go that far. Just because the Bible isn't a basis for your entire moral system completely and entirely doesn't mean it can't play a large part. I think it's valid to reject parts of the Bible but accept the rest. In physics, quantum mechanics is an a...

My "counterargument" to the slavery piece is that the Bible was written at a time and in a culture where slavery wasn't considered a separate institution, it was simply a part of the way the world was. It's kind of like how we think of taxes nowadays - not as s distinct entity that you cou...

The verse in question is Leviticus 18:22 (or possibly Leviticus 20:13, which says a very similar thing), and it's one of the best cases of translation being critical to interpretation. The original Hebrew verse actually appears incomplete - transliterated to English, it runs something like "And...

"Lucifer" is a Latin word literally translating to "bearer of light," but another common translation is the "morning star" one. Unfortunately, this is one of those areas that depends heavily on the translation of the Bible you're reading - or if you're reading one at al...

And your second love is cataloging things?

Oh, and if you're looking for an outlet that hasn't folded to some of these ridiculous demands, Rock, Paper, Shotgun seem like some pretty stand-up folks. I think that by far my favorite part of this article (slash policy statement slash manifesto) is where they talk about how it's impossible to &q...

I'm pretty sure that's the moment when you shout "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND MY ARTISTIC VISION" and run out of the room flailing your arms.

Elomin - a couple small typos. One, "affluant" should be "affluent." And two, "Helloooo Everybody!" should be spelled "Work with daddy on this." Otherwise that looks pretty magnificent.

Zip files are the go-to response for compression (gzip if you're on Linux), but that might or might not work depending on the PDF creator in question. Some programs compress PDFs by default, so compressing them further won't do anything in that case. Try zipping one and see if it decreases the files...

They're over water how are they over water neither Rhyhorn nor Abra would appear over water owww my head.