VB6_Forever

What getting -4 really means is that if the 'community' of this webtopia could downvote you more they would

'The Elements of Computing systems' by Nisan & Schocken

To truly understand the machine and the software layers on top of it

baa baa

edit -4 looks to be the limit to downvoting

I think that there's a herd mentality here w.r.t voting. Thankfully the system doesn't let the mob downvote too far

Yes 2, 3, 5 or 7 only for easy steps. Anyone who has 6 easy steps to do anything is clearly an idot.

Curiosity apart what good could it do us to discover or be discovered by aliens?

Banking seems a lot like a gambling except that it's heads you win and tails they lose.

Lend big into a property bubble and you'll be rewarded with colossal bonuses.

The bubble bursts, loans go bad and the share price collapses.

However the main banks banks are considered too big to fail and the taxpayer has to bail them out.

Bonuses (smaller ones) for exceptional performance continue to be the norm, rolling heads the exception.

Why don't the shareholders get rid of their employees, the bankers who have overseen the collapse of their asset?

The shareholders are Pension funds who, while they ostensibly have the little peoples'interests to preserve, are actually run by people from the same gene pool as the bankers themselves.

These people sit on one anothers remuneration committees.

Dog does not eat dog.

Which came first, the Uncle Sam image or this one? http://www.sterlingtimes.org/kitchener.jpg

I wonder if BG paid Marla Woods' expenses for the reunion photo.

If chinese, Indians and Koreans do well is it only because white people haven't enough resources to keep them down too?

Was his name Peter Pan?

Whether or not taking one's own life is brave, having read his suicide note I think he lived a very brave life.

Maybe you are correct. But the trend is in the wrong direction. When look at world population growth there is imo potentially a population tsunami approaching. Maybe my pessimism is unfounded, most people here seem to think it will all turn out rosy

"Stating the facts makes it all seem far less dramatic, doesn't it?"

I don't believe that I have stated any fictions if that's what your last remark implies.

I had a look at the wiki page you linked to.

Most of those 27 countries ahead of the Netherlands are negligible in terms of size, vatican City, Guernsey, Monaco, St Martin?

There are some sizeable countries but I don't believe being able to report a population density lower than, say, Bangladesh, is a cause for celebration.

As for living in a country with a population density of over 7000 per sq km, it is not something to be aspired to.

I wasn't trolling.

The netherlands has increased its area by an extraordinary 25% by reclaiming land from the sea.

Despite this the netherlands is one of the most densely populated countries on earth.

It has further increased its population by allowing immigration on a large scale, which whatever else its consequences is not going to reduce population density.

Now if you look at a nightime satellite view of Europe, the Netherlands is an uninterrupted patch of light.

I'd rather live in a country where I have the possibility of escaping from my fellow man every once in a while. That's not possible in Holland so I'd rather not live there.

I can, however, see why cycling is popular/necessary there

Can I ask you to explain what you mean?

What you say sounds right.

I wonder what, if Heroin was as freely available as alcohol or tobacco, its addiction rate would be like. It's my suspicion that drug addicts tend to come from the addictive personality subsection of the population

The Dutch reclaimed a large proportion of their national territory from the sea, presumably because they needed more space and then proceeded to allow large scale immigration from Morocco. I wouldn't like to live in Holland. They're packed like sardines there. Not cycling is probably not an option

I haven't tried crack or heroin either but I wonder if they're more addictive than alcohol or tobacco or anything else that gives instant gratification. I tend to lean toward the addictive personality viewpoint. For instance I know people who can open a bar of chocolate and eat just a square or two. If I open a bar it's all gone

I'm no advocate of piracy but having twice been effectively ripped off by DRM I can see where you're coming from

Amazon already has the infrastructure in place to allow people to sell physical books secondhand

And now you can lend a kindle book and it becomes unavailable to you for the duration of the loan.

So everything is in place to allow a secondhand market for kindle books.

Although isn't Audible an Amazon company (shudder)

Can't disagree with you there.

The tip about recording the audio first is a gem

Who do you think you are, Sigmund Freud? Of course Jews and Christians have a right to live in the Middle East. I hope you are not an Israeli and if you are that you belong to the lunatic fringe.

So the people who left Israel in 1948 and who now live with their descendants in refugee camps in Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank are free to return to Israel?

What percentage of the population of the West Bank were Jewish in 1967? The proper term for what's going on is colonisation or perhaps plantation.

If you're correct about the the majority of the West Bank population being there for less than 3 generations, then I can give you 2 reasons for this. 1: The former residents of that part of Palestine that became Israel who upon the formation of the state moved to the West Bank. 2: The increase in the Jewish population.

Do you have similar doubts as to the ownership of Israel?

I think it's pretty clear that the West Bank belongs to the people who live there, the people commonly referred to as the Palestinians. It certainly shouldn't belong to the people living next door in Israel or to whomever they allow under the protection of Israeli military force to establish settlements there.

I don't think using ancient history, however well recorded it is or isn't is a good way to decide who owns what. We all came from somewhere else if you go back far enough. The Jews aren't the only ones with historical links to Palestine. It's not just ludicrous it's evil to suggest that white Europeans or Black Ethiopians on the basis of their religion or part of their racial heritage have more right to the territory of Palestine than Palestinians do.

The people of Sussex have long felt themselves to belong to the English nation. Israel captured the West bank in a war. I doubt that the population of the west bank will ever be assimilated and become patriotic Israelis. Religion, let alone nationalism, guarantees this I'd say. Israel (and the US) will eventually tire of having to use the army to control the population. Eventually Israel will have to give it up imo

I don't have a fixed view on the issue of Palestine and Israel. Doesn't Israel have military control over the West Bank?

Dehumanising 'others' allows people to do unjust acts with a clear conscience. The flimsy anecdotal evidence you gave as the basis for your dismissal of the Palestinian people suggests to me that you are not so clever or talented as you may think.