jakee

It was actually this bit that I wanted to draw attention to, rather than the whole revenge thing.

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"The British government has made it repeatedly clear that so-called 'targeted assassinations' of this kind are unlawful, unjustified and counter-productive," Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said in a statement.

If you ever wonder why hamas and other terrorist organizations have so much support just look at the conduct of the occupying Israeli forces.

If you ever wonder why the US is so hated in the middle east, look at which countries the US supports.

I don't know that!
Aaaaargh

Saw an article in the new scientist that mentioned this. Apparently it
'designates the fetus as a human being from the moment of conception and makes the killing of one a murder seperate from the murder of a pregnant women except in certain medical procedures'

Any one have any information about it?

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LONDON (Reuters) - Britain has condemned Israel's killing of top Hamas leader Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi as illegal and counter-productive.

"The British government has made it repeatedly clear that so-called 'targeted assassinations' of this kind are unlawful, unjustified and counter-productive," Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said in a statement.

An Israeli helicopter missile strike killed Rantissi in Gaza City earlier on Saturday.

Israel hailed its killing of what it called a "mastermind of terrorism", but Hamas issued an immediate vow of revenge.

hey dave,
when are you going to empuria?

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While the UK makes it a crime to carry anything to defend yourself, has this guy committed any real crimes?

Umm, resisting arrest?
Kinda casts doubt on his character.

I might be going to Skydive Orange in Virginia this summer and if I did I'd be spending quite a lot of time there.
I was wondering if anyone could tell me what the DZ is like to live and jump at, what you think of it, that sort of stuff.
Thanks

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70's
80's
90's

Not really types of music but I like the sixties anyway.

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Rave
Techno
Trance

Ummm, you know how sometimes when you make a poll you assume people only like what you like and ignore everything else?
Glad you didn't fall into that trap

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3.And of course now certain exhausty smells remind me of the DZ. I must like the smell of fuel!

Yeah, that smell when the engine fires up in the morning for load 1, sort of mix of exhaust, unburnt jet A and a bit of burnt oil.
I just remember that smell and it makes me think of sitting in the plane, feet wet from the dew, sun climbing in the sky, the chill still in the air and mostly that incredible anticipation of the third or fourth solo jump when it's all so new, just me and the sky.
Dear god I need to jump right now.

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He was spoken to by the officer and was arrested after a struggle... '

So the police ask about the baton and he assaults them? Lets face it, doesn't sound like he was a model citizen does it. And yeah, I do feel safer now that this guy isn't walking round with a weapon specifically designed to injure people.

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And if your car gets stolen, then obviously you didn't do enough to secure it, even if it was locked up. So I guess a fine against the car's owner would be proper for "allowing" their car to be stolen, and for bothering the police with having to try and recover it.

from your article it was the company that fined him, not the police. If you had a hire car that got stolen I bet the rental company would be pissed.

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I would bet that many of the "Christians" who performed in the Inquisition, Salem Witch Trials and any slew of other "Chritistian Barbarities" were in fact just furthuring their own desires and power trips and never believed a word they said but knew they could use it to control, coerce, and terrorize those they saw as lesser than them.

But a lot did, fervently, passionately, with a fire that consumed their every waking moment. Thats why whether or not someone is religious has bugger all to do with whether or not someone is 'moral'. People do good things cos they like doing good things. people do bad things cos they like doing bad things, the voice in their head's just a reflection of that.

I might have to offer to be punched as well now.

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I haven’t met an agnostic yet who leaned toward the idea that there was not a divine force behind creation.

Thats cos we're called atheists

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Morality comes from society, and is reinforced by claiming it comes from a 'higher power' if the reverse were true all societies would have the same morals..

And surely the same basic religious structure, number of gods etc.

Good post about the monkey's, for me one of the best studies showed that chimps will lie about things that they know they shouldn't have done. Shows that they understand the rules and also can predict what others will think/feel about them.

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But then many British practices baffle me!
For example why are they still using fore and aft gear when the rest of the civilized world converted to piggy backs two decades ago?

Which DZ is that?

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That's not to say we have sterling morals today - heck, we thought it was a good idea to kill 350,000 civilians with two bombs during WWII. But they are good enough that our society does well.

Absolutely. I think today the greatest influence on the way we think of world morality today is the advent of the mass media, enabling us to see what happens when armies collide. Vietnam could be called the first war covered live on TV, HUGE public outcry massive demonstrations. Still though people only get worked up about what they see.
In the thread about Mugabe and Zimbabwe alot of people suggested that the Zimbabweans and all Africans got what they deserved for living in a violent place, and many people object to the loss of one US/allied soldier to save countless foreign lives. Compassion only for those people you can relate to.

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In Reply To
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If the justification for the moral rules is contradicted by science then the moral rules themselves are shown to be baseless and worthless.

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I disagree.

First, Moral Rules need not be derived from Religious Beliefs.

I was talking about the speficific rules derived from religious scripture and i suppose that what i should have said was that they are then no more or less valid than any other proposed set of morals and should not be set above or below what anyone else might suggest until you actually think about and evaluate them.
Obviously bibles have good points, dont kill/steal etc. but then on the same level don't carve graven images!
It seems to me that the divine rules of conduct are similar to sociological rules because THATS WHERE THEY CAME FROM. religious text just writes down what the good people are doing anyway and adds random worship related rules to keep everyone interested.

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Therefore, there must be a Great Designer of the universe.

But then you still have to step up another level, the design of the entity powerful enough to concieve and execute the design of the universe requires another designer OF the designer, any way you cut it you end up with a list of designs stretching to infinity, which brings us back to the original, most perplexing question, where the F*** did everything come from?

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There isn't much to it. An altimeter measuring barometic pressure(altitude) measuring the rate of change(speed) determines a preset activation.

And when you flip onto your back how much does that affect the pressure around where the barometer is?

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That's what they said about Islam, Mohammed, and the Quran ~800 years AD.

Do you believe that one is divine?

you are right, it is easy to cross euro borders and the US has at least as much natural diversity as Europe (mountain ranges, deserts etc. But culturally it is completely different. Not only does each country have at least one language that some of its neighbours don't (often 2 or 3) but the way of life and culture in other countries can be totally different, you really feel like you have discovered somewhere new, rather than same people different background. Even going from what was east to west germany can still make a big difference.

Not to mention the fact that one city, say paris or florence can have more history than the entire US of A

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Today, in the year 2004, we as a human population are more intellectually sophisticated than the ancient Hebrews were. I'm NOT saying we're more intelligent. I'm saying we have more tools at our disposal with which we can understand the universe.

Then surely it's time to pass down a new document. With the increased knowledge we have of the world around us isn't it time we had a new prophet who show's people how it all works in a way that makes sense now, like gods Unified Theory of Everything.
Apparently he sent the last ones down when people lost their way and forgot the message, have things got better since then?

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Much like parents trying to explain a grown-up concept to a child. They must put it in child-like terms.

Kids grow up, is it time for the next stage of our "education"

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But I still believe there's no possible way we, in 2004, could comprehend the HOW of the creation of the universe. BUt we're getting there, and we're using science to do it.

We could have a model thats a damn sight better though, and for the first time EVER the whole world could see it live on CNN.

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Here's a thought experiment: what WAS before the Big Bang? Was there anything there? Nothing? If nothing, where did all the material for the universe, all that energy, come from? What about the law of conservation of energy?

I thnk the latest theory was something to do with the big crush at the end of a previous universe creating enough energy and matter density to break through a dimension and explode out the other side. Seriously though it is a mystery and I don't think we'll ever know just how the universe started.
I just don't see why that means everyone should take the easy way out and believe in some bite size easy to swallow explanation of higher power formulated thousands of years ago and split off and redefined a million times since then.

The other side of that thought experiment is that since we, our universe and our timeline are finite and god is assumed to be infinite then what did he do Before. Most people left on their own for a few years go crazy, that might explain a lot

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Do you have a basis for your accusations or are you just repeating what you've heard? Give examples for your generalizations.

well first off there are the things that have already been discussed along the lines of the seven day creation, adam and eve and all that but the argument for that has already moved into the "take it figuratively" stage. (which begs the question, who decides what is figurative and what actually happened)

I don't know what your image of god is so its difficult to show how it may have been contradicted but lets take the example of a soul. Pretty fundamental to most faiths as the idea of a conciousness/ morality of a person that goes to a nice fluffy place when you die. Used to explain emotion and stuff. With biologists and chemists and EKG machines and CAT scans looking inside the brain finding which lobes and neurons relate to which of the brains functions surely it becomes apparent that without the brain there can be no intelligence, emotion or in fact any kind of conciousness.
Could relate that to advances in zoology/anthropology? teaching chimps to sign, finding out how much emotion and conciousness they have when surely animals are souless and therefore without conciousness.

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Something had to make it exist in the first place.

Cool, find out what it was.

Hmmm, wonder where it came from.

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With that said, even if a whole work force strikes they too can be replaced. Just ask the FAA guys what happened in the 80's.....

Same thing happened to the english printers union, I think it was the early 80's.

I'm just going to add to that, the bible is not the only absolute word of god/gods/devils/demons out there, nor is it the first.
I very much doubt that the old testament was the first religious pamphlet to be spread around either so how do you KNOW that your book is the true book when the majority of world opinion is against you?
(no matter which religion you follow more people will disagree than agree with you)