Christianity

Exceptionally old, large, and wanky fandom of Jesus Christ. Basically like Star Trek, only not as big on slash.

Occasionally truncated to "Xianity" by those using "X" as a symbol for "Christ," or "Xtianity" by exceptionally stupid people.

We have more Gods than you can shake a stick at! Our Mythology Encyclopedia features over 3,700 weird and wonderful Gods, Goddesses, Supreme Beings, Demons, Saints and Spirits...

Browse the pantheons of the world, explore ancient myths, and discover Gods of everything from Fertility to Fluff with our Holy Database Of All Known Gods...

I don't question God. The Lord is my Shepherd and I shall put none above Him. Which is why I know that if it were part of God's plan for me to stop viciously condemning others based solely on their sexual preference, He would have seen fit—in His infinite wisdom and all—to have given me the tiniest bit of human empathy necessary to do so.

You know who’s easily confused, easily thrown off-track and baffled by the questioning of rules they’ve learned? Adults.

When someone says “Kids won’t understand how two men can be married” what they mean, what they’re trying to say, is “I don’t understand how two men can be married.” When they say “Kids won’t understand why their dick looks different from daddy’s” they’re trying to explain “I don’t understand why you want to be different from tradition.” When they say “Kids won’t know who’s the daddy and who’s the mommy” they are telling you “I cannot comprehend a world without very rigid gender roles, and as far as I know neither can anyone else.”

If anyone can think of a counterexample, let me know, but from where I’m standing, it looks like every use of the “confused kids” argument is just people pushing their own incomprehension off onto some largely-hypothetical kids. Can we all agree to stop falling for it?

And I was dead serious earlier. If, after all of this, you can tell me that innocence is more valuable, that somehow your child knowing anything about sex or their bodies is detrimental to them so you’d rather they know nothing, if you can tell me that it’s more godly that they are kept in the dark, then I want you to tell me, right now, that you are okay with the children who are sexually abused within this silence. That you are okay with the knowledge that your child might have already been sexually abused and unable to tell you, and you appreciate the silence far more than their protection. (As a sidenote: asking an “innocent” child whether they have been abused won’t tell you anything if you haven’t equipped them with the knowledge of what that could even mean and if they have no knowledge of whether what happened to them could be construed as wrong or not.) If you are fine with teaching children that they are yours and that you have ultimate power and authority over everything including the say over their bodies, then I want you to tell me you are absolutely fine with sexual abuse. Because no matter what kinds of logical leaps you can make to justify these beliefs, that is what you believe.

And church, I hold you, and your culture, and your disgusting, elitist, worthless praising of innocence responsible for these lives. And until you and conservative Christianity changes, I will never see you as anything more than an abusive culture, willing to sacrifice children in pain for your own selfish illusions that “innocence” is any kind of protection, and has anything to do with morality.

Religion can and does cause literal brain damage, and that that damage can be difficult if not impossible to repair if not addressed early in life. If children learn that to doubt certain ideas is to risk eternal eternal punishment, it is inevitable that their ability to think critically will be suppressed.

Supporting evidence which shows brain atrophy caused by religion:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=religious-experiences-shrink-part-of-brain

http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0017006

Introduction

Never ascribe to malice, that which can be explained by incompetence.
- Napoleon

In the interests of creating employment opportunities in the Java programming field, I am passing on these tips from the masters on how to write code that is so difficult to maintain, that the people who come after you will take years to make even the simplest changes. Further, if you follow all these rules religiously, you will even guarantee yourself a lifetime of employment, since no one but you has a hope in hell of maintaining the code. Then again, if you followed all these rules religiously, even you wouldn't be able to maintain the code!

You don't want to overdo this. Your code should not look hopelessly unmaintainable, just be that way. Otherwise it stands the risk of being rewritten or refactored.

This is a summary of resources I've found useful in learning French in order to survive in Neuchâtel. The selection of resources is slanted explicitly toward the goal of survival: mastering the language sufficiently to be able to buy a car, read the newspaper, get your furnace repaired, and all the other fun-filled components of day-to-day life. From that base, you can proceed to a deeper understanding of the literary language and more effective ways of expressing yourself but it doesn't make sense to worry about such refinements until you're able to warn that pesky neighbour kid that if he rings your doorbell one more time and runs away, you'll tear off his fingers and toes and feed them to your vicious dog.

In the spirit of Charles Darwin, the Darwin Awards commemorate individuals who protect our gene pool by making the ultimate sacrifice of their own lives. Darwin Award winners eliminate themselves in an extraordinarily idiotic manner, thereby improving our species' chances of long-term survival.

Trial to run between Black Friday and New Year’s Day
Two malls in California and Virginia will track shoppers
Antenna will follow your phone's identification number
Fears raised about what happens if data gets stolen

Superdickery.com -Absurd, humorous, and sexually suggestive comic book covers

FARK.com We don't make news. We mock it.

If you don't know how to code, then you can learn even if you think you can't. Thousands of people have learned programming from these fine books:

Online version of the weekly magazine, with current articles, cartoons, blogs, audio, video, slide shows, an archive of articles and abstracts back to 1925

Java tutorial

This guide was written to help people with no Java experience get into the more advanced functions offered via the skin interface, for example the ability to write beanshell scripts (interpreted Java). This guide was very kindly written by Laura Seabrook and was previously posted to the forum. It is now presented here as a permanent reference.

This guide is broken down into four sections as follows:
1. Literals, Variables and Expressions
Scriptlets
Literals
Variables
Expressions

2. Decision Structures
Boolean conditions
if
switch and case
while
do while
for
break

3. Methods
Boolean
Numeric
Character
String

4. Interfacing with jAlbum
Original code
Example one - Tables
Example two - Filters

ScienceDaily (Nov. 18, 2011) — Scientists at Chalmers have succeeded in creating light from vacuum -- observing an effect first predicted over 40 years ago. In an innovative experiment, the scientists have managed to capture some of the photons that are constantly appearing and disappearing in the vacuum.

A couple of years ago our friend Clifford Pickover wrote the terrifically fun book, The Math Book. Now he's got a new one that's just as good about physics. It's called, as you might guess, The Physics Book and the publisher has kindly given me permission to run some examples from the book. You can check all of them out after the jump.

Results from a second experiment uphold the observation that neutrinos are moving faster than the speed of light. The OPERA collaboration, which first reported the superluminal neutrinos in September, has rerun the experiment and detected 20 new neutrinos breaking Einstein’s theoretical limit.

The findings are heartening to anyone hoping to see a major physics revolution in their lifetime. But scientists, as ever, are being cautious, and it will take an independent replication of the results by another team to even begin convincing many of them.

sudo !!

repeat last command with "sudo" prepended

perma-link

[...]

Along similar lines,

<command> !$

will execute <command> with the argument to your previous command. Example:

[~] > touch test
[~] > rm !$
rm test
[~] >

Karen sez, "Instructables user RobHopeless has engineered a way to make your own 3D printer. This tutorial is an entry in Instructables' 4th Epilog Challenge, which is accepting all sorts of creative projects for the chance to win an Epilog Laser."

Every password you use can be thought of as a needle hiding in a haystack. After all searches of common passwords and dictionaries have failed, an attacker must resort to a “brute force” search – ultimately trying every possible combination of letters, numbers and then symbols until the combination you chose, is discovered.
If every possible password is tried, sooner or later yours will be found.

The question is: Will that be too soon . . . or enough later?

This interactive brute force search space calculator allows you to experiment with password length and composition to develop an accurate and quantified sense for the safety of using passwords that can only be found through exhaustive search. Please see the discussion below for additional information.

Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel, Google:

I’ve considered your offer to not add my wireless network to your location database in exchange for appending “_nomap” to the SSID. I am rejecting it out of hand and laughing at the idea that this is “greater choice for wireless access point owners.”

To start with, I’m not going to reconfigure all the wireless clients I support. I’m sorry that Google is facing increased scrutiny, legislation, and legal action for raping the world’s privacy in order to sell things, but changing an SSID is a big deal for everybody. Doesn’t matter if it’s grandma’s little wireless network or a giant intercontinental wireless hotspot setup, it’s a big pain in the ass to “protect” our privacy this way.

Greater choice for wireless access point owners

From tagging a post with your location, to checking in to a restaurant, to simply finding out where you are, location-based services have become some of the most popular features of today’s Internet. One of the key ways technology companies are able to determine a location for these services is through a location database, which matches publicly broadcast information about local wireless networks with their approximate geographic location. By looking for wireless access points that are close to a user’s phone, location providers can return the approximate location you need. In addition, this method is a good alternative to other approaches, like GPS, because it’s faster, it works indoors, and it’s more battery-efficient.

Overview

Do Not Track is a technology and policy proposal that enables users to opt out of tracking by websites they do not visit, including analytics services, advertising networks, and social platforms. At present few of these third parties offer a reliable tracking opt out, and tools for blocking them are neither user-friendly nor comprehensive. Much like the popular Do Not Call registry, Do Not Track provides users with a single, simple, persistent choice to opt out of third-party web tracking.

Do Not Track signals a user's opt-out preference with an HTTP header, a simple technology that is completely compatible with the existing web. Several large third parties have already committed to honor Do Not Track, but many more have been recalcitrant. We believe regulation is necessary to verify and enforce compliance with a user’s choice to opt out of tracking.

ENJOY FREEDOM OF ACCESS TO BLOCKED INTERNET CONTENT
ANYWHERE YOU ARE IN THE WORLD!

Experience access to region-blocked video and audio!

Works on your computer or TV.

Start to enjoy your favorite shows, movies, and music on your PC, Mac, game console, Internet enabled TV or Blu Ray player, iPhone, iPad, or iPod - anywhere you are!

Anonymously secure your internet connection with HMA! Pro VPN

Connect to our VPN service to anonymously encrypt your internet activity from prying eyes. All applications on your computer that utilize your internet connection will become anonymous with just a click of a button; no technical experience is required due to our easy to use VPN software. Enjoy internet freedom and anonymity knowing that your sensitive web traffic is securely hidden behind 22'500+ IP addresses located in 35 countries.

You know how it is. You’re enjoying yourself, kicking back and relaxing at the pub or maybe at the library; or maybe you’re in class or just casually surfing the internet, indulging in a little conversation. The topic of the conversation is about a pertinent contemporary issue, probably something to do with a group of people who fall outside your realm of experience and identity. They’re also probably fairly heavily discriminated against - or so they claim.
The thing is, you’re having a good time, sharing your knowledge about these people and their issues. This knowledge is incontrovertible - it’s been backed up in media representation, books, research and lots and lots of historical events, also your own unassailable sense of being right.

Yet all of a sudden something happens to put a dampener on your sharing of your enviable intellect and incomparable capacity to fully perceive and understand All Things. It’s someone who belongs to the group of people you’re discussing and they’re Not Very Happy with you. Apparently, they claim, you’ve got it all wrong and they’re offended about that. They might be a person of colour, or a queer person. Maybe they’re a woman, or a person with disability. They could even be a trans person or a sex worker. The point is they’re trying to tell you they know better than you about their issues and you know that’s just plain wrong. How could you be wrong?

Computer networks proved their organizing power during the recent uprisings in the Middle East, in which Facebook pages amplified street protests that toppled dictators. But those same networks showed their weaknesses as well, such as when the Egyptian government walled off most of its citizens from the Internet in an attempt to silence protesters.

That has led scholars and activists increasingly to consider the Internet's wiring as a disputed political frontier.

The goal of this article is to help you understand what a neural network is, and how it is used. Most people, even non-programmers, have heard of neural networks. There are many science fiction overtones associated with them. And like many things, sci-fi writers have created a vast, but somewhat inaccurate, public idea of what a neural network is.

Wer das Volk fragt, wird zur Bedrohung Europas. Das ist die Botschaft der Märkte und seit vierundzwanzig Stunden auch der Politik. Wir erleben den Kurssturz des Republikanischen.

Papandreou hält dem zerrissenen Europa den Spiegel vor. Ein Kommentar zu Frank Schirrmachers „Demokratie ist Ramsch“.

Ein Land steht vor dem wirtschaftlichen und politischen Abgrund. Der Staat steht vor dem Bankrott und die Regierung spart drakonisch: Sie kürzt heftig bei den öffentlichen Bediensteten und erhöht kräftig die Steuern; die Wirtschaft schrumpft dramatisch, und die Arbeitslosigkeit steigt; in den Städten kommt es zu Massendemonstrationen und zu Straßenschlachten; die Banken stehen vor dem Kollaps, weil die internationalen Kapitalgeber ihr Geld aus dem Land abziehen; Banken müssen mit öffentlichen Mitteln vor dem Zusammenbruch gerettet werden. Griechenland 2011? Nein, Deutschland 1931.

Silvio Berlusconis Abgang hat nicht gereicht, das Misstrauen gegenüber Italien hat an den Märkten sogar zugenommen. Wie geht es nun weiter? Wie wirkt sich das Schicksal des Landes auf die gesamte Euro-Zone aus? Drei Szenarien.

Flucht aus der Globalisierung?

Plädoyer für eine nationenübergreifende Kritik am modernen Kapitalismus

von Jean-Marie Harribey

Seit fast zwei Jahren leiden die Gesellschaften unter den von den Finanzmärkten ausgehenden Spekulationsattacken. Jetzt ist ein kritischer Punkt erreicht. Die wirtschaftlichen Strukturen geraten ins Wanken. Der Schleier der marktwirtschaftlichen Ideologie ist endgültig zerrissen. Die Hymnen auf die Globalisierung und Markteffizienz sind nur noch gedämpft zu vernehmen. Und es hat eine breite Diskussion begonnen, die sich um die mögliche Alternative einer "Antiglobalisierung" dreht.

Verbohrte Lehrer, verlorene Debatten, verzopfte Blockierer. Das heimische Bildungssystem ist fast nicht mehr zu retten.

Datenlecks "symptomatisch für Österreich"

Fahrlässiger Umgang mit sensiblen Daten sei leider typisch für Österreichs IT-Landschaft. Hunderttausende Patientendaten aus dem E-Card-System als Datei herumzuschicken, sei nicht "State of the Art", sagt IT-Securityexperte Martin Prager.

VANCOUVER—A terminally ill woman who wants to fast-track her trial seeking to overturn Canada’s current right-to-die laws will have her case heard in November.

Gloria Taylor, who has Lou Gehrig’s disease, also known as ALS, asked the B.C. Supreme Court through her lawyer to expedite the hearing which was supposed to take place in spring 2012.

It's been nearly 20 years since Canada's laws on assisted suicide have been challenged by a terminally ill person, and now a similar right-to-die case has thrust the issue back into the spotlight.

Learn UNIX in 10 minutes. Version 1.3

Preface

This is something that I had given out to students (CAD user training) in years past.
The purpose was to have on one page the basics commands for getting started using
the UNIX shell (so that they didn't call me asking what to do the first time someone
gave them a tape).

This document is copyrighted but freely redistributable under the terms of the GFDL .

The following files are designed to teach newcomers to the Unix operating system.
Every attempt will be made to make these files as thorough and understandable
to newbies. As with all things technical, many times it is difficult to understand
new material, but don't get discouraged! There is/was method to the madness
(most of the time), its just a matter of figuring it out. It is intended that
newcomers read these in their entirety, in the order we present them.

1. Users can't access file servers.
2. Users can't access anything on the corporate network.
3. Users can'tconnect to VPN server from behind NAT devices.
4. Userscomplain of slow performance.
5. Users canconnect via PPTP but not L2TP/IPSec.
6. Site-to-siteVPNs connect but no traffic passes between the VPN gateways.
7. Users can'testablish IPSec tunnel mode connections from behindsome firewalls
8. Users can'treach some network IDs on the corporate network.
9. Users can't connect to the Internet when connected to the VPN server.
10. Multiple users connect to the VPN server using the same PPP authentication credentials