Only about 1% of the population is Christian, but they still have a fairly public presence. Seven Prime Ministers, including the recent Taro "Rozen" Aso have been Christians. Date Masamune is usually credited for pushing Christianity into mainstream acceptance, though it caused a big rift during the Tokugawa era.
Tzion: Kojima-san doesn't have to make Metal Gear any more.
Tzion
It was a divorce case (civil), not an assault trial (criminal). Different rules.
As long as he isn't managing their finances...
I was about to ask if he had heard of lolcats.
"Nobody will ever be able to pull off thousands of attacks around the entire planet at once, with one coordinated blast and chop. Unless you had a team of tens of thousands to strike everywhere at the exact same time, repairs would outpace destruction—this isn't a job for a lone wolf."
I don't really remember my first computer, since we had several that my father built for fun, but I learned to read so I could use MSDOS. Upgrading to Windows 3.1 was a big deal, as were the new computers we built to beta test Windows 95. I remember my first gigabyte hard drive (MSRP $1000, but we got it slightly…
Do you consider yourself more of a console or PC gamer?
I live in Mississippi, actually. Tax breaks, sure, you can't get without a license, but visitation rights can be granted through private contract, as can most other shared rights and responsibilities that are part of a State license. I'm studying law, so perhaps I'm in a better position to take this route.
I think it's ridiculous that anyone has to ask a government permission to be married. I don't personally support gay marriage, but I don't think marriage should be something that is regulated at all, in the legal sense. I know I'm not getting a license when I marry, I'm just writing a contract and having it approved…
UHF is always fairly short range.
Our faith in science is just as blind as it is in religion, albeit in a more fundamental way than you mention. Scientific hypotheses, even if based on thousands of observations, are still based on faith in our faculties of observation and reason, not to mention our existence, for which there is not and cannot be…
You have faith that it works because you have faith in what you see and feel, and that you can receive information at all. You don't know that gravity works. You just have faith in your powers of observation.
Oh, I have faith that I exist, so I have no trouble finding meaning in life. The fact that it is based on faith in the material doesn't make it any less legitimate. Indeed, since faith is the only way we can function (you can't even eat without faith in food and basic physiology), it's ridiculous to act as if it is…
Indeed, the very act of arguing requires faith.
Missing the point. You cannot prove that you see what you see, feel what you feel, or hear what you hear. The existence of the universe is something we assume, not something we know. We hope the universe exists, and we in it. That is faith.
I think otokonomiyaki fails to understand that no one chooses whether or not to have faith, merely in what to have it. Every action and thought we have is based in faith, it doesn't matter if the supernatural is involved.
I didn't say there was validity to spiritual claims. Merely that no claims have validity, because there is no such thing as proof. When you cite "real-world science" you make assumptions about the existence and nature of the real world, and so you are begging the question. I'm not saying religion is the only…
Have you heard of the brain in a jar thought experiment? A living brain in a jar is hooked up to a computer that replicates all the normal sensory inputs it would receive in a body. The brain cannot distinguish between this data and that it would receive in the real world. Extrapolating, we can say that there is no…
My point is that material beliefs are no more provable than spiritual ones, so the status of some asserted fact as one or the other is irrelevant. Read up on Philosophical Skepticism for more info.