MasterXan

9/11 most likely had little to do with Iraq. The excuse was the terrorists were hiding there, but I don't really buy into that. They could have been/are hiding where ever they want, especially in the Middle East (I have nothing against the Mid East, just their governments tend to look the other way when opponents of US get involved). In my opinion, we shouldn't be killing anyone over there, terrorist, civilian, or otherwise. That is what they make chemicals for; make a big chem bomb that puts everybody to sleep, which would all but eliminate accidental deaths and still allow soldiers to search the area to capture whoever it is the stupid guys want today. As for our being there and setting up a government, it shouldn't happen. Free them, let them pick the government. Still, I don't think anybody (even Hitler) should die in such a painful way as that guy. Lowers the executioner to that guy's level of evil.

Me thinks you read into the love analogy a bit deeper than I intended. And there are many who would argue about whether you could test such a thing (saying after you stop following His commandments, you go through life and at some point notice it isn't as good as it once was... I have no experiance with this, so I don't know about it) If you think about the chances of being delt one specific hand (as you said, 8 X 10^67), then take that number by itself , say, 100 times, you would have the odds of a simple series of mutations of occuring, which series would likely have to occur for some fictitious organ to work properly in its completed form. That's (8 X 10^67)^100. very unlikely, yet somehow most organisms on earth all ended up with similar characteristics. Which means you'd have to multiply that number by the number of organisms with close characteristics (say every species of ant, or monkey, or mammal), of course subtracting those that had those same characteristics before they became different (if all dolphins had eyes before there were multiple species, then obviously all will have eyes after further mutation, unless the mutation is to not have eyes). It's a very, very large number. And it all happened by accident, over not such a long time (granted, billions of years, but comparitively not very long). I would think we would have many more different varieties of organs, senses, and numbers of appendiges. Not just eyes across almost every complex organism on the planet. I do believe in a physical reality, what I meant was we choose to believe only in that reality or also in a spiritual one. I mentioned the underworld thing because you said we either follow God or get damnation for eternity. This is not so. To get damnation forever, we must be in Outer Darkness. The three kingdoms are drastically different from anybodies version of 'damnation'. The point isn't so much for God to know what we will/will not do. He knows. The point is for us to be happy. (big description coming...) If you don't like following all the laws, say you just see no point in not sharing everything, which means you steal a lot. Then after you die, do you want to go somewhere with all the people you stole from? Always knowing they were better than you, always around people who seem, to you, as stuck up snobs? That's why you're not going to the very top of Heaven. You will go where ever your lifestyle is shared by others, so you feel comfurtable and at ease. If God, knowing all, simply said "you'll like it here", then we would be angry with Him for sending us to a lower place than we thought we wanted. By taking away our memories of Him, we get to see how we really are, and then God puts us in the place we'll be most happy in. As for hiding, He doesn't hide. If He did, we wouldn't be having this discussion because He wouldn't in any way influence anything here. I try and make it a point in my life to allow others to believe whatever they will, while at the same time showing what I know to be true. But I can't unlearn what I've learned, I know it to be fact. You decide whether it is, or whether to believe me when I say that I know it is fact, just as you either believe the world is round because other people say so, or else you become an astranaut and find out for yourself. I highly recommend you don't take my word for any of this, but instead read the BoM and pray about it if you want to know. (I realize I sound arrogent when I say I know, but I really do know. And if you don't believe as I do, then I'm not going to come after you or think you are worse than me. I know what's happening when I die, now I have to catch up with the rest of you and learn how to add, subtract, and multiply-- five things I never could do very well)

This is gonna be a long one, hold on folks! I described how Satan came to be Satan, as is the belief of Mormons and is stated in the Book of Mormon (BoM, again). For proof of most of what I believe, look to the BoM. Prove it's right, you prove Mormons are right. Prove it's half right, and you get half of Mormon beliefs proven. This Pink Unicorn written by generations of herders... does it have a history of their people? The Bible and BoM are histories, meaning that the spiritual teachings in them gain credibility when you find out the history behind them actually happened. Most of the Bible has been proven to be at least based on real events, if not accurate depictions. The BoM, having fewer people studying it and since it was only discovered about 160 years ago, is not as proven scientifically. But there is no proof in either which proves it wasn't real. Any book would have to have the same attributes. (course, they would have to be written by prophets of God, and just who is and is not a prophet is highly disputed...) I really don't believe Darwin's theory could have happened on its own. I realize that adaptions would have simply happened without a specific goal, such as eyes, in mind. I also realize that adaptions without survival meaning are worthless, so would not have neccessarily been passed on to future generations. I see the complexity of life, it's many different forms which scientists don't understand, and in it all I can't imagine it being random. While it is statistically possible for a monkey to get 100% on the ACT, I don't think it will ever happen. It's also statistically possible for a whale to mutate and grow feathers, which may help it become faster by negating the need for blubber, but again I can't see it happening. If I know a fact, it doesn't mean it's objectively verifiable. When dealing with feelings, nothing is objectively verifiable. I relate it to knowing if you love somebody... you think about if you do, wonder if it's possible, and at some point you just know whether you do or do not love him/her. When you gain a testimony, it's a bit more dramatic and sudden, but similar in that you will never be able to prove to somebody else, because you learned it through a feeling. The feeling of the Holy Ghost, which is sometimes described as "a burning in the bosom", is how you gain a testimony. You have to experiance it to know what I'm talking about. Your right, a god who put some puppets somewhere and if they did evil then banished them, that would be cruel. So you are a puppet? I'm a puppet? We are more then puppets. We are told what to do and when to do it, the test is whether we do it. If God were to test our loyalty to him, how else would he do it? He would have to remove our previous memories, for anyone who where living with God would obviously believe He exists, would know His power, and would likely follow Him. We get to decide whether we believe in the physical reality or the spiritual. Now the destruction underworld thing. YOU WILL NEVER GO TO THE UNDERWORLD. It isn't possible. There are four places you could go; Heaven, i.e. Celestial Kingdom, where God lives; Terestial Kingdom, where those who were good but didn't follow God go, and the Telestial Kingdom, where murderers, thieves, rapists, etc. go. The forth is Outer Darkness, where Satan and those banished from the pre-existance are. In the BoM it says that there are about five people in the history of mankind on Earth that will go there. Because we chose to follow God's plan and come to Earth, we are almost guarenteed eternal life in a Kingdom. To go to Outer Darkness, you must have talked with God while on Earth, face to face as Moses did, and then you must rebel against him. If you were to talk with God, my guess is you wouldn't try and ruin him. In addition, there is another chance to follow God-- known as the Spirit World, it's were everyone goes after death to await the second coming. You get a chance there to repent and follow Christ. Those alive during the second coming get the millenium to repent and follow Christ. (We are told repentance in this fashon is harder, due to our lack of a body at that point. That is why we should be good now.)

Satan himself wasn't created by humans. I'm not sure where he got the name 'Satan', but Lucifer was created by God, as we all were. He (Lucifer) didn't want man to have free agency, so God sent Christ to Earth to represent Him instead of Lucifer, which made Lucifer mad... big war... 1/3rd the people God created were banished with Lucifer... Lucifer never got a physical body... Adam and Eve were placed on Earth, etc etc. Well, killing and eating every third child is surely disgusting, but only offensive in my mind if the (fictitious) group actually plans to carry it out. Well, ok, so even thinks about carrying it out. Ok ok, so it's just generally offensive... As for the 'knowing' thing, I do know. I'm one of four Mormons in my school, so not even close to everybody around me believes as I do. I was taught this way, but have since gained my own testimony. Yeah, that's hard to explain, how you get a testimony. Suffice it to say, there is no doubt in my mind. I have questioned my beliefs before with rational thought and always found them to be correct. There are two ways to get 'proof'. One, die and find out. In the event that isn't very appealing, then gain a testimony. Since that tends to be a long and involved process, try some minor hints that won't prove, but will suggest some kind of God and such to exist. First, I find it unlikely that under Darwin's theory sensory organs and complex tissues could have ever developed. The number of mutations necessary to evolve a working circulatory system or a brain would number in the millions, and until all of them have happened it wouldn't help the creature survive any better. As for Mormon beliefs, several top notch linguists have studied the Book of Mormon and found it couldn't have been written by Joseph Smith alone, too many different writing styles. Historians once believed Europeans brought the horse to the Americas, but the BoM mentions horses. Recently, new findings (a horse in a tar pit predating the Spanish by over a century --can't remember the exact years, sorry-- a child's doll closely resembling a horse, etc) have proven horses were, at some point, here before Europeans and somehow wiped out. There are other such scientific proofs, but none of them will completely prove the BoM, Mormon beliefs, or any other religion, to be true. Otherwise, we would all know and this wouldn't be a test, but more like a study period. (wow, this got REALLY long, didn't it?)

You guys are way off. Satan shouldn't be offensive to Christians, who are taught to love your enemy. Satan wasn't the most powerful angel, Christ was (Christ did overcome Satan and all his minions when on earth, sounds like he was more powerful to me. In addition, Satan, then Lucifer, lost the war in the pre-existance, proving he wasn't as powerful) Ent (and other people) you can't lump all Christians into the same group. Not all believe the same things. The are "Christians" because they beliefe in Christ, not because they all believe the same things. I know you can't be saved no matter what you do as long as you believe in Christ. As a Mormon, I know that you have to repent truely of your sins, and only Christ can tell who is truely repentant and who isn't, so don't try and judge. Killerlamb, you are the worst person to talk with about religion because you just insult everybody you can. I will ignore all your comments. No religion, no matter how different or "wrong" we might see it as being, should be deemed offensive. Although, the actions of many individual people and the teachings of some religions end up injuring/hurting/killing people, and those people/groups of people should be respected as people, but watched closely to insure they don't hurt/kill others. Satan became evil before humans had been created. He was not jealous of us. He is now, because we have physical bodies and he doesn't, which is one reason why he tries to bring us down. This has gotten really off topic, hasn't it?

When I said it doesn't load up, I meant it wouldn't load up correctly. If I recall, it loads up enough to allow you to register and not much else. As for the ads, get Ada-ware from lavasoft.de The simple scan method is free, and it gets rid of almost all installed ad programs... if you pay for the pro version, you get a Ad-watch, which prevents said programs from running. I've never tested it with XP's own particular brand of ads, but it should work. Also, try a google search on browsers and see about any free ones...

Looking for suggestions for our website. www.aloofhosting.com/n00bwarriors/ Please posr your votes for the backgrounds. Those that don't vote can't complain. Also need a good guild description from Sim and a group picture of the founding members (the first ten). A list of those members in the order they joined would be greatly appreciated. When should everybody log on for the picture?

For what it's worth, I agree with Thalos. Most of the heavy metal bands give me headaches or scare my nose hairs into hiding with bad lyrics. Some do both. Few do neither.

Alright, here is a place to discuss the failings of Windows XP. To get things rolling, I'll tell you what I KNOW TO BE TRUE about Win XP. I want responses to ONLY CONTAIN WHAT YOU KNOW, NOT WHAT YOU'VE HEARD ABOUT XP. Ok, the first thing: It's the most expensive operating system to date. (if there is one more expensive, please tell me, but I haven't seen it yet) Next: in order to use it, you have to register. Those who don't register within 24 hours of installing find their computer shuts down and won't load up. Once you have registered, changing any major part in you computer requires you to re-register. Otherwise, your computer shuts down and won't load up. This was intended to be a way to curve the increasing rate of piracy, but since anybody can copy XP onto a computer and simply say they got a new computer, the system doesn't work at all. End result: you have to ask Microsoft for permission to upgrade your computer, and piracy is just as bad so the next Windows will be just as expensive. Windows XP doesn't run DOS programs. Ok, some do work, and others you can get working with a lot of work, but XP will never run every DOS game I have wanted it to. I guess this isn't a failure for XP, since ME doesn't do well with DOS either, but XP is by far worse than any other Windows version. XP ships out with almost every computer you buy these days, making it hard to avoid for those who want to do so. Since XP is getting more and more users, virtually all viruses are written to work with XP or specifically for XP. This puts you at even more risk than ever before. Win XP likes to do things behind the user's back. Many programs operate in the background, sucking the juice out of your computer games. Some of these are hard to stop from running when you don't want them to. In addition, many functions are hidden, harder to access, more difficult to use, or simply nonexistant. Like the control panel, system files, and other things. These two things (background programs and hiding every thing that could potentially ruin your computer) were intended to prevent the ignorant or stupid computer user from damaging anything, but because there is no way to turn this 'off' and allow for easier access, it gets very old for those of us who can use Windows well and want to change it's settings on a day-to-day basis. When I say this I'm refering to the professional version, which is immensely better in this regard than the home version, but still worse than any other Windows before. (although I must admit, for the target audience of normal people who don't change their settings, it is good. It's the small and vocal minority that suffer here) Did you read the Windows user agreement carefully? By signing it you are giving permission for Microsoft to gather information about your computer. They agree to not get sensitive information (email addresses, passwords, credit card numbers, etc), and instead only get system settings "to better serve you". However, any Microsoft employee with half a brain and the right job description could legally go through your computer looking for things. If he found something interesting, he could go against Microsoft's agreement and steal it. Your firewall wouldn't be able to do anything because you installed the program he's using to access your computer, and unless a detailed investigation happened, nobody would know because it requires limited hacking ability and the employee was expected to have access anyway. Anybody else have any information/comments they'd like to share?

Might I mention that anyone with any brains should NOT be using XP? With the exception of Windows ME, XP has the most problems (Me has fewer problems actually, they just weren't intended problems, XP was purposfully meant to be difficult to use under certain circumstances) I would suggest ditching XP and going with Windows 2000, which is MUCH more stable. For those that got XP before realizing how bad it is (or got stuck with it some other way) and can't upgrade to 2000 (it is expensive), I suggest getting Linux, which is cheaper and better than Win 2000 in some ways. Then partition the hard drive into two parts, one for Linux and one for the stupid XP. Use Linux whenever possible, and use the XP for whatever doesn't run on your version of Linux. For a detailed discussion on the problems of Windows XP, look at my new post in the off topic area.

lol, you should check out the new Strong Bad emails. some of them are really good. You know, now that I think of it, I almost never look at the rest of the website, just the Strong Bad stuff... LONG LIVE THE CHEAT!!

Killerlamb, you insult me. You insult every Christian. As I've tried to argue, and you simply ignored my statements, I'll say nothing more then that I am not anti-Sematic, that I never have been, and that I've never tried to insult/hurt a Jewish person. In fact, I'm going to prom with one. Grum, God doesn't come up to each and every one of us and say, "Look at me! See, I do exist! Watch me lift this building in the air and smash Bill Gate's car with it, then watch me undo the damage so you know I'm God." If he did that, there would be no question in people's minds. There would be no doubt, and therefore no test. It'd be like my math teacher putting the formulas and answers on the board just before a test, just to prove that it is how we are supposed to do it. Toyminator, people didn't die from religion. People died because some fanatic went against the most basic law of the world: Don't kill other humans. They may have done this in the name of religion, but in reality most religions teach against killing others. Some do, but I won't get into that. Oh, and I don't remember Stalin killing out of religion, I remember Stalin killing because people opposed his rule and the communist government of the then Soviet Union. It isn't possible to prove one religion over another through any book, any arguement, or any theory or reasoning. The only way to know it's true is provided from the source: God Himself. Or if want, from the Holy Ghost who acts with God. I can't even really describe how it feels, it's like nothing else when the Holy Ghost tells you something is true or not true. Yes, I do believe I've felt it. I believe it with all my heart. Since I've posted most every basic concept in the Mormon beliefs, and the same arguements keep coming up, I think I'll have to get out of this as well. I'll still comment on anything directed to me or Mormons, but anybody who does listen has heard enough to think about my beliefs.

Anybody here been to www.homestarrunner.com ? And anybody like my avatar?

Killerlamb, that was not meant to be a slam. I meant exactly what I said: some people may have put their religion as Jedi as a joke. Just like somebody probably put Brittney Spears, or Backstreet Boys, or chocolate, or whatever. If somebody said he could pick up a car, would you believe him? Or would you say, "Yeah right, lets see it." If God is to have anyone believe he is all powerful, he must keep to the promises/covanents/things he says. He must also back it up when somebody (or a group of someones) directly goes against what he says. Otherwise, everyone would loose faith in Him. The popular image of God smiting isn't true... He doesn't sit in a chair and direct lighting bolts at people because they cussed or something. But he must remove/chasten/change those who He sees as people who will lead others away. And that last post by Killerlamb I find very offensive. :x Just so he knows.

You know Cicero, some of those people may have been pulling a practical joke... but I doubt 300,000 did. Somebody must believe in the force then.