GM

Chris Austin

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: I am lucky I swallowed the gulp of water I had just taken right before reading your post.

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell

Chris Austin

Oakman wrote:

I have great respect for the boyos over at Eve, but no desire to play the game.

I've enjoyed the game the times I've played it but not enough to hang around for more than a month. The times I have had the chance to chat with some of the team members they are very friendly and really enthusiastic about their work. They gave a really good talk at this years pycon here[^] and here[^].

Oakman wrote:

I prefer the kind of combat algorithms that Civ 4 employs which deal in probabilities, not absolutes.

Another game that has stolen nights from me. My wife pretty much forced me to remove it from my game machine.

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell

Oakman

Chris Austin wrote:

My wife pretty much forced me to remove it from my game machine.

Just one more turn, honey. Then I'll come to bed. . .

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin

Lost User

Christian Graus wrote:

Too bad, I was always a Holden man, although I see more Fords on the road, and drive all Toyotas nowadays.

Have no fear, Kev will save us!!!!

Christian Graus

Yeah, I feel much better now....

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. "I am new to programming world. I have been learning c# for about past four weeks. I am quite acquainted with the fundamentals of c#. Now I have to work on a project which converts given flat files to XML using the XML serialization method" - SK64 ( but the forums have stuff like this posted every day )

Ilion

That was so lame X| , and so automatic :zzz: ... and, naturally, pretty much what one has learned to expect.

Christian Graus

Wow - the approval of people who I respect, and the disapproval of the person who I don't. That's what I call a 100% success rate.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. "I am new to programming world. I have been learning c# for about past four weeks. I am quite acquainted with the fundamentals of c#. Now I have to work on a project which converts given flat files to XML using the XML serialization method" - SK64 ( but the forums have stuff like this posted every day )

Rob Graham

Since you like them, here's one for you: :thumbsdown:

Chris Austin

:thumbsup:

Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell

Oakman

Christian Graus wrote:

That's what I call a 100% success rate.

:thumbsup::thumbsup:

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin

Oakman

:thumbsup::thumbsup:

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin

Brady Kelly

Oakman wrote:

I think you're confusing morality with religio

Ilion's opinion of our nature, and implicitly of his own, precludes morality without religion.

Brady Kelly

Oakman wrote:

Say what? The rule of law has as its result, the right to break contracts with impugnity? What are you smoking today? I think he means a society committed the letter of the law is bound to become a slave to loopholes.

Oakman

Brady Kelly wrote:

I think he means a society committed the letter of the law is bound to become a slave to loopholes

Perhaps. And perhaps he is right - but a society committed to the rule of men is nothing but loopholes. Certainly, if the king can forgive this debt and double that one with a wave of his scepter, we are even worse off than we are now. (It might be argued that Obama is trying to get that power written into law.) The problem with any democracy appears to be that sooner or later the sheeple decide to vote themselves benefits. Businesses decide that it would be really nice to be able to hide behind a law that says they don't have to pay what they owe or deliver what they have contracted for. Not surprisingly, the people who are affected by that law want the same advantage in their financial dealings. It appears now that GM will be able to break its union contracts and its agreements with its franchisers - some of whom having spent millions building up their role as middleman and emerge with no real scars and a fat reward paid from the taxes of the same people who they just screwed to the wall. Senior management will point out that they are sharing in everyone's pain because they have cut their multi-million dollars salaries by 1/3rd, and jet off the the Keys for vacation. Back in the day, they would have gone to jail.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin

Rob Graham

Oakman wrote:

Certainly, if the king can forgive this debt and double that one with a wave of his scepter, we are even worse off than we are now.

But he is wrong to suggest that religion provides a meaningful alternative. There is no difference between the king forgiving debt and the high priest doing so. There is a significant christian sect in my area founded on the premise that "God wants you to be rich". Proof that a fast talking preacher can craft any interpretation required out of the scriptures, making them hardly of any value as a moral standard. Kant provided better, if still flawed, basis with his concept of a categorical imperative. As soon as a society starts to permit the breaking of contracts for the short-term benefit of one party, contracts become worthless, and business descends into survival of the fastest or stealthiest thief: the Bernie Madoff principle.

Oakman

Rob Graham wrote:

There is no difference between the king forgiving debt and the high priest doing so.

The odds are always quite good that one of them is in the hip pocket of the other.

Rob Graham wrote:

There is a significant christian sect in my area founded on the premise that "God wants you to be rich".

When Christianity was the religion of the slaves, it promised pie in the sky, by and by. I guess that message doesn't resonate as well when you are able to eat out three nights a week.

Rob Graham wrote:

As soon as a society starts to permit the breaking of contracts for the short-term benefit of one party, contracts become worthless, and business descends into survival of the fastest or stealthiest thief: the Bernie Madoff principle.

And it really doesn't matter whether that society thinks it is a democracy, oligarchy, monarchy or theocracy. The Madoffs will be glad to wear whatever mask is required while they empty your safe.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin

fred_

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

Lost User

Oakman wrote:

only Chevy, Buick, and Cadillac are going to come out the other side.

Thats too bad... Buick deserves to die as well. ;)

Oakman

Mike Mullikin wrote:

Buick deserves to die as we

Apparently, it's an extremely popular car overseas.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin

Lost User

Oakman wrote:

Apparently, it's an extremely popular car overseas.

Really?! Where?