Marinus

I don't claim that God doesn't exist. The only claim I'll make about God is that I've absolutely no reason to believe that God exists.

tl;dr The burden of proof is the obligation for the party that makes a claim to support that claim with evidence. It's all very simple, and you don't need to write essays of thousands of words about it. Unless you're trying to create a smoke curtain, to hide the fact that the claim "God exists" has absolutely no evidence top back it up.

http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/7386/politicsh.png

N/A

Anyone with a basic understanding of European history knows that it isn't possible to form a stable nation from Germany and France, let alone from all the member states. Well, not in the near future anyway. If the USE were to be formed in the near future, the thing would last 2 days before it collapsed, no, exploded. Unless you impose it on the Europeans with brute violence there's no way that the United state of Europe will happen in the next decades. So the USE is not a realistic option to save the Euro, And I doubt the only other possible outcome is collapse. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a wizz in the fields of politics and economics, but I tend to mistrust simple solutions like the ones you offer. Politics and economics on a continental scale are far to chaotic and complex for that. Coupled with the fact that you come up with the United States of Europe, an idea that's cute but completely unrealistic, I'm not taking you to seriously if you don't mind. Your profile says you're Canadian. As I understand it there's tension between the French Canadians and the English Canadians. You really think a nation with dozens of languages and cultures would be viable?

I smoked for 17 years, and I'm still alive. This certainly proves that smoking isn't harmful.

And since the Euro is in acute trouble, this should be done on a very short term. I'm curious: do you really believe this is a possibility? Because any European can tell you it's not an option at all.

the USE sounds like something that could happen in the distant future, but I think this crisis is mainly due to ideological idiots who wanted to get there too soon. You can't artificially unite that what has been divided for centuries until recently, especially not during this crisis. And I really can't blame Germany (and any other economic sound country for that matter) for not wanting to be part of the same confederation as Greece and the other fail-nations in the south.

I'm sure he agrees only part of the Met is racist; the white part, of course.

Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein. -Friedriech Nietszche-

It has something to do with the Heisenberg Principle, I guess?

*YAWN*

By the time she started about the quran being a misunderstood beautiful book, I'd seen enough. The quran is not an easy read and it's confusing, and it is a lot more then a book about killing infidel, but I for one, am very capable of interpreting all the disturbing stuff that's in it. There's a lot of bigotry, intolerance and outright hate-mongering in the book. But it lacks 72 virgins.

Belgians are miles ahead of everyone when it comes to the practical jokes stuff. It is known. (Stole it too btw)

As long as it isn't black coffee of course....

But the riots weren't about racist coppers. It might have taken that seriously if they were targetted at the police, and I think some of the early protests were against racist police violence, but by the time your beloved freedom fighters were running Pakistanis (?) over with their cars, and kicking the retired to pulp it wasn't about that anymore.

No, there will always be lowlifes that need free flatscreen televisions so bad, that they'll use any excuse to get them.

In my experience people like wlsc are usually only happy when you humbly apologize for being white. I could be wrong, of course, but he/she seems like some one who rants a lot about The White Man.

Semi-on-topic It's even on the evening news here that the weather in the near future is going to suck for many of you. Which probably means it's really, really, really going to suck. So the best of luck to all concerned.

Winsor, I'm not very good at German, mainly because of the complex grammar, but I still studied it for 3 years in high-school. I'm pretty confident I still know how to construct a simple sentence in German. "pretty confident" isn't enough, of course, but as luck would have it, the special other lived in Germany for a couple of years, and to be even more precise in Berlin, Germany. He is almost fluent in German, and He confirms that "Ich bin ein Berliner" is in fact a correct way to say that one is a citizen of Berlin. What's even more, the pastry berliner is known under another name in Berlin, so the whole story is probably a hoax or an urban myth. And most people who speak a foreign language make embarrassing mistakes, not only US presidents.

Let's keep it at this: "Ich bin ein Berliner" is most on par with "Ich bin ein Hamburger" "Ich bin ein Berliner" is correct Deutsch, btw. "Ich bin Berliner" might be preferred, when referring to one's origins, but that doesn't make the first variant incorrect. I seriously doubt Germans will make a big deal out of it or will even notice it when you use the phrase "Ich bin ein Berliner". Even if it's an aesthetic issue, which I doubt btw, it would be a minor imperfection, which would be completely eclipsed by the fact that JFK addressed them in their own language. It wouldn't be seen as a sign of ignorance or stupidity. I think the Dutch language works exactly the same in this respect. "Ik ben een Hamburger" and "Ik ben Hamburger" are both correct ways to tell you're a citizen of the city Hamburg. While the phrase "Hamburger" has also another meaning, hardly anyone will associate you with a patty, and only the lamest people will make a joke about it.

"Berliner" can refer to a citizen of Berlin, Danish can't refer to a Citizen of Danmark. Beside "Danish" is short for "Danish X" in that context. This isn't exactly Grammatical Nazism but what is it. Ethymologic Nazism?

Don't worry, no one will ever know if you keep it a secret.

It's a false dilemma, nothing more. It's better to have a life that's full of what you like doing and it's better to have a long life. The two aren't mutually exclusive and so the statement doesn't make a lot of sense. It comes in handy as a statement when you fancy a life full of risky stuff, but on the wisdom scale this one doesn't score very well.

I'm familiar with "circular logic" and "ununseptium" and I'm not anywhere in the domain of the intellectual elite. The first term is part of basic logic, and the second word you learn during high-school physics.