http://www.boingboing.net/2006/09/15/amazon_unbox_to_cust.html

I just posted a comment regarding evolution in a thread on Living Life Without a Pulse...
This sentence caught my eye: The reason why we have a pulse is because it's hard for evolution to result in turbines or continuously spinning things.

So I decided to make an intelligent reply - assuming that it would quickly get modded down due to the pro-evolution crowd that moderates on slashdot. To my surprise, it was modded up to +5 within a couple minutes.

What're you waiting for? Check it out!

Hmm...

Out of the last 4 comments I've posted to a story, all 4 were modded up to +5 within a few minutes. And 3 of them received -2 points each, anywhere from 4 - 24 hours later. In most cases, the infamous 'overrated' descriptor was used. Looks like I made someone mad! (doh!)

Comment 1
60% informative, 40% overrated

Comment 2
60% informative, 20% flamebait (??), 20% overrated

Comment 3 (the worse case!)
70% funny, 20% overrated, 10% redundant.
This one is the worse because, although the comment is corny, a lot of people do find it funny - so the modbombers keep modding it down, and the other slashdot readers keep modding it back up.
(FYI, funny does not increase your karma but overrated and redundant does decrease your karma)

But, last time I checked CmdrTaco's page, he was talking about his plans for revamping the moderation system.

Here's some 'cutting edge' research for you:

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/8271890.htm

This is the first time I've ever seen something as temporally 'instantaneous' (muscle strength) tied to something so slow that it has never actually been observed (macroevolution). It's really amazing to realize that these researchers are implying that as these chimpanzees were 'evolving,' the ones with a bigger brain were at an environmental disadvantage due to their brain being cramped by tight jaw muscles.

Science has reached a new low.

Why is it so popular to conclude that, despite overwhelming mathematical evidence to the contrary, creatures that have similarities must have evolved from each other rather than concluding that the same intelligent being created them?

I call it a humanistic worldview... God created us all with two built-in witnesses that He is real: The perfect creation & our conscience. (Book of Romans). People who choose to reject God must view their world such that there are no massive conflicts in their conscience. I believe that this action - intelligent people accepting ludicrous theories in place of more scientifically reasonable ones - is the strongest evidence for an intelligent Creator.

I decided to write a letter to the editor @ Washington Post this evening.
Here's the article...

I read your article titled "Gibson's Blood Libel" this evening and it left me with two questions.

1. You state that other peoples' opinions of "The Passion of Christ" are important because the story involves other people. Now, if you believe in the infallability of the Bible, you will believe the story is truthful and accurate. (In that case, you likely wouldn't have a problem with this movie.) However, if you don't believe the Bible is 100% accurate, then you should find similar problems with "Schindler's List" inciting anti-Germanism (http://www.germanic.org/antipg00.htm) or "Braveheart" inciting anti-Britishism. Except you would actually have a much more resonable problem in criticising the previous two movies; In "The Passion of Christ," it is a Jewish man that was brutally executed - and there were many Jewish people that were against his death!

2. Omission is NOT the same as denial. The gospel of Luke omitting Jesus' scourging neither infers nor implies that it did not happen! Why do you suggest that Gibson should leave this section out? The book of Isaiah (Which was written several hundred years before Jesus' birth and deemed 100% accurate after finding a nearly complete copy in the dead sea scrolls during the early 20th century) says that Jesus was "wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities; The chastisment for our peace was upon Him & by His stripes, we are healed." Why would Gibson leave out the part of the story that shows how our iniquity (i.e., that sinful 'nature' of man that causes a two year old to know the word "mine" without teaching him/her) was atoned for or how we can be certain that Jesus has in fact healed us?

Here's the deal:
Just change your "HighLight Color" to 0 102 102 (hex: 006666) & you'll think of Slashdot everytime you select something. (depending on your GUI, even desktop icons get that "Slashdot Tinge(tm)" to them)

In Windows, using regedit, go to HKCU\Control Panel\Colors\ and change "Hilight" to "0 102 102"

In MacOSX, go to Control Panel -> Colors and change "Highlight" to "0 102 102" or "006666" *

In Linux... heh, depends on your GUI.
Sawfish 2: change bg[SELECTED] to 006666 **

* Untested
** Good luck!

If you're using Windows, an easy way to make this change (without a way to easily undo it) is open notepad, cut & paste:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Colors]
"Hilight"="0 102 102"
"HilightText"="235 235 255"


Then go File -> Save as... -> select 'All File Types' -> Call it foo.reg & save on your desktop. Double-click to add to your registry.
To undo, go to your Control Panel -> Display -> Appearance & change to a different color theme (WinXP - Change your theme)
The HilightText of 235 235 235 is a little grayer than the font color on Slashdot, but on my desktop, it looks better.

Enjoy & don't sue me if the RIAA comes after you for changing colors on your desktop :-)

There are a LOT of Slashdot readers that seem to be obsessed with their karma. Just look at the FAQ & how many A's are devoted to karma Q's! Browse through a recent article & you'll likely find someone who claims they were the original karma-in-signature poster. Bah.

HOWEVER, despite people being obsessed with something as pointless as karma on a tech website, it does seem to do it's job... very well. I generally read /. comments at +1 & I rarely run into trolls or offensive posters. That's the point, right? Keep the average Joe reader from having to sort through garbage. In 5 minutes or less I can generally skim through all the 'gems' in the comment section & gain a lot of insight on the posted article.

Of course, the whole reason I decided to post this is that my karma just became excellent ;-) This means that my comments are generally informative to people - so now I get a +2 bonus & my comments will be noticed by more people. I hope others gain some insight when I make useful posts - And while I don't attempt to openly evangelize in my comments, I do try to post with the character that Jesus has given me by His sacrifice. I believe that being myself (a person who has been transformed not by himself, but 100% by the grace of Jesus) WILL make a difference, even on Slashdot!

Karma & Moderation (Score:5, Informative)
by Slashdot (1) on Wednesday, April 12, 2000, @1:30PM

nt=no text (Ahh, the good old Blizzard discussion forum days...)

Curious...

Theorem 1: HP (or some other company) will continually design & manufacture new, faster, more efficient & 'cooler' PDA's

Theorem 2: PocketPC > PalmOS; While consumers are the intended beneficiary of T1 & PocketPC is less than 10% of the principal cost of a new HP 'iPAQ,' ultimately, it is inevitable that Microsoft will end up profiting from T1 the most.

But what can one man do? I really have only one choice! Replace my 'outdated' h5455 with an h5555 iPAQ...

-Caleb