Australis13

Sigh. Misleading headline - the suspected radiotrophic ability seems to already exist in the species (which was identified in the late 19th Century; it's not new, despite the article claiming it's a "strange black fungus") and several others, based on research with non-Chernobyl collections:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1866175/

I'm sure these idiots have no concept of the future. They want to burn everyone out in months to years for the sake of boosting their profits in the here and now. Doesn't matter that if you treat your workers well (and pay them well) you often get greater productivity over a longer period.

That's my point. I feel like they have been sitting on this for a while and didn't release it ages ago because it would be one more thing to reduce the odds of people shifting from 10 to 11.

Right, so they wait until just after Windows 10 reaches EOL to release the patch for this annoying bug. Typical. They've probably had the solution ready for ages.

That's quite possible, unfortunately...

I have several use cases, a big one being that it gives me an alternate storage medium for backing up home photos and videos. Obviously there's caveats on how long BD-Rs last (although M-discs should outlast me) and the issue of needing a player in future, but it gives me more peace of mind knowing that I can backup these sorts of things to different storage types (external hard drives are all well and good until they're corrupted by power issues or user error, or you want to keep a copy at a relative's place and it's a multi-hour trip... with optical media you can just keep adding discs to the offsite backup as needed and update the external HDD less frequently).

The other major use case I have has already been mentioned - backing up Blurays that I've bought (or, in the case of a few shows I like, being able to compare the DVD vs Bluray frame by frame).

Interesting to see that demand for optical drives is increasing, although apparently it's only in Japan: https://www.tomshardware.com/software/windows/optical-drive-demand-surges-amid-windows-10-retirement-japanese-users-switching-to-windows-11-are-buying-up-blu-ray-drives

Still, hopefully that means Bluray writers stay on the market for a bit longer.

I guess that depends on how you define those terms - being omnipotent wouldn't necessarily require the exercise of that power, whilst "all-loving" would depend on whether you consider allowing people free will and hence the ability to reject God to be loving or not.

Ah yes, the issue of predestination vs. free will in the Bible. There are definitely some that believe in predestination, or a deterministic/pre-determined outcome. Personally I don't think this is an accurate reading.

Some of the answers to the same question posed here - https://christianity.stackexchange.com/a/77861 - I think cover it well. https://reknew.org/2015/08/paul-teaches-free-will-not-determinism-romans-9-part-3/ also touches on why this passage is not suggesting God predestines some for salvation and some for damnation. Again, I think this comes back to the argument that the God of the Bible knows what people's choices will be and acts accordingly.

I'd suggest it depends on whether one assumes we have free will or not.

My understanding of the Bible is that humanity has free will and so there are lots of things that happen that technically aren't God's will or plan (e.g. John 3:16 is pretty well known as mentioning God not wanting anyone to perish but for everyone to have eternal life, but then there's also the Great White Throne Judgement in Revelation where there are definitely some who are cast into the Lake of Fire - the second death). There's a good argument to be made as well for the prophetic parts of the Bible not being "God's will" but simply the result of Him being outside time and space and hence knowing what the result of humanity's free will will be.

So no, I don't think the Antichrist is part of God's plan per se; rather, God knows there will be an Antichrist and that's given as a warning so people 1) aren't deceived by him and 2) know that God can handle him (in Revelation it ends badly for the Antichrist).

Oh, I definitely agree. We need better privacy and data protection laws here in Australia too. In the meantime, however, I do what I can to minimise my footprint. I'm well aware that other people are going to be the weak link!

I remember reading that in Trump's first term.

It's even more unsettling now.