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Posted

In the book I read, it said that each time a region was conquered, the conquering state would use various methods to control/make allies of the local population.  The Ottomans basically had either a "baby tax" where 1 in 10 infants born in the town were given over to the state (often castrated- they became administrators; the civil service was populated with eunuchs under the assumption that men with no chance to pass on a legacy to their own children would not overthrow the government), or, the town could declare as Muslim and no baby tax but they'd have to stand up a militia that would be responsible for protecting their territory, under command of the sultan.  The Ottomans didn't really care which they chose, but many towns chose to convert to Islam.  The Christian conquerors would also encourage towns to convert to their sect but were more likely to use force, coercion, even torture.


(disclaimer:  I read this book over 10 years ago so my memory of this might be a bit off)

Posted

Uhhmmmm.

In my quest to understand why in general, I’ve been focusing on ego. It’s a funny thing to me because I’m sure it evolves as a survival technique. Makes perfect sense when you look at “you kill me” vs “I kill you”, but it seems that an advanced race wouldn’t have the room for ego. It’s fine for the bugs and the critters, the biblical “meek”. We all have ego though. What service does it provide for society? I’ve been super aware of it since my parents died. I find comfort, somehow, realizing that what you see of me is nothing more than the reflection of light off of me. I’m more than what you see, and what I see. Logic then follows that you are more than what I see, and what you see. If I could set aside my ego and you could do the same, would we see even more of who/what we are?

I think so.

Posted

I may have or may not have been coughing when I convinced of my idea. My ego won’t let me say. I may have found a new moniker, though, when I have the time to switch.

Posted

Just placed my first order on Grub Hub. Exciting times we live in!

Out of curiosity I checked Grub Hub for my little area south of 5/20. A Mediterranean place, BK, India House, Six50 and Denny’s. I can get a big/greasy/hungover Denny’s breakfast delivered to the middle of nowhere?! Holy in !!
Posted

Out of curiosity I checked Grub Hub for my little area south of 5/20. A Mediterranean place, BK, India House, Six50 and Denny’s. I can get a big/greasy/hungover Denny’s breakfast delivered to the middle of nowhere?! Holy ######in ######!!

Thanks pretty amazing.

Posted

Thanks pretty amazing.

We were one of the first customers for Mendon Wok and they were glad to deliver down here when they were looking for customers. We are out of their radius now but we’re grandfathered in. They’re food is the best too.
Posted

Everybody knows that the world is full of stupid people, so meet me at the Mission at midnight, we'll divy up there.

 

Well, I've got the pistol, so I'll get the pesos. Yeah, that seems fair!

Posted

Everybody knows that the world is full of stupid people, so meet me at the Mission at midnight, we'll divy up there.

 

Well, I've got the pistol, so I'll get the pesos. Yeah, that seems fair!

I love that song.

Posted

As soon as I read it the song lodged itself deep in my head.  Spent an agonizing few minutes trying to come up with the name of the band.  Finally gave up and googled.  Never would have gotten it.  

Posted

Mardi Gras parade season down here in the Big Easy... I don't think my liver will ever be the same.

I dabbled last week, it was rough, and I hate to say it, but my 4 days down there were more than enough, and I'm only 33
Posted

Why can I see more land the higher I go up? Thought that occurred to me when watching a sniper in a movie and I wondered why the height gives him a vision advantage 

Posted

Why can I see more land the higher I go up? Thought that occurred to me when watching a sniper in a movie and I wondered why the height gives him a vision advantage 

 

There's an interesting place over in Amish Country that looks like Nebraska. When I'm there, all I can see in any direction is flat fields. I'm pretty sure it's actually a very shallow bowl, as the area around that is pretty hilly. Because I'm at ground level I can't see over the slight rise that surrounds me. If I were probably 10 or 20 feet up, I'd see over the rise and see the mountains, farms, and everything else around me.

 

If you're at ground level, anything more than 6 feet tall is going to block your sight line past that.

Posted

There's an interesting place over in Amish Country that looks like Nebraska. When I'm there, all I can see in any direction is flat fields. I'm pretty sure it's actually a very shallow bowl, as the area around that is pretty hilly. Because I'm at ground level I can't see over the slight rise that surrounds me. If I were probably 10 or 20 feet up, I'd see over the rise and see the mountains, farms, and everything else around me.

 

If you're at ground level, anything more than 6 feet tall is going to block your sight line past that.

Does the curvature of the earth affect this then? Higher up I am, the more over the curve I can see

Cringe worthy game of tic-tac-toe at a recent Blazers game...

Saw this, it was incredible 

Posted

Does the curvature of the earth affect this then? Higher up I am, the more over the curve I can see

Saw this, it was incredible 

 

I think at even sniper distances it's minimal.

http://dizzib.github.io/earth/curve-calc/index.html?d0=3&h0=6&unit=imperial

 

If that's accurate, standing at 4 miles (6 feet tall), you'd be able to see all but a person's boots. It goes downhill (figuratively and literally!) quickly though, at 5 miles you'd miss anything below the groin, and at 6 miles, you'd miss an entire 6 foot person entirely. I really think getting up high is about getting over ground clutter and hills.

Posted

My work computer died on the 2nd and it turned into this big fiasco, but I had known this might happen so I had all of my CAD files and important stuff backed up on our server and a flash drive. I was able to get the old computer running but it wasn't quite right so we bought me a new computer and everything is zen. But it finally set off alarm bells with the higher ups that maybe it was time we upgraded how we do things here at our company. One of my major points of emphasis is that my boss doesn't have his PC backed up anywhere and it is getting long in the tooth. If it dies we could lose a lot of inventor files and whatnot.

Today that has happened. And now I get to try to fix it.

None of this would be an issue if anyone here had bothered to heed my warnings for the last two years that we were living on borrowed time with the way we are doing IT and data management. 

 

:rolleyes:

Posted

I don't want to ever see you mentions someone's birthday in this thread again.  ;)

 

 

Seeing as my wife has creeky knees, stairs are not a desired feature in a house for us.

 

Well, Mr. Smarty Pants, I have never wished anyone a happy birthday in this thread.  Only in the awesome thread, or that other one that 11 created in some kind of rage against the machine.

 

And don't worry it seems that there has been a bit of re-programming and birth dates are not displayed anymore even if that bit of info is revealed.

 

+++++

 

On your second point.  I get it.  Ageing is wonderful, but it beats the alternative, so far anyway.

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