This buys into the fallacious Great Man Theory of history.

Constantine didn’t make Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire; he ended government-sponsored persecution of Christians in 313, and while he himself was sincere in his conversion, most of the Patrician class remained Pagan, and even the Emperor can’t piss off powerful people too much. Christianity didn’t become the official religion until 380, under Emperor Theodosius. But it’s not like Theodosius forced Christianity on a Pagan populace; Christianity had been growing in the empire for centuries, initially mostly among the poor and slaves. Poor people and slaves have less ability to change things than the rich, but at some point they get big enough that actively opposing them leads to riots and destruction, and you don’t want that.

So Rome would have become Christian anyway, no matter who was emperor. Different people holding the office would have resulted in it happening a little differently, but the overall trend was towards Christianity replacing Paganism.

Christianity also didn’t result in the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Setting aside that the Roman Empire continued in the east for another millennium, the western part of the empire collapsed due to economic and political forces. It’s the same instability that allowed Julius Caesar to become dictator for life, 44 years before Jesus was even born. The empire was totally dysfunctional, so when a populist marched an army in and ordered the Patricians to elect him permanent dictator, they did what he said. But the systemic issues affecting the empire could only be held in check for so long, and eventually the western part came crumbling down.

But it’s also incorrect to assert that no new developments took place during the Middle Ages. Off the top of my head, that’s when lowercase letters and spaces between words were invented. Plough design also improved a lot during the Middle Ages, allowing more land to be cultivated more effectively.

And one last thing. You say “That shit set civilization back by centuries.” Why would the events in Rome have any bearing on the developments of civilisation in Ethiopia, Iran, Arabia, India, China, Cahokia, Mexico, or Peru?

Fold the First and Third Commandments together.

To bring to total up to Ten, add another one that says “Thou shalt not say to thy son, thou mayst not do this, for this is the duty of women, nor shalt thou say to thy daughter, thou shalt not do this, for this is the duty of men”.

It’s usually mediated by viruses. A virus infects an organism, picks up some host genetic material, and later jumps to a different host. At some point, the viral DNA is incorporated into the host genome and stays there, bringing the DNA from the previous host with it. This is how mammals got placentas. About 8% of the human genome is made of viruses that got stuck there

My country recently changed it from “only if the mother’s life is in danger” to “any time in the first three months; after that, the mother’s life must be in danger”.

Maybe I’m just terminally online, and most people have more detailed opinions than one normally sees on social media.

I think part of the reason they come across as mediocre to modern ears is that they were so influential, basically every rock and pop singer copied them. As such, they can easily come across as generic nowadays.

So if I build a house I own the walls and ceiling, but not the ground floor?

Human life begins at some point after conception but before birth. Therefore, there comes a point in pregnancy at which abortion ends a human life.

Mango works surprisingly well.

It’s still early days, and kbin and Lemmy are experiencing a massive influx of Reddit users.

I would compare it to Mastodon just after Elon Musk took over Twitter. Giant influx, and for a few weeks it was full of people talking about Twitter. But then they got that out of their system and started talking about other stuff, and now Twitter only comes up if Musk does something really, really, really stupid.

I expect Lemmy and kbin will follow a similar trajectory. There will be a period when it’s all Reddit sucking all the time, but people will soon enough start using them to share news and links.