February 2008
Islamic Reformation? →
The Hadith is the second most sacred text in Islam after the Qur’an. It contains a collection of thousands of sayings reputed to come from the Prophet Muhammad; think low tech blog.
However the Turkish state has come to see the Hadith as having an often negative influence on a society it is in a hurry to modernise and also believes it obscures the original values of Islam.
So the...
Follow You Follow Me
Make you a deal Chris, follow me, I’ll follow you … opps music meme … didn’t Genesis write a song about that …
“I will follow you will you follow me All the days and nights that we know will be I will stay with you will you stay with me Just one single tear in each passing you”
Tumblr anthem? Damn this is going to be stuck in my head all day …...
Encyclopedia of Life →
Launched a few days ago, brought to its knees yesterday.
The Encyclopedia of Life website couldn’t keep up with the interest after it was launched on Tuesday, forcing it to revert to an earlier demo version of the site; my initial attempts at viewing were met either with time-out errors or text only pages.
The aim of the site is to have one page for each species of organism on Earth. The...
Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia →
Is the fear of the number 666.
Which is a really irrational fear, especially when you consider the actual Number of the Beast is 616.
No longer the Devil's Airline →
Lithuania’s main airline has just changed its shares listing number to get rid of three 6s at the end. Giving in to the Christian superstition that 666 is a cipher for the Antichrist; I think this gets mentioned in the drug fuelled stream of consciousness that makes up the book of Revelation in the Bible.
Just in case you think it’s just the Lithuanians who are superstitious,...
Al Qaeda looking to Friend you on Facebook? →
Canadian military chiefs have told soldiers not to post personal information on Facebook (good advice for everybody really) because it could prompt attacks from Al Qaeda!
They must hold very strong opinions about their favourite songs.
Life after heaven. →
British Bishop Thomas Wright, thinks there is life after heaven for Christians. He believes that at the end of time “God will literally remake our physical bodies and return us to a newly restored planet”.
I think he’s mixing up Philip Jose Farmer’s science fiction Riverworld series for the Bible.
Not that there isn’t a precedent for this, Scientologists have been...
Beware the Wrath of the Green God →
Gregor Stronach doesn’t hold out much hope for humanity as a whole evolving to the point where everyone actually accepts the truth of Evolution.
However, should this occur and all the standard religions go out the window he wonders where “will the masses turn for their inspiration to do good works? To whom will the masses listen when they need to be scared into submission, for fear...
Woman 'gives birth hanging from tree' →
A pregnant Papua New Guinea woman was hung from a tree by her neighbours after they accused her of sorcery.
The woman gave birth to her baby while struggling to free herself. The mother was able to break free and took her baby into hiding for 3 days before going to hospital. They are both reported to be doing well.
“But the question is should the school, should every organisation, change its...”
– Brett Webster, principal of Orminston College, defending his decision to not change the school’s uniform policy to accomodate student’s who ware turbans.
Turban ban. →
A private school in Queensland (a State of Australia, lots of monarchists live there) is being sued by a Sikh family who allege that the school discriminated against their son and religion. The point of contention seems to be the son’s wearing of a turban, which doesn’t fit into the school’s uniform policy. The principal claims that they offered the child a place at the...
How good intentions can run amok →
Ryde Council (Ryde is a suburb of Sydney, Australia) decided to put on a film night under the stars; so far so good.
As the movie they chose “The Queen” (lots of monarchists in Ryde); not a bad movie by all accounts.
The council decided to be inclusive and wanted subtitles on the movie so that the deaf and hard of hearing could also enjoy the night; even better.
But then...
Changes ... →
Richard Dawkins and others have likened theism as a virus which parents hand down to their children. The implication being that most people will adopt the religion (or non-religion) of their parents. Well a recent survey released from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public life seems to point to a change in this behaviour at least in the US. The survey claims that 44% of Americans have either...
$cientology kindergarten closed down →
German authorities have closed a kindergarten in Munich after discovering that it was run by the Church of Scientology.
In Germany Scientology is not considered a religion but as a money making venture and cult which exploits its members financially.
The reason given for closing the kindergarten was to safeguard the wellbeing of the children which the Munich city authorities believed...
Bush breaks new record! →
George W. Bush’s overall job approval rating has dropped to a new low, with only 19% of Americans approving of the way Bush is handling his job of president. Can he make it 10%?
Thanks to Rickstina for the link.
Tumblr tools
Seems I’m the last to know but here is a list of useful tumblr “tools” I’ve found via other people’s tumblr blogs:
topherchris has created a social network site, tumblrist, for tumblr users complete with forums, themes and resources.
asprettyasasong reblogged Tumblr Hacks’ article on the Tumblr Universe search tool. tumblr Universe is a search engine...
“In 1897, Indiana tried to pass a bill stating that pi is equal to 3.2, as...”
– This and hundreds of other amazing facts are available via the Random Fact Generator (via asprettyasasong originally posted by topherchris)
AR - At least they were a bit more accurate than the Bible, which seems to imply that Pi is only 3; 1 Kings 7:24, 1 Chronicles 4:3
UPDATE:
You can find...
Worried about Global Warming? Help is at hand! →
Flood Maps can help you plan for a warm global future!
You can enter in an expected sea level rise and Flood Maps will overly a Google map with a new shore line. You can find out if you need to move or, if your an investor, where the next sea front property will be located.
All this and it’s free!
Big Bang vs Big Clash →
Physicist Neil Turok is not so sure the Big Bang model is correct and has come up with a different model and some scientists are taking him seriously.
Turok’s model is based on string theory (m-theory to be more specific). In his model there is not a singularity (Big Bang) from which space and time were created. Instead his model is based on the collision and separation of objects...
Flight of the world's first biofuel jumbo jet →
Virgin Atlantic has carried out the world’s first flight of a a commercial aircraft powered by biofuel. The flight from London to Amsterdam wad partially fuelled with a biofuel mixture of coconut and babassu oil. Virgin claims that the use of such fuel will produce less CO2 than regular jet fuel. However many scientists are questioning the environmental benefits of biofuels, especially...
Visiting Muslim students want uni classes to fit... →
International Muslim students, predominately from Saudi Arabia, have asked a number of Australian universities to reschedule lectures to fit in with prayer timetables and to establish separate male and female eating and recreational areas. At least one institution has rejected their demands on the grounds that the university is secular and it does not want to set a precedent for requests ...
“Seventy-five percent of Americans are God-fearing Christians; 75 percent of...”
– Ricky Gervais, “My Argument With God
Muslims to boycott Crisps/Chips →
British Muslims are being warned not to eat Walkers snacks after it was revealled that the snacks contain traces of alcohol. And of course taking alcohol is against their relgion ( or is it ).
A very small amount of alcohol is used in the production process to release the flavour of some chips.
Wonder if they still use pig fat to fry the crisps in?
Give the gift of life. →
One thing atheists and theists agree upon is that when your dead you have no need for your body. So you’d think that most people would readily agree to donate their organs after death, but this doesn’t seem to be the case.
While Australia has the highest rate of recycling waste in the world, we have one of the lowest rates of organ recycling in the world. It appears that Aussies...
Facebook 'joke' ends in jail →
A Moroccan court handed down a 3-year jail sentence to a man who registered a false Facebook profile for King Mohammed VI’s brother. The judge and prosecutor repeatedly reproached the accused for undermining “the sacred integrity of the realm as represented by the prince.”
At least the British Royal family can take a joke … or was it that they are a joke…
WatchJon Stewart gets to know The Huckster, who while a man of Faith is tired of people asking him God questions.
A forgive a day keeps the doctor away. →
“Many researchers think forgiveness - a virtue embraced by almost every religious tradition as a balm for the soul - may be medicine for the body. They have shown that “forgiveness interventions” - often just a couple of short sessions in which the wounded are guided towards positive feelings for an offender - can improve cardiovascular function, diminish chronic pain, relieve...
Would the real Jesus please stand up. →
Deepak Chopra muses on three different Jesus and wonders which one is relevant to today.
Despite his claims of a historic Jesus things are not so clear cut. There is in fact no historic record of a Jesus as described in the Bible. There are records of various Messiah type characters in around the period, and a number or scholars consider the Jesus in the Bible to be an amalgam of their...
Catholics fight to keep ill gotten gains. →
A recent Australian government study showed that private (read religious) Australian schools were being over paid according to the federal funding system based on the socio-economic status of regions where the students’ families lived.
Anglican schools have said that they are opposed to funding above the entitlements under the formula; ie they are happy to get less money. However the...
Out of Africa. →
US scientists using DNA techniques have developed the most detailed maps of our evolutionary past. Their findings were published this week in two scientific papers in the British journal of Nature.
One paper reveals that human genetic diversity decreases the further one gets from Africa, the cradle of humanity. It is also now clear that Europeans suffered a “genetic bottleneck”,...
Scientology is just not a religion. →
Despite protests against the Church of Scientology by a group know as Anonymous no civil rights group has stood up to defend the Church, why?
Well it would appear that most people don’t consider the “Chruch a church”.
A Missing Link Found →
An international team of scientists have found one of evolution’s missing links in the very body of water I look down upon from my office window; Sydney Harbour.
It’s a single-celled creature and is a type of brown algae but DNA analysis has revealed that it’s closest relatives include cryptosporidum, a parasite that can be found in water ways, and plasmodium, the cause of...
It's not only the kids who are obese. →
It now appears that our galaxy, the Milky Way, has being stacking it on too! Australian astronomers have found that the Milky Way is actually twice as thick as previously thought; 12,000, not 6,000 light years thick.
1 light year is roughly 5,878,499,810,000 miles or around 9,460,528,400,000 km.
“There is no evidence that God created the universe. There is no evidence that...”
– Paula Kirby, from her article Fleabytes; A review of 4 books written in response to The God Delusion
Why do some believe in god? →
Researchers at the University of Oxford have started an investigation into why some people believe in a god. The purpose of the $4 million dollar (AUD) study is it to try and find out whether belief in a deity is a matter of nature or nurture.
Justin Barrett, a psychologist, said: “We are interested in exploring exactly in what sense belief in God is natural. We think there is more on the...
Sheik told suspect murder is OK. →
An alleged terrorist suspect was told by his religious leader that it would be OK to kill the then Australian PM, John Howard and his family. This was seen as payback for the former PM’s policies (Australian involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq) that had resulted in the deaths of innocent Muslim families.
When is interest, not interest? When it's a rent... →
Bonds are a cornerstone debt instrument in financial markets. Essentially the issuer guarantees the holder of the bond an income stream at a fixed interest rate for the life of the bond. When the bond matures the owner of the bond gets back the money they paid for the bond. Essentially we are talking about a loan with interest payments that can be traded on an open market.
Now Islamic...
